Archaeologist Searh For War of 1812 Fort at Elk Landing

Maryland history straight ahead. Signs for Elk Landing, Fort Hollingsworth and the Maryland Archaeological Society Field-School mark the spot, along with one tossed in for the Cecil County Airpark.

Dozens of people from the Archaeological Society of Maryland were at Elk Landing on this beautiful Sunday afternoon working to dig up new clues about Fort Hollingsworth and the pre-historic period at a strip of land located at the confluence of the Big and Little Elk creeks.  This site bustled with activity as professional and avocationals investigators carefully scrapped, swept and sifted the soil with small trowels, brushes and other hand-tools looking for the smallest fragments of evidence that might shed light on the past.  Under the careful supervision of professionals, lots of people from all around the state were busy with these types of tasks, acquiring first-hand experience during the 41^st annual Tyler Bastian Field Session.  This enthusiasts, which numbered near one hundred people in total during the school, had been at it for over a week..

George Reynolds the dean of Cecil County’s archaeologist has been conducted studies in the county since the 1950s. He opened this year’s annual field-school last weekend with a talk about exploring the Landing and the area in the first study 30 years ago.

A fortification was put up here to protect Elkton from a British attack during the War of 1812 and this is a central focus of this year’s investigation.  To help with spotting places for careful examination, ground penetrating radar had been used week’s earlier.  The students today were digging at those prime spots, in particular working a long trench where they carefully eyed changes in the soil strata while sifting for relic fragments long buried deeply in the ground.  Elsewhere there were clusters of students from Towson State University out in the old plow fields looking for pre-historic Native American artifacts.

In a period of over thirty years, the old farm soil has yielded many secrets as a number of digs have been done here.  Investigators have found material culture from pre-historic people, aboriginal burial grounds, bottles, arrowheads. Cannon-balls, plenty of 19^th century relics and lots more.  A formal report on this latest dig should be released by September, according to the principal investigator, Dr. James Gibb and the President of the Northeastern Maryland Archaeological Society. Dan Coates.  We’ll look forward to hearing that report as the soil at the Landing still contains many secrets.

Two members of the Maryland Archaeological Society carefully sift the soil looking for clues about Fort Hollingsworth, the War of 1812 redoubt.

Four archaeologist work in a trench where they’re searching for evidence related to the War of 1812 fort.

Archaeologist Bring New Life to Elk Landing

From the Cecil Whig

A team of archaeologists and university students has brought new life to Elk Landing over the past week as they have been excavating the property in the 41st annual field session.

Jim Gibb, head investigator of the war of 1812 project, Robert Wall, a professor of archaeology and physical anthropology and Dan Coates, president of Archeological Society of the Northern Chesapeake chapter have worked with the Historic Elk Landing Foundation President Josh Brown to excavate the Elk Landing Peninsula.

“This was very exciting to me,” Brown said Wednesday. “They wanted to do this big dig, they were opening it up to the public, for the students to come, it’s a learning program… they don’t do it every year, they probably won’t be here for another four decades.”

The peninsula, where the Little and Big Elk creeks merge, was home to the site of Fort Hollingsworth, a 300-foot long semi-circular breastwork fort with a large ditch and parapet, said Gibb. It created a surface to place cannons and men to ward off attacks. The fort no longer stands, because the farmers plowed it down after the war, Gibb said.

article continues on the Cecil Whig

After Decades of Legal Wrangling Elkton’s Marriage Mill Started Grinding a Little Slower

Life Magazine from the files of the Historical Society of Cecil County.

The marrying parsons of Elkton and their employers, “the taxi syndicate,” were miserable in the autumn of 1938.  These entrepreneurs fretted that Maryland voters might put a halt to “weddings without waiting.” 

The threat came just as things boomed for the cabbies, as their chief interest was the wedding business.  At one company, the Rev. C. M. Cope worked days while the Rev. J. T. Baker pulled overnights officiating at 1,118 marriages in Sept. 1938.  These two captured half the services.  But the Rev. Edward Minor, 81, whose church ordered him to cease uniting couples, arranged for the Rev. P. K. Lambert to do his work at the altar.  Mr. Lambert did 461.  A 48-hour waiting period had been passed by the legislature in 1937, but petitions opposing the delay brought the question to the voters.

The waiting period, “aimed squarely at the marriage racket in Elkton,” passed overwhelmingly.  When the Evening Sun visited town just before the “famous marriage mart” breathed its last in December 1938, the paper wrote that a “melancholy calm” had descended upon the border town of 3,600.  Ordinary residents were glad to see “Dan Cupid’s trade in the chute to oblivion.  Only the ministers and the business people who have profited from the marriage mill were sore.”

Having been briefly put out of business one of the “matrimonial magnates,” an operation with four autos for hire and Rev. Edward Minor officiating at the altar, moved to Alexandria, VA.  The Rev. Cope planned to retire to New Carolina, while Pastor Baker advised that this wasn’t his only job as he preached at churches.  “I’m going on and preach and bury the dead and visit the sick just the same as always.”

Although it would seem that the principal business of Elkton, elopements, was a thing of the past, the taxicompanies still found growth opportunities for cupid’s affairs in Elkton as couples continued dashing across the state line.  They found a number of legal or questionable ways to eliminate the wait.  With a court order, the restriction could be lifted, say in the case of “expectant motherhood.”  Such an aid to hasty marriages was credited with thirty percent of the licenses issued in 1940.  Another reason for getting rushed the ceremony was the call up for military service.

The year before the waiting period became effective (1937) there were 16,054 marriage licenses issued.  The total slumped in 1939 to 4,532, but once the “solicitors” hit upon “good and sufficient cause” it jumped up again to nearly double what it was in 1939.  There were 8,526, the Sun reported.  The volume started growing again and Elkton did about 14,000 marriages in 1942.

Once the war was over, another challenge emerged for the syndicate.  The State wanted to allow the Clerk of the Court to perform civil ceremonies but financial interests hired lobbyist to fight that effort in Annapolis.  They held things off or a while in Annapolis.  But finally in 1964, E. Day Moore, a retired postal worker and clerk of the court, started performing ceremonies in the courthouse.   The marriage mill was starting to grind a lot slower in Elkton as the waiting period was now being strictly enforced and while there was still marrying parlors in Elkton, couple had options.

West Nottingham honors man who fought for kidnapped girls

From Souther Chester County Weeklies

The West Nottingham Historical Commission in concert with Chester County Facilities and Parks paid homage to Joseph Miller, a man who was murdered while attempting to rescue two sisters who had been kidnapped by a slave catcher in the mid-1800s.
Descendants of both Miller and the two girls gathered at the Union United Methodist Church near Fremont, where Miller is buried, on Saturday to discuss the details and legacy of Miller’s rescue.
Miller was a white farmer in the township, and he had working for him a young, free black girl named Rachel Parker, who was 16. Rachel’s family had lived in West Nottingham for several generations and was known around the area.
In 1851, a freelance slave catcher from Elkton, Md., who was allegedly in need of money, kidnapped Rachel from the Miller farm, just as he had done months earlier to Rachel’s younger sister, Elizabeth, 10, at the Donnelly farm down the road.

article continues on Southern Chester County Weeklies

Wright’s A.M.E Has Been a Part of Elkton History Since the 19th century

On a spring day in the middle of May, Wright’s A.M.E. Church, an old Elkton house of worship, looks good as storm clouds break and the sun begins to shine on the sanctuary.  It’s been a part of Elkton history since it was dedicated in 1880.  Click here for a web page on Wright’s history.

Archeological Society of Maryland Field School Opens at Elk Landing This Weekend

Archaeologists complete test digs at Elk Landing in preparation for Tyler Bastian Field Session in Maryland Archeology.

Press Release — Historic Elk Landing Foundation———————-

One hundred and ninety nine years ago musket and cannon fire erupted from Fort Hollingsworth at the confluence of the Big and Little Elk Creeks. That skirmish between members of the Cecil Militia and British Marines and sailors kept Elkton from being burned.

The invading British and the Militia occupants of the fort are long gone, but what ever happened to Fort Hollingsworth? Does anything remain of that earthen fort? Members of the Northern Chesapeake Archaeological Society think they know and will attempt to locate Fort Hollingsworth and any artifacts its defenders may have left behind during this year’s archaeological field school to be held at Historic Elk Landing beginning on May 25th and running through June 4th.

article continues on The Elk Landing Appeal

Old Maps Showing Elkton and Elk Landing During the Revolutionary War Help Archaeologist

Seeking out colonial era maps of Elk Landing local archaeologist, George Reynolds, stopped by this week.  The Archaeological Society of Northeastern Maryland is sponsoring a summer field school at the Landing and George is preparing for the opening talk, as he conducted the first study on that historic parcel in the early 1980s.  To flush out the lecture, George was searching for Rochambeau’s map of Head of Elk so we’ve scanned two of them below as we thought others might be interested too.

During the American Revolution French troops under Jean-Baptist de Rochambeau passed through Cecil County in 1781.  As the army marched through the area, the general’s cartographer sketched out the advance.

Here are two included in the excellent reference, The American Campaigns of Rochambeau’s Army, which also contains a published journal detailing the movement.  Anyone studying Cecil’s history during the Revolutionary War will find this title of interest.  These 1781 maps show a cluster of nine structure at Elk Landing.  They also show structures in the vicinity of North and Main streets, as well as the placement of French military units.

Those interested in this subject will find this title helpful, as it’s one more method we’ve used to develop evidence based interpretations of Cecil County during the Revolutionary War.