BALTIMORE.
Position of Baltimore.--Streets.--Cathedral and Churches.--
Public Buildings.--Educational Institutions.--Art Collections.--
Charitable Institutions.--Monuments.--Railway Tunnels.--Parks
and Cemeteries.--Druid Hill Park.--Commerce and Manufactures.--
Foundation of the City.--Early History.--Bonaparte-Patterson
Marriage.--Storming of Baltimore in 1814.--Maryland at the
Breaking-out of the Rebellion.--Assault on Sixth Massachusetts
Regiment, in April, 1861.--Subsequent Events during the War.--
Baltimore Proves Herself Loyal.--Re-union of Grand Army of
the Republic in Baltimore, September, 1882.--Old Differences
Forgotten and Fraternal Relations Established.
The first in commercial and manufacturing importance of all southern
cities is Baltimore, situated on the north branch of the Patapsco River,
fourteen miles from its entrance into the Chesapeake Bay, and one
hundred and ninety-eight miles from the Atlantic. It embraces an area of
nearly twelve square miles, about one-half of which is built up solidly
with residences and business houses. The city is divided into East and
West Baltimore, by Jones' Falls, a small stream running nearly north and
south, and spanned by numerous bridges. The northwest branch of the
Patapsco also runs up into the heart of the city, forming a basin, into
which small vessels can enter. The outer harbor, or main branch of the
Patapsco, is accessible to the largest ships. The harbor is a safe and
capacious one, capable of furnishing anchorage to a thousand vessels. At
the point of the peninsula separating the two branches of the river is
situated Fort McHenry, which defends the entrance, and which was
unsuccessfully bombarded by the British fleet in the War of 1812.
The general appearance of the city is striking and picturesque. It is
regularly laid out, the streets for the most part crossing one another
at right angles, but there is sufficient diversity to prevent sameness.
Thus while the main part of the city is laid out with streets running
north and south, crossed by others running east and west, large sections
show streets running diagonally to the points of the compass. The
surface of the ground upon which the city is built is undulating, and
its streets are moderately wide. Baltimore street, running east and
west, is the main business thoroughfare, containing the principal retail
stores and hotels. North Charles street is the most fashionable
promenade, while Mount Vernon Place, and the vicinity of the Monument
and Broadway are favorite resorts.
The city abounds in handsome edifices. A generation ago, the Catholic
Cathedral, at the corner of Mulberry and Cathedral streets--a large
granite edifice in the form of a cross, one hundred and ninety feet
long, one hundred and seventy-seven feet at the arms of the cross, and
surmounted by a dome one hundred and twenty-seven feet high--was the
especial pride and boast of Baltimoreans. At its west end are two tall
towers with Saracenic cupolas, resembling the minarets of a Mohammedan
mosque. It contains one of the largest organs in America, and two
valuable paintings, "The Descent from the Cross," the gift of Louis XVI,
and "St. Louis burying his officers and soldiers slain before Tunis,"
presented by Charles X, of France. Now other buildings are found equally
as magnificent. The Roman Catholic churches of St. Alphonsus, at the
corner of Saratoga and Park Streets, and of St. Vincent de Paul, in
North Front Street, are fine in architectural design and interior
decorations. The Unitarian Church, at the corner of North Charles and
Franklin streets, is a handsome edifice, faced by a colonnade composed
of four Tuscan columns and two pilasters, which form arcades, and
containing five bronze entrance doors. Grace Church, Episcopal, at the
corner of Monument and Park streets, and Emmanuel Church, also
Episcopal, at the corner of Reed and Cathedral streets, are handsome
gothic structures, the former of red and the latter of gray sandstone.
Christ's and St. Peter's Episcopal churches, the one at the corner of
St. Paul and Chase streets, and the other at the corner of Druid Hill
avenue and Lanvale street, are both of marble. The Eutaw Place Baptist
Church, at the corner of Eutaw and Dolphin streets, has a beautiful
marble spire one hundred and eighty-six feet high. The First
Presbyterian Church, at the corner of Park and Madison streets, has a
spire two hundred and sixty-eight feet high, with side towers,
respectively seventy-eight and one hundred and twenty-eight feet in
height, and is the most elaborate specimen of Lancet-Gothic architecture
in the country. The Westminster, at the corner of Green and Fayette
streets, contains the grave and monument of Edgar Allan Poe. Mount
Vernon Church, which fronts Washington Monument, at the corner of
Charles and Monument streets, and is in the most aristocratic residence
quarter of Baltimore, is built of green serpentine stone, with buff Ohio
and red Connecticut sandstone, and has eighteen polished columns of
Aberdeen granite. The Hebrew Synagogue, in Lloyd street near Baltimore
street, is a large and handsome edifice.
The City Hall, filling the entire square bounded by Holliday, Lexington,
North and Fayette streets, built of marble, in the Renaissance style,
was completed in 1875, and is one of the finest municipal edifices in
the United States. It is four stories in height, with a French roof, and
an iron dome two hundred and sixty feet high, with a balcony elevated
two hundred and fifty feet above the sidewalk, from which a magnificent
view of the city may be obtained. The Masonic Temple, in Charles street,
near Saratoga, is a handsome building, completed in 1870, at a cost of
$200,000. The Exchange, in Gay street, between Second and Lombard
streets, is an extensive structure, surmounted by an immense dome, one
hundred and fifteen feet high, and fifty-three feet in diameter, which
overarches a spacious and brilliantly frescoed rotunda. Six Ionic
columns, the shafts of which are single blocks of Italian marble, form
colonnades on the east and west sides. It contains the United States
Custom House, Post Office, Merchants' Bank, and a fine, large
reading-room. The Corn and Flour Exchange, the Rialto Building, Odd
Fellows' Hall, Y. M. C. A. Building, are all modern and elegant
structures. The Merchant's Shot Tower, which stands at the corner of
Front and Fayette streets, is two hundred and sixteen feet high, and
from sixty to twenty feet in diameter, and is one of the landmarks of
the city. One million, one hundred thousand bricks were used in its
construction.
Peabody Institute faces Washington monument, on the south, and was
founded and endowed by George Peabody, the eminent American-born London
banker, for the diffusion of knowledge among the people. It contains a
free library of fifty-eight thousand volumes, a conservatory of music,
lecture hall, and a Department of Art, which includes art collections
and an art school. The AthenA|um, at the corner of Saratoga and St. Paul
streets, contains the Merchants' Library, with twenty-six thousand
volumes, the Baltimore Library, with fifteen thousand volumes, and the
collections of the Maryland Historical Society, comprising a library of
ten thousand volumes, numerous historical relics, and fine pictures and
statuary. The Johns Hopkins University, which was endowed with over
three millions of dollars, by Johns Hopkins, a wealthy citizen of
Baltimore, who died in 1873, has a temporary location at the corner of
Howard street and Druid Hill avenue, but will probably be permanently
located at Clifton, two miles from the city on the Harford road. The
Johns Hopkins Hospital, to be connected with the Medical Department of
the Johns Hopkins University, and endowed with over two millions of
dollars by the same generous testator, is in process of construction at
the corner of Broadway and Monument street, and will be the finest
building of its kind in America. The Maryland Institute is a vast
structure at the corner of Baltimore and Harrison streets, and is
designed for the promotion of the mechanical arts. The main hall is two
hundred and fifty feet long, and in it is held an annual exhibition of
the products of American mechanical industry. It contains a library of
fourteen thousand volumes, a lecture room, and a school of design. The
first floor is used as a market. The Academy of Science, in Mulberry
street, opposite Cathedral street, has a fine museum of natural history,
embracing a rich collection of birds and minerals, and including a
complete representation of the flora and fauna of Maryland.
Not only is Baltimore noted for free educational institutions, but for
her art collections as well. Annual exhibitions of American paintings
are held in the AthenA|um, and the Academy of Art and Science contains a
fine collection of paintings, engravings and casts. The private art
gallery of William T. Walters, of No. 65 Mount Vernon Place, is one of
the finest in America.
There are numerous charitable institutions in the city, prominent among
which are the Hospital for the Insane, in East Monument street;
Institution for the Instruction of the Blind, in North avenue near
Charles street; State Insane Asylum, a massive pile of granite
buildings, near Catonsville, six miles from the city; Bay View Asylum,
an almshouse, on a commanding eminence near the outskirts of the city,
on the Philadelphia road; Mount Hope Hospital, conducted by the Sisters
of Charity, on North avenue, corner of Bolton street; Episcopal Church
Home, in Broadway near Baltimore street; Sheppard Asylum for the Insane,
founded by Moses Sheppard, a wealthy Quaker, situated on a commanding
site near Towsontown, seven miles from the city, and Mount Hope Retreat
for the insane and sick, four miles from the city, on the Reistertown
road.
But her monuments are the special pride of Baltimore, and from them she
derives her name of "The Monumental City." Chief among them is
Washington Monument, whose construction was authorized by the
Legislature in 1809, the land being donated for the purpose by Colonel
John Eager Howard. The site is one hundred feet above tide-water, in
Mount Vernon Place, at the intersection of Monument and Washington
streets. It is a Doric shaft rising one hundred and seventy-six and
one-half feet, from a base fifty feet square by thirty-five feet in
height, and is surmounted by a colossal figure of Washington, fifteen
feet high, the whole rising more than three hundred feet above the level
of the river. It is built of brick, cased with white marble, and cost
$200,000. From the balcony at the head of the shaft, reached by a
winding stairs within, a most extensive view of the city, harbor and
surrounding country may be obtained. Battle Monument stands in Battle
Square, at the intersection of Calvert and Fayette streets, and is
commemorative of those who fell defending the city when it was attacked
by the British in 1814. A square base, twenty feet high, with a pedestal
ornamented at four corners by a sculptured griffin, has on each front an
Egyptian door, on which are appropriate inscriptions and basso relievo
decorations illustrating certain incidents in the battle. A fascial
column eighteen feet in height rises above the base, surrounded by bands
on which are inscribed the names of those who fell. The column is
surmounted by a female figure in marble, emblematic of the city of
Baltimore. The Poe Monument, raised in memory of Baltimore's poet, Edgar
Allan Poe, stands in the churchyard of Westminster Presbyterian Church,
at the corner of Green and Fayette streets. The Wildey Monument has a
plain marble pediment and shaft, surmounted by a group representing
Charity protecting orphans, and has been raised in honor of Thomas
Wildey, the founder of the order of Odd Fellows in the United States. It
is on Broadway near Baltimore street. The Wells and McComas Monument, at
the corner of Gay and Monument streets, perpetuates the memory of two
boys bearing those names, who shot General Ross, the British Commander,
on September twelfth, 1814.
The railway tunnels, by which the railroads on the north side of the
city are connected with tide water at Canton, are among the wonders of
Baltimore. That of the Baltimore and Potomac Road is second in length
only to the Hoosac Tunnel, in America, it being 6969 feet long, while
the Union tunnel is half the length. They were completed in 1873, at a
cost of four million, five hundred thousand dollars. Previous to their
construction, passengers and freight were transferred through the city
by means of horses and mules attached to the cars.
Federal Hill is a commanding eminence on the south side of the river
basin, and from it extensive views are obtained of the city and harbor.
It was occupied by Union troops during the civil war, and now contains a
United States Signal Station. It has been purchased by the city for a
park. Greenmount Cemetery, in the northern part of the city, and Loudon
Park Cemetery, both have imposing entrances and contain handsome
monuments. Patterson Park, at the east end of Baltimore street, contains
seventy acres handsomely laid out, and commanding extensive views.
[Illustration: VIEW OF BALTIMORE FROM FEDERAL HILL.]
The people of the present day can scarcely comprehend the grand scale on
which landscape gardening was attempted a hundred or more years ago. The
landed gentry, themselves or their fathers immigrants from England,
considered a well-kept park, like those of the immense English estates,
an essential to an American one. To this day may be seen traces of their
efforts in this direction, in stately avenues of venerable trees, which
the iconoclastic hand of modern progress has considerately spared. In
some rare instances whole estates have remained untouched, and have
become public property, and their beauties thus perpetuated. Bonaventure
Cemetery, near Savannah, is a notable instance of this, where a
magnificently planned Southern plantation has been transferred from
private to public hands, and its valuable trees remain, though the hand
of art, in attempting to improve, has rather marred the majestic beauty
of the place. Lemon Hill, the nucleus of Fairmount Park, in
Philadelphia, was, in revolutionary times, the estate of Robert Morris,
and though the landscape gardener has been almost ruthless in his
improvements (?), he has been considerate enough to spare some of the
century-old trees. To the same private enterprise, love of the
picturesque and appreciation of beauty, Baltimore is indebted for Druid
Hill Park, in the northern suburbs of the city. Colonel Nicholas Rogers,
a soldier of the Revolution and a gentleman of taste and leisure, when
the war was over, retired to his country residence, a little distance
from Baltimore, then a city of some ten thousand inhabitants, and
devoted the remainder of his life to improving and adorning its
extensive grounds. He seemed a thorough master of landscape gardening,
and all his plans were most carefully matured, so that the trees are
most artistically grouped and alternated with lawns; dense masses of
foliage are broken into by bays and avenues, and beautiful vistas
secured in various directions. Also in the selection of his trees a
careful consideration was had of their autumn foliage, so that fine
contrasts of color should be produced at that season of the year. The
result of all this care and labor was one of the most charming and
enchanting private parks which the country afforded. It contained an
area of nearly five hundred acres.
When Colonel Rogers died, his son, Lloyd N. Rogers, who seemed to have
inherited only in part the tastes of his father, devoted himself solely
to the cultivation of fruit, doing nothing to add to or preserve the
beauty of his domain, but, on the other hand, allowing it to fall into
neglect and decay. However, the harm that he wrought was only negative,
for he did nothing to mar it, and preserved, with jealous care, the
grand old trees which his father had planted, and with unremitting
vigilance warded off interlopers and depredators. The estate was
secluded from the outside world by fringes of woodland, and though the
city had gradually crept to within a quarter of a mile, few people knew
anything of its beauties. When, therefore, the Commission appointed to
select the site for a new park decided upon Druid Hill as the most
available for that purpose, it was absolutely necessary to detail its
advantages. Mr. Rogers reluctantly consented to accept one thousand
dollars an acre for his estate, and it became city property.
Subsequently, other small pieces of adjoining property were bought, and
Druid Lake and grounds were finally added, and the people of Baltimore
found themselves in the possession of a park embracing an area of six
hundred and eighty acres, which needed not to be created, but only to be
improved, to be one of the most beautiful in the country.
There has been but little attempt at architectural decoration. A costly
and imposing gateway, a Moorish music stand, bright with many colors, a
boat-house crowning a little island in a miniature lake, a pretty bridge
and a Moorish arch thrown across a ravine, a few handsome fountains,
and, finally, the old mansion, renovated and enlarged, standing out
against the densely-wooded hill from which the park takes its
name--these are about all which have been attempted in that line. The
surface of the Park is gently undulating, with occasional bold
eminences from which fine views may be obtained of the city and
surrounding country. Its special attractions are its secluded walks,
well-kept drives and tree-arched bridle-paths, its smooth, velvety turf,
and the venerable beauty of its trees, which are the oldest of those of
any park in the country. Its glades and dells have been left as nature
made them, having been spared the artificial touches of the landscape
gardener; and its little trickling springs and cool, secluded brooks,
have a sylvan, rustic beauty which is surpassingly delightful.
The future care and improvement of the Park are well provided for. About
the time that it became a matter of public interest, the charter for the
first line of street passenger railways was granted, and this charter
stipulated that one-fifth of the gross receipts of the road, or one cent
for each passenger carried, should be paid to the city, to constitute a
Park Fund. This amount, small at first, but gradually increasing until
it now amounts to more than a hundred thousand dollars annually, was
devoted first to paying the interest on the Park bonds, and finally to
the preservation and improvement of the Park. The Park Commissioners,
who receive no pay for their services, have most judiciously
administered the fund entrusted to their care.
The foreign and coasting trade of Baltimore are both extensive. Two
lines of steamships leave the port weekly for Europe, and she commands a
large share of the trade of the West and Northwest. Her shipments to
Europe are principally grain, tobacco, cotton, petroleum and provisions.
The city contains rolling mills, iron works, nail factories, locomotive
works, cotton factories and other industrial establishments, numbering
more than two thousand in all. The rich copper ores of Lake Superior are
chiefly worked here, and nearly four thousand tons of refined copper are
produced annually. The smelting works in Canton, a southern suburb of
the city, employ one thousand men. There are also extensive flouring
mills, while oysters, fruit and vegetables, to the value of five million
dollars, are canned annually. Five hundred thousand hides are also
annually made into leather and sent to New England. Baltimore oysters
are renowned as being among the best the Atlantic seaboard produces, and
no one should think of visiting the city without testing them. The
Chesapeake oyster beds are apparently exhaustless, and supply plants for
beds all along the coast.
Although the first settlements in Maryland were made early in the
seventeenth century, the present site of Baltimore was not chosen until
1729, and in 1745 the town was named Baltimore, in honor of Lord
Baltimore, a Catholic, to whom the patent of the province of Maryland
had been originally made out. In 1782 the first regular communication
with Philadelphia, by means of a line of stage coaches, was established,
and Baltimore was chartered as a city in 1787, having at that time a
population of twenty thousand, which, by 1850, had increased to nearly
two hundred thousand; and, according to the census of 1880, the
population was 332,190 inhabitants. In 1780 the city became a port of
entry, and in 1782 the first pavement was laid in Baltimore street.
In 1803 Baltimore became the scene of a romance which is even yet
remembered with interest. Jerome Bonaparte, the youngest brother of
Napoleon, born in Ajaccio, November fifteenth, 1784, found himself, in
the year just mentioned, while cruising off the West Indies, on account
of the war between France and England, compelled to take refuge in New
York. Being introduced into the best society of that and neighboring
cities, he made the acquaintance of Miss Elizabeth Patterson, daughter
of a merchant of Baltimore. The manner of their introduction was
peculiar. In a crowded saloon the button of young Bonaparte's coat
caught in the dress of a young lady, and as it took a little time to
disengage it, the future King of Westphalia had opportunity to see that
the lady was young, surpassingly beautiful and charming. This interview,
by some who knew the lady and who were acquainted with her ambition,
thought to be not entirely accidental, resulted, on the twenty-seventh
of December of the same year, in a marriage between the two, the
bridegroom being but nineteen years of age. Being summoned back to
France by his Imperial brother, he was quickly followed by his young
wife, who, however, was not permitted to land in France, and retired to
England, where she shortly afterwards gave birth to a son, whom she
named Jerome, after his father. Napoleon annulled the marriage, on the
ground that it had been made contrary to French law, which stipulates
that the consent of parents must be gained in order to legalize a
marriage. Jerome was compelled, after he succeeded to the Westphalian
crown, to marry Sophia Dorothea, daughter of King Frederick I, of
Wurtemburg. Madame Patterson, as she was called to the day of her death,
though she maintained her title to the name of Bonaparte, having an
utter scorn for America and its democratic institutions, spent much of
her life in Europe, where at first her beauty, and to the last her wit
and charming manners, secured her admission to the most exclusive
salons, and a sort of acknowledgment of her claims. She never saw her
husband again, save on one occasion, when she came face to face with him
in a European picture-gallery.
Madame Patterson's aristocratic prejudices were greatly shocked when her
son married a most estimable American lady, the mother's ambition
seeking for him an alliance among the royal or at least noble families
of the Old World. During the reign of Napoleon III, the Pope recognized
the first marriage of Jerome Bonaparte, and the Emperor, who had taken
offence at his cousin, the son of Jerome by his princess wife, also
legitimatized the son, and took him into his service. Madame Patterson
lived to be nearly a hundred years old, having spent her last days in
her native city, and dying but a few years ago. Her son Jerome survived
her not many years, leaving two sons, who are known as the
Patterson-Bonapartes.
In December, 1814, Baltimore was made the object of attack by the
British forces, then at war with the United States. On the eleventh of
that month the fleet reached the mouth of the Patapsco, and on the next
day six thousand men landed at North Point, and proceeded, under command
of General Ross, toward the city. An army of over three thousand men met
them and kept them in check, in order to gain time to put the forts and
batteries of Baltimore in proper condition for defence. A battle was
fought, and the Americans defeated, with considerable loss. Among the
killed and wounded, which numbered one hundred and three, were many of
the most prominent citizens of Baltimore. The next morning the British
advanced to the entrenchments about two miles from the city, and at the
same time a vigorous attack was made by the fleet, upon Fort McHenry, at
the entrance of the harbor. The fort was vigorously bombarded during the
next twenty-four hours, but without visible effect. The troops which had
landed, after hovering at a respectful distance from the city, until the
evening of the thirtieth, then retired to their shipping, and set sail
down the river, leaving behind them their commander, General Ross, who
had been killed in the battle of the twelfth. It was during the siege of
Baltimore, while the British fleet lay off Fort McHenry, and the bombs
were raining upon it, that Philip Barton Key wrote the "Star Spangled
Banner."
From 1814 to 1861, nearly half a century, Baltimore had nothing to do
but develop her resources and extend her commerce, which she did so well
and so thoroughly, that in 1860 her inhabitants numbered more than
212,000, and she stood in the front rank as a manufacturing and
commercial town.
At the inauguration of President Lincoln, in 1861, the sentiments of the
people assimilated rather with those of Virginia and the South, than
with those of Pennsylvania and the North. Had it not, by its
geographical position, been so completely in the power of the Federal
government, Maryland would probably have seceded with Virginia. Great
excitement was aroused by the attack on Fort Sumter, and the State was
with difficulty made to retain her old position in the Union. The only
line of railway from the north and east to Washington passed through
Baltimore, and when, on the fifteenth of April, the President made his
call for seventy-five thousand men, it was necessary that, in reaching
the seat of war, they should pass through that city. Apprehensions were
felt that they might be disturbed, but the Marshal of Police, on the
eighteenth of April, maintained perfect order in the city, and summarily
quieted all attempts at riot. He also received from the State Rights
Association a most solemn pledge that the Federal troops should not be
interfered with. The Mayor issued a proclamation invoking all good
citizens to uphold and maintain the peace and good order of the city.
On the nineteenth, the Sixth Massachusetts Regiment, the first to
respond to the President's call, arrived, by the Philadelphia and
Baltimore Railroad. A crowd of two or three thousand persons had
gathered at the depot early in the day, to witness their arrival. Soon
after eleven o'clock in the morning twenty-nine cars arrived from
Philadelphia, filled with soldiers. Horses were attached to the cars,
which were driven along Pratt street to the Camden station. The
multitude hooted and yelled after the first six cars, but did not
otherwise molest them. The horses becoming frightened by the uproar,
were detached from the seventh car, which moved without their aid nearly
to Gay street, where a body of laborers were removing the cobblestones
from the bed of the street, in order to repair it. Some thirty or forty
men had followed the car to this point, cheering for President Davis and
the Southern Confederacy, and applying contemptuous and insulting
epithets to the troops. The latter received these taunts in perfect
silence; and when the horses were again attached, and the car commenced
moving off, a proposition was made to stone it. Almost instantly, acting
on the suggestion, nearly every window was smashed by projectiles
snatched from the street. The eighth car was treated in a like manner.
The ninth car was suffered to pass unmolested, as it was apparently
empty. When the tenth car approached, after an ineffectual attempt to
tear up the track, it was heaped with paving stones, and a cartload of
sand dumped upon them, and four or five large anchors, dragged from the
sidewalk, completed the barricade. Progress was impossible, and the car
returned to the President Street Depot.
Two-thirds of the cars still remained, filled with troops, besides
others loaded with ammunition and baggage. Mayor Brown hastened to the
depot, in order to prevent any disturbance. The troops were ordered to
leave the cars and form into line. While forming they were surrounded by
a dense mass of people, who impeded their march, threw great quantities
of stones, and knocked down and severely injured two soldiers.
Marching through the city, from the President Street Depot to the Pratt
Street Bridge, they were pursued by the excited crowd, who continued to
throw stones, and even fired muskets at them. When they reached Gay
street, where the track had been torn up, they were again violently
assaulted by a fresh mob, and a number knocked down and wounded. At the
corner of South and Pratt streets a man fired a pistol into the ranks of
the military, when those in the rear ranks immediately wheeled and fired
upon their assailants, wounding several. The guns of the wounded
soldiers were seized, and fired upon the ranks, killing two soldiers.
Reaching Calvert street, the troops succeeded in checking their pursuers
by a rapid fire, and were not again seriously molested until they
reached Howard street, where still another mob had assembled.
The police did their utmost to protect the troops from assault, but
were pressed back by the excited crowd. The soldiers left the Camden
station about half-past twelve o'clock, and a body of infantry, about
one hundred and fifty strong, from one of the Northern States, which had
arrived meantime, next attracted the malevolence of the crowd. The
excitement was now intense. A man displayed the flag of the Confederate
States, and a general panic ensued. As many as twenty shots were fired,
happily without injury to any one, and cobblestones fell like hail. At
last the soldiers gained refuge in the cars. Other troops, by order of
Governor Hicks, were sent back to the borders of the State, and the
military was called out and quiet restored, by evening. Nine citizens of
Baltimore had been killed, and many wounded; while twenty-five wounded
Massachusetts troops were sent to the Washington Hospital, and their
dead numbered two.
Thus Baltimore shares with Charleston the doubtful honor of being first
in the great civil war which devastated the country and sent desolation
to many thousand homes, both north and south. Charleston fired the first
gun, and Baltimore shed the first blood.
During the succeeding night, a report reaching the city that more
Northern troops were on their way southward, the bridge at Canton, the
two bridges between Cockeysville and Ashland, also the bridges over
Little Gunpowder and Bush rivers were destroyed, by order of the
authorities of Baltimore. Upon a representation of the matter to
President Lincoln, he ordered that "no more troops should be brought
through Baltimore, if, in a military point of view, and without
interruption or opposition, they can be marched around Baltimore." The
transmission of mails, and removal of provisions from the city, were
suspended, by the order of the Mayor and Board of Police. Four car-loads
of military stores and equipments, sufficient to furnish a thousand men,
belonging to the Government, were thus detained. On the twenty-fourth of
the month the city had the appearance of a military camp. Twenty-five
thousand volunteers had enlisted, and four hundred picked men left the
city for the Relay House, on the Baltimore and Ohio Road, for the
purpose of seizing and protecting that point, in order to cut off
communications with Washington by that route.
For a week an unparalleled excitement prevailed in Baltimore, which was
succeeded by a counter-revolution, when the volunteer militia were
dismissed, and a large number of troops landed at Fort McHenry and
shipped for Washington, from Locust Point. On the fifth of May General
Butler removed a portion of his troops to Baltimore, and they were
permitted to enter and remain in the city without disturbance. As they
proceeded on their way to Federal Hill, they were even greeted with
cheers, while ladies at windows and doors waved their handkerchiefs and
applauded. On the sixteenth of May the passenger trains between
Baltimore and Washington resumed their regular trips. On the
twenty-seventh of June, Marshal of Police Kane was arrested and escorted
to Fort McHenry, on the charge of being at the head of an unlawful
combination of men organized for resistance to the laws of the United
States and the State of Maryland. On the first of July the Commissioners
of Police were arrested, for having acted unlawfully. On the sixteenth
of July General Dix was put in command of the troops stationed at
Baltimore, and the city thenceforth remained tranquil. At the fall
elections a full vote was cast, which resulted in the Union candidates
receiving a very large majority. At the meeting of the Legislature, it
appropriated seven thousand dollars for the relief of the families of
the Massachusetts troops killed and wounded at Baltimore on April
nineteenth.
On June thirtieth, 1863, Major General Schenck, in command at Baltimore,
put that city and Maryland under martial law. The value of merchandise
exported that year from Baltimore was $8,054,112, and her imports during
the same time were $4,098,189, showing that although on the borderland
of strife, her commerce was in an exceedingly healthy condition. During
July a number of her citizens were arrested, on a charge of being
disloyal to the government. On the Fourth of July all citizens were
required by the Commander to show their colors, from ten o'clock A.M.
to six o'clock, P.M.; an absence of the national flag being considered
tantamount to a confession of disloyalty. In 1864 the State adopted a
new Constitution, which conferred freedom upon the slaves within her
borders, and in November a Freedman's Bureau was established by Major
General Wallace, having its headquarters at Baltimore.
The following year saw the close of the war, and Baltimore, which had
not suffered like her sister cities at the South, her port being free
from blockade, but had rather witnessed increased prosperity arising
from the demands of the war, continued her prosperous career. Although
many violent disunionists had found their homes within the city, the
popular sentiment had grown strongly in favor of the North, and
Baltimore had come to see that she had little to lose and much to gain
by the reestablishment of the Union.
The bitterness of the old war times has passed away, and, as if to
emphasize this fact, the Grand Army of the Republic was invited to hold
a reunion in Baltimore in September, 1882. Accepting the invitation, her
citizens vied with each other in honoring the veterans of the war, and
made their visit a regular ovation. Of the Sixth Massachusetts Regiment,
who had passed through Baltimore on that fateful day in April,
twenty-one years before, and who suffered from the fury of an ungoverned
mob, only one member attended the reunion, Captain C. P. Lord, a
resident of Vineland, New Jersey. He was lionized on every hand.
This Grand Army reunion had many pleasant and amusing features. Here men
met each other again who had last parted on the battlefield or in a
Southern prison. Here the dead seemed to come to life, and the lost were
found. Many officers and soldiers of the Confederate army were also
present, and it was as satisfactory as curious, as more than once
happened during this occasion, to have two men meet and clasp hands in a
cordial greeting, as one of them said to the other, "The last time we
met I tried to put a bullet hole through you on a battlefield;" or, "I
took you prisoner when I saw you last;" or, "This empty sleeve, or these
crutches, I must thank you for."
The gathering was one which will long be remembered by Union and
Confederate soldiers, and by the citizens of Baltimore as well. It was
the inauguration of an era of good feeling between the North and the
South. All personal and sectional enmity had died out, and this
gathering joined those who had represented, on one side the North and on
the other the South, in that great intestine struggle which is now so
long past, and the terror of which, thank God, is being gradually
obliterated by time from our memories, in new fraternal bonds, which are
a good augury for the preservation of our Union. When soldiers who
suffered so much at each other's hands, who were stirred by all the evil
passions which war develops, and who bore the brunt of the conflict,
offering all, if need be, as a sacrifice on the altar of the cause they
had espoused, can so forget the past, and shaking hands over the chasm
which divided them, look forward to a happy and concordant future,
surely civilians should be willing to bury the hatred and prejudice
which has so embittered the past, and live only for a common country,
made of many parts whose interests are identical.