Project sponsored by the Maryland Society of the Sons of the American Revolution
Recent posts: Finding the Maryland 400
Project Updates
We are proud to announce that recently we published our 700th biography! Lucky number 700 was Private Francis Shepard of the First Company; he survived the Battle of Brooklyn and the rest of the 1776 campaign, reenlisted and served until 1781, eventually rising to the rank of captain! Since, there were almost 1,000 Marylanders at […]
The Mystery of the Maryland 400, Part II
Read Part I of this post here On October 12, 1776, William Smallwood wrote a dispatch about the Battle of Brooklyn back to Maryland. The commander of the First Maryland Regiment noted that he had “enclosed a List of the Kill’d & Missing amounting to 256 officers inclusive.” [1] Since the goal of this project […]
The Mystery of the Maryland 400, Part I
Today is the two-hundred forty-second anniversary of the Battle of Brooklyn. The main goal of this project is to learn the names of the Maryland soldiers who fought at the battle and to determine their fates, especially the men killed in the famous stand of the Maryland 400 that saved the Continental Army. Because of […]
William Smallwood Papers Unveiling
Yesterday, the Maryland State Archives and the Maryland Society of the Sons of the American Revolution jointly unveiled a new collection of William Smallwood papers. The collection was acquired earlier this year, and consists of letters written to Smallwood, as well as file copies of letters that he sent, between 1777 and 1784, while he […]
Archives
Tag Archives: Baltimore
“Flecking the hedges with red”: Palmer’s Ballad on the Maryland 400
In the past, we have written about poems and songs relating to the Maryland 400. [1] They were celebrated years after and during the Revolutionary War, with newspapers often containing poems and songs. Such poems included one about William Sterrett in 1776 … Continue reading
Persecuted in Revolutionary Baltimore: The Sufferings of Quakers
In March 1777, revolutionary leader John Adams wrote an angry letter to his wife, Abigail. He declared that Baltimore was a “dull place” where many of the town’s remaining inhabitants were Quakers, who he described as “dull as Beetles” and a “kind of neutral Tribe, … Continue reading
The political climate of Baltimore in 1776
Baltimore Town was more than a diverse and pre-industrial port town that sat on the Patapsco River. It had numerous sentiments, ranging from the pro-revolutionary, some of which were militant in their beliefs, to support for the British Crown. This article continues the series … Continue reading
A “dull place” on the Patapsco: Baltimore and the Marr Brothers
In May 1776, the Revolution had been raging for almost a year with skirmishes between the British imperial army and the rag-tag revolutionaries. William Marr, probably with his brothers Nicholas and James, enlisted in the Continental Army in Capt. Nathaniel Ramsey’s … Continue reading
David Plunket: A Radical Rebel
As Second Lieutenant of the Fifth Maryland Regiment at the time of the Battle of Brooklyn, David Plunket fought bravely and resolutely amidst heavy cannon and mortar fire to hold off the British Army, while the body of the Continental … Continue reading
The Road to Trenton
December was a desperate month for the Revolutionary cause, which badly needed a victory to turn the tide of losses. Expiring enlistments were steadily chipping away at the size of the Continental Army, and the British established a winter camp … Continue reading
The Whig Club: Judge and Jury in Baltimore
It was a cold morning when Melchior Keener got word to leave Baltimore or suffer the vengeance of the Whig Club. At nine o’clock on December 5, 1776, James Cox, a popular local tailor, delivered the message that Keener had three … Continue reading
The Resurrection of William Sterrett
An anonymous poet composed the following eulogy for nineteen-year-old lieutenant William Sterrett. It was published in the Maryland Gazette on September 12, 1776, just over two weeks after the Battle of Brooklyn: On the death of Mr. WILLIAM STERET, who … Continue reading
237 Years Ago
On July 6, 1776 the Convention of Maryland ordered Colonel William Smallwood to march his 6 Companies stationed in Annapolis and the 3 Companies in Baltimore to Philadelphia. Joining them would be three of the Independent Companies, specifically those under … Continue reading
