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Welcome
to Maryland American
History and Genealogy Project
we are in the process of
building new State and County pages for the states where
the coordinator has moved on to other projects.
Washington County is looking for a new Coordinator would you
be interested? If so please contact
Webmaster.
Many of the present coordinators are always willing to give help and
suggestions to newcomers, you can learn, I did and that was after 60!!
Read our
About Page and see what our requirements are,
pretty easy!
Court House at
Hagerstown
Washington County was established on the same day as
Montgomery and was taken from Frederick, originally
including Allegany and Garrett. It is bounded on the
north by Pennsylvania, on the east by South Mountain,
which separates it from Frederick; on the south and
southwest by the Potomac River, dividing it from
Virginia, and on the west by Sideling Hill Creek, which
separates it from Allegany. It is nearly triangular in
shape. The county is abundantly watered by the Antietam,
Beaver, Conococheague, Israel, and other creeks
tributary to the Potomac.
The principal products are wheat, corn, oats, hay, rye,
potatoes, wool, livestock, butter and honey. The county
seat is Hagerstown, with a population of 13,591, and an
admirable location as a railroad centre. It lies on
Antietam Creek, 86 miles from Baltimore, and a seminary
of high order and other private institutions are among
its educational facilities. The Baltimore and Ohio,
Western Maryland, Norfolk and Western, and Cumberland
Valley Railroads traverse the county, and all pass
through Hagerstown.
The manufacturing establishments of the city are
numerous, and some of their products are bicycles,
gloves, organs, building materials, agricultural
implements, cigars, flour, carriages, etc. Williamsport
has a population of 1,472, and is a commercial and
industrial centre. Sharpsburg, Hancock, Clearspring,
Boonsboro, Smithsburg, Leitersburg, Funkstown,
Keedysville, and others, are thriving villages.
The county ranks high among wheat producing counties of
the United States, and is noted for its mountain-side
peach orchards. The population is remarkable for
intelligence, industry and thrift. Its area is 525
square miles. Germans, English, Scotch, Swiss and French
from the border provinces of Alsace and Lorraine were
among the original settlers. A number of families were
established in the county as early as 1735, and from
1740 onward the numbers rapidly increased. Washington
has been the mother of a long line of distinguished men
in every walk of life, who have left their impress not
only upon Maryland, but upon other States and the
nation.
The county may lay claim to no inconsiderable share in
the construction of the first steamboat built in the
United States (1785-86). General Washington and Governor
Thomas Johnson were patrons of the experiment of James
Rumsey, and parts of his steamboat were made at the
Antietam Iron Works on March 14, 1786. Sharpsburg and
vicinity was the scene of the most terrible and bloody
battle of the Civil War, and in the Antietam National
Cemetery here lie buried 4,667 Union dead.
The Delaware and Catawba battle-ground, at the mouth of
Antietam Creek, the limestone or subterranean curiosity
from which Cavetown derives its name, and old Fort
Frederick, near Clearspring, the last remaining visible
vestige of the French and Indian War and Maryland
Heights, rendered conspicuous in 1861-65, together with
Antietam battlefield, dotted with monuments and tablets,
make the county forever memorable in song and story.
Online Here or Other Sites
Maryland
AHGP
Source: History of Maryland, by
L. Magruder Passano, Wm. J.C. Dulany Company, 1901.
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