USA > Maryland > Dorchester County > History of Dorchester County, Maryland > Part 17
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I have the Honor to be Sir yr very h'ble Serv't HENRY HOOPER.
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SELECT MILITIA
UPPER BATTALION-SELECT MILITIA. Anno 1781. Bartholomew Ennalls, Jr., Captain, James McCollister, Lieutenant,
John Miles, Ensign,
John Hooper (of John),
Isaac Williams,
Thomas Canady,
Joseph Trippe,
Thomas Ball,
Luke Williams,
William Smith,
James Paul,
Hooper Hurst,
Philemon Dickinson,
Henry Travers,
Mathew Williams,
George Robinson,
Andrew McCollister,
William Phillips, Jun.
Richard Covey,
Edward Riggin,
Henry Windows,
Edward Jones,
Samuel Higgins,
Thomas Arnett,
Thomas Keys,
William Dingle,
Willis Scottoe,
Thomas Slaughter,
Peter Cook,
John Sears,
George Turner,
Robert Ingram,
Samuel Shareman,
Hezekiah james,
Nehemiah Hubbert,
Joseph Croneen.
John Dean, Jun.
Beacham Harper,
Charles Dickinson,
Littleton Waller,
Levin Thomas,
John Elliott, Jun.
Jeremiah Neach,
Benjamine Shaw,
Wallace Crawford,
Absalom Harding,
Thomas Delehay,
James Hicks,
William Robinson, James Withgott,
Thomas Hamilton.
LOWER BATTALION-SELECT MILITIA. Anno 1781. Charles Staplefort, Captain, Richard Tubman, Jr., Lieutenant. Charles Stewart, Ensign, Edward Woolen of John, Benjamine Valient or Nalient, James Gadd,
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HISTORY OF DORCHESTER COUNTY
LOWER BATTALION-Continued.
Philemon LeCompte of Wm. Nathan Staplefort,
Thomas Earle,
Edmund Colson,
Thomas Abbott,
Thomas James,
Benjamine Stevens,
Elie Lane,
John Byrn,
John Busick,
John Eccleston,
Edward Broadus,
Joseph Scott,
William Phillips,
William Matkin,
John Colson of Thomas,
Philip Tall,
Elijah Pritchett,
Charles Thomas,
Henry Brannock,
Aaron Wallace,
James Busick,
James Johnson,
Granthorn Earle,
Ezekiel Keene, Jr.
William Christopher,
Ayres Busick,
Robert Meekins,
Thomas Cook, of Baln.
David Mills,
John Barney,
Reubin Ross,
Robert Ramsey,
John Warren,
Nehemiah Beckwith,
William Navey,
William Ross of Thos.
Standley Byus,
John Sharpless,
John Marshall,
Richard Pattison, Jr.
John Childerstone,
James Travers, Jr.
William Soward,
Philemon Simmons.
HORSES SUPPLIED THE ARMY FROM DOR- CHESTER COUNTY.
In Council, Annapolis, 29, Septr. 1781.
Sir:
We request you to send all the horses you have collected and not delivered, immediately to this place and have them delivered to John Bullen, Esq. You will give particular direction to have the horses well taken care of on the road. We are Sir yr. ob't Servt. THOS. H. LEE.
To Doctor Wm. Hooper,
Collector of horses Dorset County.
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CLOSING YEAR OF THE REVOLUTION
CLOSING YEAR OF THE REVOLUTION.
In the campaign of 1781, Maryland was taxed to the utmost for all resources needful in war to confront the invad- ing foe and sustain the Continental Army in its movements against Lord Cornwallis. Dorchester County, well supplied with grain and live stock to feed the army, and sail vessels for its transportation, made heroic sacrifices in the line of duty to assist in winning the final victory at Yorktown, that brought the War for Independence to a successful close.
FLOTILLA OF BARGES RENDEZVOUSED AT CHURCH CREEK, MD., BY ORDER OF EASTERN SHORE COMMITTEE.
In Special Council, Talbot Court house, October 4, 1781.
Ordered that Commodore Grason do cary or cause to be carried the barges "Revenge," "Terrible," and "Intrepid" to Church Creek, and deliver them together with their oars, Sails, Rigging and everything belonging to them with an inventory thereof, to Mr. Robert Richardson, there, who is requested to receive and take particular care of everything put into his hands, for which he shall be allowed a reasonable account.
Why were the armed barges laid up before the surrender of Cornwallis' army and fleet of British vessels at Yorktown?
Had prophecy foretold the Council of Safety what the results at Yorktown would be?
Country Products and Resources. CHAPTER XXVIII.
TOBACCO-STATE OF TRADE-LUMBER-SHIPBUILDING-FARMING-INCREASED FACILITIES - MANUFACTURING - OYSTERING - FISHING - TERRAPINS- WILD FOWLS-FUR TRADE.
The first crop cultivated for sale by the early settlers in Dorchester County was tobacco. It was at first raised in small quantities and until ports of entry were established on the Eastern Shore, was carried to Patuxent, there to be exported mostly to England. It was the chief medium of exchange for merchandise, for the use of the colonists in the county. Larger crops were annually raised for sale or export up to the beginning of the Revolution of 1776, and brought wealth and luxury for those days to the planters. But when the war came and trade with England was suspended, this paying crop was abandoned for corn, wheat, rye and live stock for home consumption and army supplies. These sta- ple crops were thereafter grown until the close of the Civil War in 1865, when changed conditions in agriculture largely retired grain crops on the Eastern Shore for others appar- ently more profitable.
Most branches of business in the county have greatly in- creased, some two and threefold, within the last fifty years. Only a few industries have declined and in most cases have been supplanted by others more profitable. Business enter- prise has increased in more rapid proportion than the popula- tion, at present about 28,000, a fact which speaks well of the perseverance and active energy displayed by the inhabitants.
Lumbering and shipbuilding, so extensively carried on for more than 150 years is an industry of the county that has suffered the greatest decline. Vast tracts of oak and pine
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FARMING
timber, once so plentiful and cheap, are now almost ex- hausted. As early as 1735, vessel building was active on both the Choptank and Nanticoke Rivers. To name some of the vessels and owners who built that year may not be a thrilling event, but a historical fact, nevertheless. (See record of vessels, Md. Archives): "Register granted to William Ed- mondson, of Maryland, merchant, being of the people called Quakers, for the Schooner 'Charming Betty' of Maryland, John Coward, Master; square sterned vessel, Burthen ab't thirty Tons, built at Choptank River, in the year 1735, by Henry Trippe, John Anderson, and the said William Ed- mondson owners thereof."
June 25, 1735, "Register granted in common form unto Adam Muir of Maryland, Merchant, for the Brigantine, 'Sea 'Nymph,' of Maryland, Law, Draper, Master, Burthen about fifty tons, square sterned, built in Dorchester County, in the year 1735, for the said Adam Muir, owner thereof."
October 22, 1739, a register was granted to "James Bill- ings. merchant, for the ship 'Rider,' about 80 tons, burthen built at Nanticoke River, in 1738. James Billings, Master and owner."
Since 1738 many Bay and seacoasting vessels have been built on all the navigable rivers within and bounding the county. and hundreds of cargoes of ship timber have been sent to Baltimore and Eastern cities of the United States for shipbuilding. A much greater bulk of building lumber for general purposes has been shipped out of the county. Forty years ago shipbuilding was a prosperous enterprise at Cam- bridge, Church Creek, Loomtown, Taylor's Island and on the Nanticoke and Northwest Fork Rivers. Now only at two places in the county are vessels extensively built- Brooks' Yard, near Madison, and Linthicum's, at Church Creek.
FARMING.
Farming has made favorable progress through the adop- tion of improved methods and the substitution of fruit and vegetable crops in the place of larger grain crops formerly
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HISTORY OF DORCHESTER COUNTY
raised. Changed conditions elsewhere, the rapid growth of large manufacturing and commercial cities in and near Mary- land, and the phenomenal production of very large grain crops in the "West," required a change in the farming sys- tem here, though large crops of wheat, corn, hay and live- stock, sheep, cattle, horses, hogs and poultry have been and still are extensively raised.
Wherever progressive energy leads to greater development that requires better facilities for successful advancement, genius skillfully invents methods to meet the exigencies.
The fine navigable rivers of Dorchester County, Nature's outlets for its products, were not sufficient to meet the farm- ing demands as larger areas of interior lands were improved and put under cultivation. hence two railroads have been built across the county, intersecting each other at right angles that offer greater facilities for rapid transit traffic, so that farmers have been induced to raise large crops of orchard and garden fruits and vegetables on thousands of acres, annually cultivated, that yield fair returns for the reward of labor.
A vast area of fertile but neglected land in the southern section of the county only awaits railroad advantages for active and paying development.
MANUFACTURING.
Manufacturing has always been and still is limited by the absence of good water-power and convenient coal supply. However, there are about twenty water-mills in active opera- tion for the manufacture of flour, meal, hominy and lumber, and fifteen steam mills for like uses in the county.
OYSTER, FISH AND CRAB INDUSTRY.
Next to agriculture, in importance for resourceful employ- ment and for the support of a large number of people living within and out of the county, is the oyster industry. Before 1830 the commercial value of oysters was very low, ranging from ten to twenty-five cents a bushel. No regular city mar-
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OYSTER PLANTING. NEAR CAMBRIDGE.
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THE OYSTER INDUSTRY
kets had then been established for buying, shucking and shipping them to distant points. In 1836, when C. S. Maltby began shucking oysters in Baltimore and shipping them by relays of wagon teams as far as Pittsburg, in Pennsylvania, oystering as a business was begun in Dorchester County. Oyster buyers in boats first came to Fishing Bay and other places in the county from Annamessick and established a market for tonged oysters. There was no law to regulate catching oysters then, which were caught and sold at any time and all seasons whenever in demand. The first buyer, with his vessel, from Dorchester County, was Capt. Levin Insley, who began the business in 1840. In a few years the trade became so profitable that oyster dredging was legalized in Somerset County. Soon thereafter the Somerset dredgers began to invade the water of Dorchester in fleets of boats and dredge where oysters were more plentiful than in their own county. To prevent this wholesale robbing of the oyster beds, the Legislature passed an Act authorizing the Sheriff and other officers of the county to arrest any non-resident dredgers found dredging within the limits of Dorchester County. To enforce this law it required the aid of private citizens, who were summoned and sometimes armed to assist in driving away these daring oystermen. During efforts made to capture some of them that they might be made to suffer the penalty of the law, they resisted so forcibly that firearms were used upon them, and occasionally some Somer- set dredger was shot. In these conflicts one or two persons from Deal's Island were killed. This warfare kept up a very bitter feeling in the Somerset people against Dorchester oystermen, which has never entirely subsided but has been at times revived by subsequent fights, in which some have been wounded and a man killed in later years.
In 1861 violations of the oyster law became so flagrant that the Sheriff of Dorchester County was obliged to forcibly em- ploy the Steamers "Pioneer" and "Cecil," at great cost, and also the Schooners "Taylor's Island" and "Past Grand," "Albert Thomas," and "Regulator," with Capt. James
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HISTORY OF DORCHESTER COUNTY
Langrall, all of which were armed and equipped to guard the great oyster beds in the county from invasion by dar- ing dredgers from Somerset County, Baltimore City, Phila- delphia and New Jersey.
In this period of local protection under county control, William Fallin, a civil officer in Straits, was a bold and fearless leader who probably did more effective work than any other man in the county towards protecting the oyster beds from ruinous depletion by desperate invaders.
After the State established police protection in 1870, first under command of Capt. Hunter Davidson and other suc- ceeding officers, several oystermen have been shot who resisted or fled from arrest. Owing to the conflicting inter- ests that originated from the different ways allowed for catch- ing oysters, the time when to be caught and where to be sold, the laws have been frequently changed for proposed im- provements but have failed to benefit people and State as desired, and it is still an undetermined and vexed question as to the best way to perpetuate and improve this valuable indus- try. And while there has been a great diversity of interests and dissensions among the different classes of oystermen in the county, and annual prosecutions for violations of the oys- ter laws for the past thirty years, yet there has been derived from license fees and fines a handsome revenue appropriated for public school uses, that has averaged about twenty per cent. of the county school fund annually, a grand aggregate of $100,000 at least since 1870 for public school education.
Crabbing is a summer business, in which oystermen and fishermen engage, catching hard and soft crabs with some profit. Most of the crabs are shipped alive to the city mar- kets. Canning crab meat has not been profitably and per- manently established in the county. Its future is more promising.
FISH.
In the county waters a variety of fish, millions in numbers, make either a permanent or temporary home for propagation and existence; they are principally caught during spring,
OX TEAM IN TOWN.
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TERRAPIN-WILD FOWL-FUR TRADE
summer and fall, in hauling and floating seines, hedge pounds, weirs, and with hook and line, the angler's sport, a practical privilege which every citizen has been freely allowed without restraint of law since the time when the first white man planted his home on the Eastern Shore.
The business of trap fishing, chiefly for the migratory species-shad, herring, trout and other kinds, is often profit- able and affords employment for hundreds of Dorchester cit- izens under regulations of law. The estimated value of fish, an uncultivated food product, fails to receive due considera- tion in point of value by consumers of such healthy and nutritious diet.
TERRAPIN.
The natural home of the diamond back terrapin in Chesa- peake Bay and tributaries includes the hundreds of salt water coves, creeks and inlets that indent the Bay and river coasts of Dorchester County. Where once they were so plentiful as to be neglected as a table delicacy, they are now so scarce that a terrapin supper is one of the most costly entertain- ments prepared to please epicurean tastes.
Terrapin catching as a business is chiefly confined to the oystering and fishing classes.
WILD FOWL.
Wary water birds of instant flight, migratory geese and ducks, that annually winter in Maryland waters, afford the finest shooting sport sought by gunners. No table luxuries surpass a feast on wild goose and canvasback duck.
FUR TRADE.
The fur-bearing animals in the county are of small species, chiefly the otter, mink, muskrat, opossum, rabbit, fox and raccoon. The muskrat skins trebly outnumber all the others combined that are taken by hunters and trappers. This
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HISTORY OF DORCHESTER COUNTY
traffic has been increasing for the last thirty years, subject, however, to the variable prices of fur annually set in Euro- pean markets. The number of skins annually sold in the county is surprising. The sales from the winter's catch end- ing in March, 1902, were about 80,000, averaging twenty cents apiece, amounting to over $15,000 for Dorchester fur dealers and trappers.
The shipment of muskrat meat and bull frogs to Baltimore market is no burlesque on the county's products and trade.
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War of 1812-1815. CHAPTER XXIX.
The military records of the State of Maryland of the War of 1812 were removed from the Adjutant General's office in Annapolis to the War Department at Washington during the administration of Governor Hicks, and are not now acces- sible for private citizens to collect historical data therefrom; therefore, the war history of local interest relating to Dor- chester County cannot be fully obtained.
In this war with Great Britain, tragic scenes were broad on land and sea, extending from Canada to Louisiana, and from one side of the Atlantic to the other.
The declaration of war was made by Congress, June 18, 1812, though not unanimously; six Maryland representatives voted for war and three against it. In the Maryland House of Delegates, resolutions opposing an offensive war were adopted by a vote of forty-one for and twenty-one against. In the Senate a majority favored prosecuting the war with much vigor.
While six thousand soldiers were Maryland's quota, twelve thousand volunteered. Without records for examination the volunteers from Dorchester County cannot be named.
Not until the spring of 1813, when the British blockaded Delaware and Chesapeake Bays and invaded the Chesa- peake from mouth to head with a great fleet of war ships and smaller armed vessels under Admiral Cockburn, did the people of Dorchester feel alarmed and realize the danger from such a large force of the enemy so strong and so near. While some towns and many farm houses along the Bay and tributaries were plundered and some burnt, Dorchester escaped serious ravages. Many people in the county who lived near the Bay and mouths of the rivers moved their
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HISTORY OF DORCHESTER COUNTY
live stock and personal property into the interior, and organ- ized themselves into squads of home guards for defence, and were ever ready to meet when called by the signal of alarm, which was firing a musket three times in close succession. Some time in August, 1814, a crew on a British barge entered Fox Creek, in Straits, landed and went to Gabriel McNa- mare's and took all of his meats and provisions from his smoke-house, one live hog, cut down some corn in his field and carried away one of his colored men, who, before he left, took his master's best hat and wore it away. One of the enemy's barges at another time went into Norman's Cove, and the crew burnt Capt. Timothy McNamare's vessel and went to Clement McNamara's, plundered his house and car- ried away his farm supply of provisions, and cut out and carried away a "piece" that was in the loom, partly woven.
In 1814 a British tender and crew, commanded by Lieut. Phipps, entered Little Choptank River; as they went up the river, they landed at some farm houses and took supplies of provisions. When near Tobacco Stick, they set on fire a schooner and then started to return down the river but ran ashore on a shoal at the mouth of Parson's Creek, where they were temporarily detained. In the meantime, the men in the neighborhood had been apprised of their arrival in the river and hastily organized under command of Capt. Joseph Stewart at Tobacco Stick, and started in pursuit of the enemy, put out the fire on the burning vessel, then went onward and attacked and captured the tender and her crew. The prisoners, Lieut. Phipps, crew of seventeen men and one colored woman, were taken to Tobacco Stick, kept there one night and the next day marched under guard to Cam- bridge, and from there sent to Easton. One small cannon and some small arms were captured on the barge. The old cannon was then named "Becca Phipps," after the first name of the colored woman prisoner and the last name of the Lieutenant in command. The old gun is still kept at Tay- lor's Island and Madison as a trophy of the naval battle and victory on the Little Choptank, fought and won by the county militia.
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REWARD FOR BRAVERY
In 1816 and 1817 Congress well recognized the bravery and patriotism of Capt. Stewart and his volunteers by passing the following act :
"An Act authorizing the Payment of a Sum of Money to Joseph Stewart and others."
Sec. I. "Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Rep- resentatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, That the Secretary of the Treasury be, and is hereby authorized and required to pay to Joseph Stewart and his associates of Dorchester County, in the State of Maryland, or to their legal representatives, the sum of one thousand eight hundred dollars, out of any money in the Treasury not otherwise appropriated, which money is paid to them for their gallantry and good conduct in capturing, during the late war, a tender belonging to the 'Dauntless.' British Ship of War, and taking eighteen prisoners, to wit: one lieutenant, one midshipman, thirteen seamen, and three marines, and as a compensation for the prisoners so taken."
Sec. 2. "And be it further enacted, That any claim which the United States may have to the said captured ves- sel and property shall be, and the same is hereby, released to the said captors."
After the passage of this Act many more claimants than fighters claimed a share of the appropriation. The men who came out of the bushes after the battle was over arrived too late to participate in the fight. Hence it became necessary for Congress to pass a second Act and designate who were justly entitled to share in the award.
The second Act, passed in 1817, states: "That the money authorized to be paid to Joseph Stewart and his associates of Dorchester County, in the State of Maryland, or to their legal representatives by an Act." approved in 1816, "shall be paid to the following persons, their legal representatives or agents, viz: The said Joseph Stewart, Moses Navy, John Bell, Moses Goeghegan, Mathias Travers, Samuel Travers, Henry K. Travers, Hicks North, Thomas Tolly, Joseph Cator, John Willoby, James Hooper, Hugh Roberts, John Tolly, Moses Simmons, Robert Travers, John Simmons,
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HISTORY OF DORCHESTER COUNTY
Edward Simmons, William Powers, William Geoghegan (of James), William Geoghegan (of Moses), Jeremiah Spicer, Travers Spicer, Jeremiah Travers, William Dove, Thomas Woolen, Samuel Edmonson, Henry Corder, Roger Tregoe, Thomas Arnold, Samuel Creighton, Jeremiah Creighton, Benjamin Keene, Thomas LeCompte, James LeCompte, Fountain LeCompte, Elijah Tall, Charles Woodland, Wil- liam Barnes, William M. Robinson, Joseph Saunders, and Daniel Wilson."
Wm. G. LeCompte was a soldier in this war.
BRITISH AT TOBACCO STICK.
In 1814 a British crew on a tender or barge from one of their war vessels went into the harbor at Tobacco Stick and burnt Capt. Thomas Linthicum's vessel and some other vessels nearby. They carried Capt. Linthicum away and kept him a prisoner about Kent or Poplar Islands for several months. After his release, then half clad and barefooted, an object of pity from great privation while held a prisoner, he walked most of the way to his home in Dorchester County.
The burning of these vessels and the capture of Capt. Linthicum at Tobacco Stick caused so much excitement there that the Home Guards constructed barracks on the lot near George Jones' wind mill at the upper end of the town and encamped there for weeks on constant guard antici- pating another attack from the British.
The ladies of the town and neighborhood were so patriotic they prepared the food and did the cooking for the militia while encamped there.
BRITISH THREATEN DORCHESTER, (From American and Commercial Daily Advertiser.)
August 5, 1812.
From the Merchants Coffee House Book.
By an open boat from Cambridge, which she left on Wed- nesday at 2 P. M., information is received of the light squadron of British being still off James' Point and mouth
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BRITISH THREATEN DORCHESTER
of Choptank River; on Tuesday they captured 7 sail of craft in Choptank River with a barge and 10 or 15 men (the brig in sight), 4 of which they burnt. They fired several shots at a vessel on the stocks, but did not land, 1 or 2 pieces of Artillery having been sent there from Cambridge. Two schooners, whose maneuvering has rendered them very suspicious, have been stretching from one to the other shore of the Bay for the last three days; one of them has been seen as high as Sandy Point. Last evening, they were hailed by some of the vessels bound down but gave no satisfactory answer. Ten or twelve vessels bound to Choptank put into Annapolis last evening, having spoke the vessels.
LATEST.
By another boat that left Choptank last night, we learn that the squadron got under way and stood down the Bay; late in the evening they were below James' Island. They took off a Mr. Jones, whose vessel had grounded in coming out of the Creek. He went on board for the purpose of having her restored, by ransom or otherwise, but they paid no attention to him, set her on fire and carried him off. The artillery from Cambridge did not reach the shore until they had sailed.
During the war many such losses occurred that financially ruined the owners of vessels and other property. Captain Evans, who lived on Sandy Island, at the mouth of Nanticoke River, started out one dark night on his vessel with a cargo for Baltimore. When in Hooper's Straits the wind ceased to blow, and while there becalmed a crew on a British barge came in. Just before they reached the vessel, Captain Evans and his crew started in their small boat for the shore to avoid capture, but soon to see his vessel on fire, which was entirely consumed.
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