Another Completed Company!

Posted on November 14, 2017 by Finding the Maryland 400

We have recently completed the biography of the last remaining Second Company soldier, and are excited to say that yet another company is done! We’re one step closer to having biographies of all of the Maryland 400’s soldiers. Continue reading →

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Becoming “Amply Supplied with Very Good Shoes”

Posted on October 30, 2017 by natalierosemiller

Winters for the Continental Army soldiers were brutal.  Although fighting usually ceased and the troops took up winter quarters, there was no break from military life.  In addition to freezing temperatures and food shortages, troops were plagued by inadequate uniforms, and especially a lack of decent shoes.  In December 1777, Brigadier General William Smallwood had an idea. He wrote to George Washington, lamenting how “the march of the troops…through the frosty roads, has cut out their shoes, and by being barefoot they are rendered unfit for duty.”  [1] Continue reading →

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A Pennsylvanian in the Maryland Line?

Posted on October 1, 2017 by Finding the Maryland 400

Most Maryland 400 veterans returned to Maryland after their military service ended. Many, perhaps most, of them stayed in the state afterward, but plenty moved on instead, mostly heading west in search of land.

Michael Waltz, a private in the Second Company in 1776, for example, ended up in Wayne County, Ohio. He moved there in 1834, traveling with his family from Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, “in order to be near his relatives who had previously left Pennsylvania.”

Waltz’s westward migration is not particularly noteworthy, but his military service is. He left the First Maryland Regiment sometime in November or December 1776, signing on with a Pennsylvania unit. We have found hardly any men who went on to serve in another state after leaving the Maryland Line. Continue reading →

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A Hot Cup of Patriotism

Posted on September 29, 2017 by natalierosemiller

As you sit down to enjoy your morning, afternoon, or evening cup of coffee (don’t worry, we won’t judge you if you’re in that last category), do you ever wonder how America became a coffee society?  According to scholars, it has a lot to do with the Revolutionary War. Continue reading →

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Death by Pig

Posted on September 20, 2017 by natalierosemiller

While researching soldiers and their families from the Revolutionary War, it can be difficult to uncover reliable information.  We have written about some of our methods before, and you can read one of those posts here.  However, sometimes the best we can do is to make an educated guess or conclusion, as was done in the case of the biography of John Jasper. Continue reading →

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A Veteran Remembers

Posted on September 15, 2017 by Finding the Maryland 400

The last officially recorded fact about Joseph Steward’s military service is that he enlisted in the Second Company of the First Maryland Regiment, commanded by Captain Patrick Sim, on February 26, 1776. There is nothing to tell us what became of him. [1]

But another soldier remembered Steward. Moses Gill still remembered clearly, some fifty years later: Continue reading →

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Happy National Literacy Day! – Literacy Rates in Colonial America

Posted on September 8, 2017 by natalierosemiller

In addition to the Revolutionary War, a literary revolution swept across the American Colonies and Europe in the 18th century.  In celebration of National Literacy Day, today we will explore the literacy rates of Colonial America and how they affected the men of the Maryland Line.  Continue reading →

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Upcoming Maryland 400 Lecture

Posted on September 1, 2017 by Finding the Maryland 400

On Saturday, September 9, Finding the Maryland 400 project director Owen Lourie will give a lecture at Belair Mansion in Bowie, Maryland. He will talk about the Maryland 400 at the Battle of Brooklyn in 1776, and highlight the stories of several soldiers from the Bowie area.

The lecture will be part of a day-long festival celebrating the march of the French Army, lead by General Rochambeau in 1781, which stopped at the mansion on its way to Yorktown, where they defeated the British. The program will feature reenactors from the First Maryland Regiment and the Maryland Loyalist Battalion, as well as a colonial printer and dressmaker. You can play period games and try some colonial-style sewing!

The event is free and open to the public, and runs from 12:00 to 4:00 PM. For more information, see the Event Page. Hope to see you there!

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The Battle of Brooklyn in Five Objects: Number 5, The Old Line State Quarter

Posted on August 25, 2017 by natalierosemiller

The last object in this five-day series is one that many readers have likely seen before: the Old Line State quarter.

maryland-quarter

The Maryland Old Line State quarter was released in March 2000, and was the seventh coin issued under the 50 States Commemorative Coin Program Act.  It features the Maryland State House, which was the nation’s first peacetime capital, and the location where the Treaty of Paris was signed, ending the Revolutionary War. It also shows leaves from the White Oak, which is the state’s official tree.  Lastly, and most important to this series, it shows Maryland’s nickname: The Old Line State. [1] Continue reading →

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The Battle of Brooklyn in Five Objects: Number 4, Daniel Bowie’s Will

Posted on August 24, 2017 by Finding the Maryland 400

Today’s object is one that we have featured before: the will that Captain Daniel Bowie wrote on August 26, 1776, the day before he was killed in combat at the Battle of Brooklyn.

For most of the year, Bowie had been a lieutenant in the First Maryland Regiment’s First Company, stationed in Annapolis. It wasn’t until July 6, four days before the Marylanders marched for New York, that he was promoted to captain of the Fourth Company. The Fourth had been based in Baltimore all year, and Bowie may not have even met any of his officers or men until a day or two before the regiment departed for New York. In addition, while a full-strength company had 74 officers and men, the unit Bowie inherited had just 58. Bowie was twenty or twenty-one years old, and like all of his men, had no prior military experience.

Daniel Bowie’s original will, written the day before he was killed in combat at the Battle of Brooklyn [MSA C1327-121]

Continue reading →

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