USA > Maryland > Talbot County > History of Talbot county, Maryland, 1661-1861, Volume II > Part 38
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32 Maryland Gazette, May 17th and July 12th, 1845. Also Callister Manuscript letters.
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was customary, and at one period obligatory, for masters of vessels to advertise by posting the rates of freight to different ports, and the time and place of receiving it, and when this became compulsory by law, it was also required that a record should be made of the same in the office of the clerk of the county. It may not be amiss to state, as one of the customs of the time, for the captains publicly to invite their patrons and friends on board their ships, to partake of such entertainment as they could give. While waiting for tobacco or other freight in Choptank it was common for the ships, then unprotected by copper, to ascend that river into fresh water to escape the teredo, or boring worm, so destructive to vessels in the salt water. Dover thus became quite a rival of Oxford, and there Mr. Anthony Bacon had one of his principal factories. Very often vessels came from England in ballast, and so it has happened that at several points upon Choptank, and at Oxford may be found lumps of chalk which were used for this purpose, and being unsalable were thrown into the water, where they may be seen to this day.
The following extracts from the journal of Captain, afterwards known as Colonel Jeremiah Banning, will serve to show the extent of the foreign and domestic trade of Oxford at the period of its greatest pros- perity, and also the time when that trade, for some years diminishing, finally became extinct. It was hardly necessary to say that Col. Ban- ning was personally conversant with that of which he wrote.
The storekeepers and other retailers both on the western and the east- ern side of the Chesapeake, repaired there to lay in their supplies. Seven or eight large ships, at the same time were frequently seen at Oxford, delivering goods and completing their landing; nor was it uncommon to despatch a ship with 500 hogsheads of tobacco in twelve days after its arrival. At that time tobacco was not examined or inspected by sworn officers as now. Men skilled in the article were employed by the merchants or storekeepers and called Receivers, to view, weigh, mark and give receipts to the planters, after which vessels were sent to collect it, when it underwent a pressing and packing pre- paratory for shipping. After the death of Mr. Morris, commerce, splendor and all that animating and agreeable hurry of business at Oxford gradually declined to the commencement of the civil war which broke out in April, 1775, when it became totally deserted as to trade. In the autumn of that year was the last appearance of British ships or indeed of any other at that port. *
* Oxford's streets and strand were once covered by busy crowds, ushering in commerce from almost every quarter of the glove. Bereft of all former greatness, nothing remains to console her but the salubrious air and fine navigation which may anticipate better times.33
33 This extract is a portion of Col. Banning's journal, furnished to the writer by his granddaughter, Miss Mary E. Banning, now of Baltimore.
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It is hardly necessary to say that the "salubrious air and fine naviga- tion" remain, and have brought "better times."
Reference has been made to the importation of negro slaves at Oxford -a traffic which continued down to the time of the extinction of the town as a depot of foreign trade. In the official records there are several, but not numerous entries of slaves. In 1763, the Two Sisters, Capt. Jere. Banning, 160 tons measurement, manned with 20 men and carrying 6 guns, owned by Anthony Bacon, Gilbert Franklin and An- thony Richardson, of London, and built in Maryland, brought from Senegal 5 negro slaves. No other cargo is named. On the 3rd July, 1771, the sloop Success, John Kingham, Master, and owned by Richard Worge, of London, brought in 104 slaves from Senegal. In the next year the same vessel brought 86 slaves from Senegal, and the schooner Experiment, owned by James Dickinson and James Lloyd Chamberlaine, 5 slaves from Barbadoes. In the Maryland Gazette of July 8th, 1746, Mr. Robert Morris, with an assorted cargo of merchandise, just arrived, by the ship Cunliffe, Capt. Johnson, from Bardadoes, adver- tises for sale at Oxford "a parcel of negro men, women, boys and girls." It is not necessary to say to the well informed, especially after the mention of so many reputable men engaged in its prosecution, that no disrepute attached to the trade in African slaves.
But the ships trading with England also brought human freight, under the names of transported rebels, condemned convicts, and inden- tured servants. To such must be added respectable freemen seeking to advance their fortunes in a new country. In 1717 a portion of the cargo of the ship Friendship, from Belfast, consisting of eighty rebels who had been taken in arms during the Jacobite rebellion in 1715 at Preston and elsewhere in Scotland, was brought to Oxford and sold to masters, for a term of years, and among the purchasers were Messrs. Philemon Lloyd, John Oldman, Daniel Sherwood, Robert Grundy, John Valliant, William Elbert, Peter Anderton, Philemon Sherwood, James Colston, William Thomas, Thomas Robins, and perhaps others of this county.34 Again on the 20th July, 1747, the ship Johnston,
34 Scharf's Hist. Md., Vol. 1, p. 385, et seq.
Maryland Gazette, July 28th, 1747.
Maryland Gazette, Dec. 11, 1755. The Callister MS. letters, and the Records of Talbot County Court; also Scharf's Hist. Md., Vol. 1, p. 475, et seq. In the records of Talbot County court for March 6th, 1721, there is a most interesting account of the proceedings which were had upon a petition of some of these rebels, sold for a term of seven years, whom their masters were attempting to hold for a greater length of time.
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Capt. Will. Pemberton, arrived at Oxford, having on board a large number of Scotch rebels captured at Culloden and elsewhere during the rising in behalf of the young Pretender, Charles Edward, in 1745. Not finding a ready sale in this county a portion of this human cargo was sent to Annapolis. Another class of political exiles was that of the Acadians, a ship load, one of four that came to Maryland, of whom arrived at Oxford, Dec. 8th, 1755, and came under the care of Mr. Henry Callister, then acting as factor of Mr. Anthony Bacon, at that place. He and the Rev. Thomas Bacon, both Manx men, interested themselves most actively and earnestly in behalf of these unfortunate people. Contributions were solicited for their support, and applica- tion was made to the county authorities for assistance. They were distributed in the counties of Talbot, Queen Annes, and Dorchester. The transportation of criminal convicts continued uninterruptedly, notwithstanding the frequent protests of the colonists down to the Revolution, indeed the last ship that appeared in St. Michaels river landed her servants, fourteen of whom were convicts and two inden- tured, though not allowed to discharge the other portion of her cargo.35 Of indentured servants scarcely a ship arrived at Oxford from London or Liverpool, that did not bring a greater or less number. It should be stated here, as it has been in other connections, that nothing disreputable attached to persons securing their passage by their agreement to serve a stipulated time; though doubtless there were disreputable persons who did thus pay their way across the ocean, as there were others called respectable who had their passage paid for them by friends who were glad to be well rid of those who reflected no credit upon their families.
In the year 1683, after the passage of the Act for laying off the town of Oxford, the Commissioners and Justices of the Peace of this county authorized the establishment of a ferry at that town across Third Haven creek, and appointed Mr. Richard Royston as the Keeper, for which they allowed him the sum of 2500 pounds of tobacco.36 The ferry, then established, was maintained for many years, probably as long as the town possessed any trade, or to the period of the Revolution. It was then discontinued, and for a long series of years persons wishing
35 See contributions entitled "The Poor House" published in the Easton Star, Dec. 2, 1879.
36 The following is the entry in the Levy list of the year: "Richard Royston for one-half the allowance for keeping a ferry from his plantation to the towne of Oxford, and back againe, or on board any shipp nigh, there riding, for one year, 2500 pounds." .
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to cross to or from that town were dependent upon the courtesy and kindness of people living on either shore. For a while persons were licensed to keep ferry at Oxford, but were not paid from the county funds. They were compensated by those who used the ferry. But in the year 1836 the public ferry was revived, Mr. Morris Orem Colston was appointed the Keeper, and from that day to this it has been main- tained at the county expense. At the date of the original establish- ment of the Oxford Ferry there had long been a ferry over St. Michaels, or Miles river at or near the place where the bridge now in use was erected.
In the year 1695 a public post was established in the Province, one of the few stations of which upon the Eastern Shore being Williamstadt or Oxford. It was long after that a regular postoffice system was estab- lished by the home government.
From many entries in the Levy list of charges "for expenses in treat- ing with the Indians at Oxford," within the years 1689-91, it is apparent that about this time there was an assemblage at that town of the repre- sentatives of the Provincial Authorities and some of the chief men of the Indian tribes upon the Eastern Shore-probably the Choptanks, seated along the river of that name, or the more troublesome Nanticokes, living further down upon the peninsula. No reference to the treaty at Oxford has been found in any books of State history, but there can be little doubt of the fact.
In the year 1706 an act was passed by the General Assembly, entitled
An Act for dividing and regulating several counties on the Eastern Shore of the Province, and constituting a county by the name of Queen Anne's, within the said Province.
By this act the boundaries of Cecil, Kent and Talbot, as they are now were defined, and Queen Anne's county was laid off from the territory hitherto belonging to Talbot. Commissioners were appointed to cause the boundaries of the several counties to be surveyed and marked, and they were "impowered to lay out and purchase by agreement with the owners or by valuation of a jury two acres of land in each county for a Court House, &c." By the segmentation of the territory of Talbot the seat of justice at York on Skipton creek was far removed from the centre of the county. It was therefore resolved that there should be a change of the location of the Court House. At first it was determined that Oxford should be made the county seat, and in Novem- ber, 1709, a Court House was ordered to be built in that town, where
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from Aug. 19th, 1707, until March 20th, 1711, (N. S.), the courts were held in the houses of the High Sheriff, Daniel Sherwood, and of Mary Stevenson. At the November session of the Court in 1709, a contract was entered into between the "Worshipful the Commissioners and Justices of the Peace," of the one part, and Mr. Daniel Sherwood and Col. Nicholas Lowe, of the other part, to erect a Court House at Oxford; but this was never carried into execution, for in 1710 an act of Assembly was passed authorizing and directing that the Court House for Talbot should be built at "Armstrong's Old Field, near Pitts' Bridge," and there accordingly it was built. This is the origin of the town of Easton, of which it is proposed, in another contribution, to give an account.
The following articles copied from the Maryland Gazette, probably refer to one and the same enterprise, and will serve to commemorate an event of some importance in the history of Oxford in ante-revolution- ary times.
A proposal is on foot for maintaining a good deck'd boat, to run on fixed days once a week constantly (except when hindered by the ice, or tempestuous weather) across the bay, from Oxford to Annapolis, and Annapolis to Oxford. And we hear, those who subscribe thirty shillings a year are to have a free passage as often as they please, finding them- selves provisions. Those gentlemen on the Western Shore who have a mind to encourage so useful a scheme are requested to give in their names at the printing office.87
By public spiritedness is meant beneficence, munificence, generosity, benevolence, every thing good and commendable. Animated by these principles a number of gentlemen in Talbot and Dorchester counties and thereabouts, and in Annapolis, have lately subscribed a sum to support a packet boat, well fitted and manned, from Choptank to Annap- olis, weekly in summer and once every fortnight in winter, unless unavoidably hindered by frost or tempests. She began her stages the first week in March. Her times and places of attendance are: At Cambridge on Mondays, which she leaves in the afternoon, and pro- ceeds to Oxford; from whence she sails to Annapolis on the Wednesday morning following and leaves Annapolis for Oxford on Friday morning: except in the two first weeks of each Provincial Court, when she is to be at Annapolis on each Tuesday. By these riders [post riders previously referred to in the article] and the packet boat a ready communication by letter is opened to a great part of the province. Whoever subscribes 20 shillings a year or upwards towards the support of the packet may cross the bay in her as often as they please, without further expense, except the supplying themselves with provisions.38
37 Maryland Gazette, April 2nd, 1761.
38 Maryland Gazette, March 25th, 1762.
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Ridgely in his "Annals of Annapolis" mentions the theatrical per- formances of a troupe of comedians from Virginia, in June, 1752. Some authorities claim that these were really the first ever witnessed in America. This company of players went to some of the upper towns of the province, Upper Marlborough, Piscattaway and Chestertown being mentioned as having been visited. From an entry in the court records of Talbot, it is probable they visited Oxford. The same record is interesting also for the reason that it gives the first evidence, yet discovered, of the presence in this county of pleasure carriages as dis- tinguished from those of burden. At the June term of the court in 1755 Jacob Bromwell brought suit against Mrs. Margaret Lowe, and among the items in his account were these:
For riveting and fitting plates and springes to your shaise, five shil- lings, also for 2 pins and 2 small plates for your shaise 2s 6d. May 26th, 1753, to 2 sealed tickets for you to go to the play, 15 shillings.
While this is not positive evidence of there having been theatrical performances at Oxford-for Mrs. Lowe may have crossed the bay to attend those which were enacted at Annapolis-yet it is sufficient to raise a presumption that such was the fact. Madam Lowe was a wealthy lady of Oxford Neck and the name of Jacob Bromwell is still familiar in that vicinage. In this connection it may be mentioned that another amusement which the people of Talbot had long enjoyed, was in May, 1767, presented with more than usual eclat at Oxford. At this time there was horse racing near that town, at which the Governor of the province was present, and many of the most prominent citizens and other gentry of the county.39
Here may conclude the pre-revolutionary history of Oxford. During the war, it being a place of no commercial nor strategetic importance it was the heat of no operations that deserve commemoration. Early in the contest the independent company of Capt. James Hindman was stationed here to overawe the disaffected, and to prevent the depreda- tions of marauding parties of the English and Tories, who had possession of the bay. For more than three-quarters of a century after the Revo- lution the "town and port of Oxford" can hardly be said to have had a history, so completely has its life been extinguished by the changes of the political relations of Maryland, taken in connection with the fact that the trade of the county, a good share of which Oxford had
39 Maryland Gazette, May 7th, 1767. Also private letter of the Hon. Matthew Tilghman, in the possession of Col. Oswald Tilghman.
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enjoyed during the years of her prosperity, was drawn off to Easton, which, from being an insignificant village, had acquired an importance it had not hitherto possessed, after the institution of the new state government, for besides being the seat of justice for the county it was made the place where certain officers for the Eastern Shore were re- quired to reside and discharge their functions, and where the General Court of the state held stated, and the United States District Court occasional sittings. Col. Jeremiah Banning in his journal, written prior to 1798, gives a sad picture of the desertion and desolation of this town, as contrasted with its former animation. He says:
Oxford's streets and strands were once covered by busy crowds ushering in commerce from almost every quarter of the globe. The once well worn streets are now grown up in grass, save a few narrow tracks made by sheep and swine; and the strands have more the appear- ance of an uninhabited island than where human feet had ever trod.
This condition continued down to a very recent period-down to the late civil contest, when reaction commenced and fresh life and vigor began to be manifested; so it may be said, that as the war of the Revolu- tion marks the end of her old prosperity, the other greater war of the rebellion marks the beginning of her new growth in population and wealth.
In the earlier years of the present century Oxford, as remembered by the oldest residents of the town and vicinity, had become an insignificant village of less than one hundred inhabitants (seventy white and twenty colored people) occupying thirteen houses.40 Of these houses the two most conspicuous were the Markland house situated on Back or Town creek-an old, quaint, rip-roofed brick building still standing; and the large framed structure, long occupied by Capt. Saml. Thomas, which stood on the river, at the corner of the principal street, and which is now a part of the Riverview Hotel. The only traces of the former commercial importance of the town were the "Salt-House" which stood near the place where is now the ship-yard of Mr. Nathaniel Leonard; and the Tobacco Warehouse which was near the strand, but further down towards Town Point. Both of them were in a state of dilapidation and have long since disappeared. This warehouse was abandoned even
40 For many of the details which follow, the writer is indebted to the courtesy of Mr. Philemon Willis, of Oxford neck, a venerable gentleman, whose retentive memory has preserved the impressions of a naturally receptive mind, and whose reminiscences have more than usual value to the local antiquary for their accuracy and the caution with which they are expressed.
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before tobacco had ceased to be cultivated. It is believed Mr. David Robinson was last appointed inspector. The foreign trade of the port had dwindled to a single sea-going schooner, the Col. Ramsey, commanded by Capt. Thomas Coward, that occasionally brought a cargo of salt from Turk's island for the merchants of the county. It may be said, however, that Messrs. Christopher and Robert Johnson, Scotchmen, were im- porting merchants at Oxford as late as 1791, and they were also manu- facturers, there, of nails upon quite an extensive scale, considering the time and place. The retail trade was carried on in three small shops kept by Mr. William Markland, Mr. James Stewart and Mr. John Willis. This last named gentleman with Mr. Philemon Willis was conducting a ship yard (at least in 1798) at the town; and sail making and rigging was carried on by Mr. Thomas Whiting as late as 1810. A wind mill stood upon the public square, owned by Mr. Edward Bromwell, which had been running since 1796. It may be well enough to mention that in 1717 permission was granted, by legislative enact- ment to Mr. John Oldham to erect a wind mill upon Town Point. At the period, now described, there were no churches within the town, and no public school, though Mr. Saml. Parker at one time and Mr. Thomas Watts at another, had private schools. There were no mails, the nearest post office being Easton, twelve miles distant, and communi- cation with the outer world was by the packets from the same town which weekly passed by the deserted port on their trips to Baltimore. But in June, 1819, the first steamboat that plied upon the waters of Chop- tank and Third Haven made her appearance in the harbor, upon her first trip from Baltimore and Annapolis to Easton. This was the steamer Maryland under the command of Capt. Clement Vickars, with Mr. Eugene McCully as engineer.41 Steam navigation had been intro- duced only a few years before, namely in 1813. The ferry that had been maintained at the public expense had long since ceased, and was not renewed until 1836, as before mentioned-then, not because of any increase in the number of passengers, but for the purpose of relieving the residents of the town and neighborhood of the annoyance which they were subjected to by being compelled (by their kindness and courtesy) to set people across the river in their boats when it was by no means con- venient nor agreeable. Even then the salubrious air attracted occasional
41 Previous to this date the steamer Surprise, Capt. Jonathan Spencer, was running upon Saint Michaels river. In 1823 the steamer Albemarl commenced making trips upon Choptank as far up as Cambridge in Dorset, touching at How- el's Point in Talbot.
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summer visitors, and a few families from other parts of the county, some- what later than the time now under our view, made it their home during the unhealthy seasons of the year. Life flowed on in one monotonous course diversified by no more important events than the capture of rock- fish three feet in length, or of a sheepshead twelve pounds in weight, -for the drowsy air of the place seemed to nourish devotees to the dreamy sport of the rod and line, or slaves to the lazy task of fishing, while the surrounding waters furnished an abundance of the finny game to keep awake the interest in this mild recreation or to afford remuneration to this easy work.
In this languishing condition Oxford remained for a long series of years, giving few tokens of vitality and affording slight encouragement to the hopes which were always cherished by her people, with a kind of listless confidence, that there would be at some day a resuscitation of her former prosperity, when her advantages for trade, the great salubrity of her climate, and the beauty of her situation would attract population and capital, and her ways and waters regain a portion of her former animation.
The first sign of the reawakening of this slumbering town was given in the year 1847, and had a most creditable origin-no other than the electric touch of divine science. In the autumn of this year Mr. John H. Allen, a graduate of West Point, established a school at this place, which merged into the "Maryland Military Academy." It is not proposed, in this connection, to present an account of this institution of learning: this will be done hereafter when treating of the schools of Talbot, a subject as yet only partially discussed in these contributions. Suffice it to say, here, that Mr. Allen, largely and efficiently aided by Gen. Tench Tilghman of Plimhimmon, a gentleman of whose merits will hereafter be better appreciated than they were during his life or than they are even now, succeeded in enlisting the cooperation of many of the more prominent and influential citizens of Talbot, and the neigh- boring counties, in his scholastic enterprise, by which a charter and some governmental recognition were obtained from the State of Maryland, a school building and dwelling house for the principal were erected and a large number of pupils quickly collected. On the 13th of Sept., 1855, unfortunately, the principal building used for lecture rooms and dor- mitories was destroyed by fire, and was never replaced. The school soon became entirely extinct, but not before it had rendered efficient service to the cause of liberal education, and had benefited the town of Oxford by calling attention to its healthful and beautiful situation
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whereby accessions to the population began to be made and its advan- tages as a place of residence for those seeking retirement from the turmoil and conflicts of city life began to be appreciated. Following the school came the churches. In April 1853 the corner stone of a Protestant Episcopal church edifice, designed by the celebrated archi- tect Upjohn, of New York, was laid, Bishop Whitehouse officiating. This remains to this day incomplete, standing upon a beautiful site near the river and on the border of the town. It is generally supposed that this structure was the first ever erected in Oxford for religious purposes, but this supposition is erroneous. It is known from extant records-imperfect and obscure to be sure, but authentic and positive in character, that Mr. Samuel Chamberlaine of Plain Dealing, con- tributed largely to the erection of a Chapel of Ease, of the church of England within the town. This Chapel stood upon or near the Public Square, which had been reserved, when the town was originally sur- veyed, and it existed down to about the year 1800, when it was destroyed by fire originating from the discharge of a gun beneath it by a boy hunting for rabbits-an incident which serves to indicate how com- pletely the town had lost its urban character and had reverted to its original rusticity.42 The school and the church heralded the dawn of a brighter day for the town of Oxford. In 1861 the war of the Rebellion broke out, and though nothing of sufficient importance occurred at this place in connection with the military or naval operations of the govern- ment to merit any notice, this great contest is referred to here, because it is not only epochal in the history of the country at large, but it marks the period when this town began to experience, in common with the county, the benefits of the great political and social revolution which was by it accomplished. It may be well enough to state that at Oxford for a short time in the first year of the war, was stationed a detachment of soldiers, which seems to have been sent to seize the muskets belonging to the state that had been used in the Military Academy. Later the town was occasionally visited by gunboats, having on board the generals in command of the Department, who came upon their tours of inspec- tion and observation. In Dec. 1862 Boards of Trade were appointed
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