African American history – The Lost Towns Project

Whitehall Overseer’s Quarter: Connecting Local African American Histories Through Archaeology on the Broadneck Peninsula

18April2024Lost Towns Project19th century, African American history, Anne Arundel County, architecture, fieldwork, Whitehall

By Jennifer J. Babiarz (Anne Arundel County), C. Jane Cox (Anne Arundel County), and Lisa H. Robbins (Lost Towns Project consultant). This blog post was originally published on Our History, Our Heritage, the blog of the Maryland Historical Trust, and is cross-posted here.

In 2022, The Lost Towns Project, Inc., in collaboration with the Anne Arundel County Office of Planning and Zoning’s Cultural Resources Section, began a county-wide study—documenting and contextualizing architectural and archaeological sites representing African American households living through enslavement, resistance, and freedom during the 19th century. This project was possible thanks to an FY 2022 Historic Preservation Non-Capital Grant Award from the Maryland Historical Trust.

Products of the study include a comprehensive database of these site types in Anne Arundel County; a report providing an historical, architectural, and archaeological context for Anne Arundel County’s 19th-century African American households; and updates to, or creation of, over a dozen historic archaeological inventory forms to ensure that the state’s inventory more fully and holistically reflects the existence and importance of African American households in 19th-century Anne Arundel County.

The work undertaken at the Whitehall Overseer’s Quarters (AA-326A) was one of the more compelling sites the team studied not only because it was poorly documented in state inventory records, but also because it sparked a new level of engagement, interest, and connection with the area’s descendant community and the possibility of future partnerships and discoveries.

(*Note: This building and site is on private property, and should not be visited without the express permission of the owner(s).)

The Whitehall Overseer’s House, which stands about 40 feet west of the Overseer’s Quarters, was built in 1750 by Governor Horatio Sharpe as a one-and-a-half story frame, whitewashed house with an attached kitchen. After Sharpe’s death in 1790, Whitehall and its associated properties were willed to John Ridout, and the Whitehall Overseer’s House (AA-326) remained in the Ridout family until 2022. Horatio Ridout II and his wife Jemima Duvall were the first Ridouts to live in the Overseer’s House and likely constructed the duplex quarter for enslaved families.

The Whitehall Overseer’s Quarters is a 1½-story log structure that rests on a roughly coursed, cut stone foundation. Its style is referred to as a double-pen saddlebag, or duplex, and consists of two independent dwellings under one roof, which were separated by a central chimney with a partition wall and likely would have housed two families. This is a common vernacular architectural form in the mid-Atlantic and the South, though this is the only surviving double-pen log quarters in Anne Arundel County and one of only a few surviving double-pen log quarters in Maryland.

Surviving evidence indicates that the building was originally constructed as one story with an accessible attic/loft, arranged in two bays (each about 14’x12’), with doorways in each corner of the façade. Based on the evidence of the surviving fasteners and finishes, the building likely was constructed between 1840-1860. Remnants of whitewash survive on surfaces throughout the interior of the building, including both logs that were added to create the half-story and logs forming the walls below. The exposed end grain of the logs forming the dovetail corner notches is remarkably unweathered, suggesting that the building may always have been enclosed with siding.

*The Whitehall Overseer’s Quarter, viewed from the northeast; the sheathing boards and the shingles are 20th century; the roof frame was replaced in the 19th century.*

In the 1840 Census, Horatio S. Ridout II is documented as enslaving 24 individuals; by the 1850 Census the number of individuals he enslaved was 13, and in 1860 the count had dropped to nine.

There is only one recorded manumission by Horatio Ridout II: a man named John Wright in March of 1864 based on his service in the 30th Regiment of the US Colored Troops during the Civil War. Records referred to as the “Slave Statistics,” are particularly important due to their recordation of the full given name and surname of those persons who had been enslaved until the enactment of the Constitution, as well as their age, physical condition, and term of service. In reference to Horatio Ridout II, the statistics are as follows:

John Wright, 35, Male, Good, For Life, Enlisted in US services
Thomas Kemble, 34, Male, Good, For Life
Benjamin Simpson, 22, Male, Good, For Life
Gilbert Calvert, 16, Male, 16, Good, For Life
Moses Bullen, 16, Male, Good, For Life
May Smith, 30, Female, Good, 8 Years to Serve
Hester A. Simpson, 7, Female, Good, 28 Years to Serve
Isaac Smith, 3, Male, Good, 32 Years to Serve

Benjamin and Nellie Ross were interviewed by George McDaniel about the log house they moved into in the 1880s in Charles County, Maryland:

“Everybody pretty much lived in log houses back then. There were very few frame houses, and let me tell you, White and colored lived in log houses.”(McDaniel 1982:139)

The roofs of frame and log structures were typically covered with shingles, clapboards/planks, or thatch (made from grass and possibly straw in Southern Maryland).

*Detail of the northeast corner of the log crib with well-carpentered full-dovetail joints exposed below the current wall covering.*

Being located on private property, and now under the stewardship of relatively new owners, the team’s initial site visit was designed to develop a rapport with the new owners, and to gather previously unrecorded details about what we found to be a rapidly deteriorating structure. Dr. Dennis J. Pogue and MHT staff joined on some of the first visits to the site, working with the team to document and interpret this rare surviving building type. Pogue generously shared his extensive experience documenting enslaved housing for the last 15 years with the Virginia Slave Housing Project. The original MIHP form, last updated in 1976, sorely lacked architectural details, a clear statement of significance, and any consideration of possible archaeological value.

While the research design included developing measured drawings and taking photos for architectural documentation, the team also gained the trust and support of the new owners, who agreed to allow a limited Phase I archaeological survey around the Quarters. Excitement built as we began to realize the rare chance to see if there might be undisturbed and archaeologically significant deposits here, that might tell us about the families that had lived in the building during the last half of the 19th century. The team set to developing an achievable research plan for a brief one-to-two-day field session.

Having worked on other nearby sites in the area in previous months, we had also cultivated several points of contact within the local descendant communities, and knowing that they would be interested, and some had even received some limited archaeological training on other projects—we invited them to participate in the archaeological fieldwork. Our hope was that in addition to having their help with the dig, that their collective and individual memories shared through generations of their communities would also help to inform the interpretation of the site—and perhaps guide future research. In fact, we got so much more!

*Volunteers and Descendants Doing Fieldwork in April 2023*

Over two days in April 2023, more than a dozen volunteers signed on to help excavate 21 close-interval shovel test pits on the lawns and terraces surrounding the Quarters. Everyone pitched in on every level of work that needed to be done, from paperwork to wielding a shovel, and their stories, laughter, and curiosity made the excavation days fly by. As volunteers from the first day shared this experience with their family and friends, the numbers swelled on the second day and cars packed in along the edge of this narrow dead-end end single-lane driveway. As they trickled in over the day, several shared that they had grown up in the area, and could connect their roots back to those who had been enslaved on the Broadneck Peninsula. Team members scrambled to monitor the digging, while also giving impromptu tours—explaining the history of the site and detailing the architecture of the building. One couldn’t help make the connection that their forefathers and mothers may well have lived in dwellings much like this one—yet most all traces of such old homes have been lost to time.

While some joined us just to see the site and spent a short time visiting, others were so intrigued that they stuck around, and jumped right in getting their hands dirty. In addition to two of our favorite volunteers April Chapman and Ann Green, we were visited by representatives from the Maryland Commission on African American History and Culture, including Director Chanel Compton and Commissioner Elinor Thompson. Well-known local historians Janice Hayes-Williams and Bernadette Pulley-Pruitt, both of whom have direct and profound connections to Broadneck, the Whitehall properties, and the Ridout family were there. Members of several organizations that have missions to help raise up and celebrate this local history also joined us, including representatives of Rev. Samuel Green, Sr. Foundation, Inc., the Annual Fathers Day Foundation such as Devon Edwards and Rev. Randy Rowe Sr, as well as representatives from the Truth, Reconciliation, and Reparations Task Force at St Margaret’s Church.

The archaeology was successful. We found evidence of historic compacted living surfaces, likely indicating swept yard spaces to the east and south of the structure, and recovered domestic and architectural artifacts that could yield new information about the historic use and layout of the space, including lead glazed redware, cut nails, and coal slag. The work clearly demonstrated that the site has research potential and further archaeological work could provide important details of everyday life for those enslaved, and later tenant families, living in this building. The archaeology however was also important to better acknowledge and appreciate such a site for state and local history, including for generations of descendants.

For the descendants of those who resisted violence and coercive control by building families, and vibrant households that have survived through generations in the same area, the chance to discover and hold everyday items that had likely been part of their everyday lives during that process was very moving. Many of the descendants that we worked with us expressed feeling closer to their ancestors than ever before; though not necessarily peaceful, it was very meaningful to them. Black spaces are being erased from the landscape at an alarming rate throughout the state and county. It is through ongoing partnership building with descendant communities and landowners that these spaces can be more fully identified and documented through the Maryland Inventory of Historic Places forms. African Americans’ crucial contributions to the economic and cultural development of Anne Arundel County should be acknowledged and celebrated through their representation in the official documentation of local and state histories.

*Volunteers, Supporters, and Descendants at Whitehall Overseer’s Quarters-April 2023*

References Cited:

ANNE ARUNDEL COUNTY COMMISSIONER OF SLAVE STATISTICS (Slave Statistics). 1867, MSA C142, pg 87, Maryland State Archives, Annapolis, Maryland.

Manumission Papers, database, Legacy of Slavery in Maryland (https://slavery2.msa.maryland.gov/pages/Search.aspx: April 11, 2024), Entry for Horatio Ridout.

McDaniel, George W. 1982 Hearth and Home: Preserving a People’s Culture. Philadelphia: Temple University Press.

Virginia Slave Housing, Special Projects, School of Architecture, Planning, and Preservation, University of Maryland, College Park (https://arch.umd.edu/research-creative-practice/special-projects/virginia-slave-housing: April 12, 2024)

US CENSUS BUREAU (Census Record, MD), Slaves 1850. Maryland State Archives, MSA SM61-156, pg 369. Annapolis, Maryland.

US CENSUS BUREAU (Census Record, MD), Slaves 1860,. Maryland State Archives, MSA SM61-226, pg 32. Annapolis, Maryland.

www.revsamuelgreensrfoundation.org/

www.annualfathersdayfoundation.com

www.africanamerican.maryland.gov/

www.st-margarets.org/truth-reconciliation-and-reparations-task-force.html

African American Inventions, Artifacts, and Stories at the Glen Burnie Library

12February2023Drew WebsterAfrican American history, Anne Arundel County, Crownsville, exhibit, Glen Burnie

We’re switching things up at the Glen Burnie Library! After the successful collaboration for Native American Heritage Month, librarians and archaeologists teamed up once again for Black History Month. The exhibit highlights the numerous contributions by black inventors, and highlights the story of the Savoy family, tenant farmers from Crownsville.

It will be up for the next few months at the Glen Burnie library at 1010 Eastway.

African American History Resources

2September2022Lost Towns ProjectAfrican American history, Anne Arundel County, civil rights, slavery

The Lost Towns Project, in collaboration with Anne Arundel County’s Office of Planning and Zoning, has recently completed two online resources on African American history in Anne Arundel County, Maryland. Check them out by clicking on the pictures below.

African American Voices, Memories and Places: A Four Rivers Heritage Trail

This virtual trail and its companion guide highlight publicly accessible historic sites that provide a tangible place to visit, explore, and contemplate important African American individuals, families, people, historic places, events, struggles, and accomplishments. It also included many privately-owned sites, and in far too many cases, sites physically lost to time. This interactive tour acknowledges and celebrates contributions by African-Americans over the County’s 370-year history; those who tilled the soil on farms that made Anne Arundel County prosper prior to Emancipation, those who harvested, processed and shipped the Bay’s seafood to feed an expanding Country, and those who physically built the grand colonial houses for wealthy landowners, many of whom were enslaved. We honor those families and individuals that came together in good times and bad, to start a church and a congregation, to found a school, to build a community, and to create a legacy.

Please note that many of the tour stops are privately owned and not accessible for visitation.
Thank you for respecting the privacy of these properties.
Sites open to the public are clearly marked.

Explore the Civil Rights Era in Anne Arundel County, Maryland

Relying upon more than 50 oral histories, this virtual tour is a rare opportunity to hear about local history through the eyes, voices, and memories of those who experienced it first-hand. Highlighting local places, residents, and their stories, the project offers accounts of everyday activities during a time of segregation. It documents spaces of leisure and recreation, where people of color could gather and enjoy solidarity and empowerment; places like stores, ballfields, beaches, juke joints, movie theaters, beauty salons, and barber shops. A team of historians, led by Lyndra Marshall (née Pratt) and Dr. John Kille worked with citizens who generously shared their memories of what life was like during segregation, and uncovered compelling stories of injustice, resistance, and sacrifice, as well as perseverance and triumph. The full interviews and transcriptions are accessible by request from the Maryland State Archives.

What is an Internship with the Lost Towns Project Like?

30August2022Drew Webster19th century, 20th century, African American history, Anne Arundel County, Arden, fieldwork, German immigrants, Harwood, interns, labwork, Maryland Archaeology Month, Millersville, Prince George's County, truck farming

We asked Catonsville High School senior and 2022 intern Abby Shackelford. Here is what she had to say:

I first discovered the Lost Towns Project in a Maryland Archaeology Month pamphlet I picked up while on a college tour at St. Mary’s College of Maryland. Originally, I had hoped to find something closer to home, but as I looked through the pamphlet, I realized that Anne Arundel County was as close as I was going to get. I applied for the internship because I wanted to make sure that I liked archaeology and got some experience with it before I chose to pursue it in college.

I really enjoyed our field trips to all of the different sites. It was cool to see how they varied in upkeep and the difficulties that the different environments caused while executing field work. I also enjoyed the trip to the Prince George’s County Archaeology Lab because it was interesting to see the difference in collections storage from county to county, and it was cool to see how other people did their processing and cataloging procedures outside of our tiny sphere at the London Town Lab. I liked how we had an equal balance of lab days and field days. It was good to have some variety, and I really enjoyed all of the field trips to all sorts of cool historical sites I wouldn’t otherwise have heard about. Conversely, it was also nice to have the lab days after weeks out in the field, sweating in the heat. Some days you just needed to sit and mindlessly clean some brick with a toothbrush while you soaked up some AC.

Interns outside the Anne Arundel Archaeology Lab (background, right), on the grounds of Historic London Town & Gardens

Altogether, besides miscellaneous lab work, I worked on two major field projects. One was at Kinder Farm, while one was at Arden. Kinder Farm Park, an Anne Arundel County park, was formerly the site of the Kinder family farm. The Kinders were German immigrants and truck farmers, growing produce and transporting it to larger centers of commerce for sale. We dug multiple shovel test pits (STPs) around the locations of two of the major farmhouses and other various outbuildings, finding a variety of artifacts, mostly from the early 20^th century.

Our other major field project was on a private property—a former plantation known as Arden, built in the 1840s. Arden was home to Dr. James Murray, a slaveholder, who served in the Confederate Army during the Civil War as a surgeon. We excavated in the woods near the main house, around and in the foundation of a former tenant house, where a man we know only by oral retelling as “Uncle Wec,” reportedly a former slave on the plantation, lived up until the 1940s. We collected surface finds, dug STPs around the remains of the foundation, and excavated a unit in the corner of the house. Most of the artifacts we found likely dated to the late 19^th and early 20^th centuries.

A memorable moment would be when I dropped my phone in poison ivy. The worst part was that we weren’t even in the field! I dropped it off of the deck by the waterfront and it managed to land face down on the one patch of poison ivy in the whole garden (but luckily it missed the storm drain which was mere inches away). Before this internship, I had no idea what poison ivy looked like. I knew it had three leaves and it was shiny, but I didn’t know its exact appearance. I can now confidently say I know what it looks like. It just took dropping my phone in it and getting a little bit of it on my hand for me to figure it out.

I would definitely recommend this internship to other students. For another high school student, I think this internship could also be helpful to help them determine whether or not they want to continue with archaeology as a career path, since it was composed of a wide array of everyday archaeological tasks. My main takeaway from this internship would have to be that I learned methods of archaeology—I gained experience in different techniques used to clean, label, and excavate artifacts, among other things. I think I can also claim to know the layout of the lab pretty well, after all of the cleaning and organizing we did of it. Coming away from this internship, I can now say that I have more of an idea of what I am getting into if I choose to pursue archaeology as a profession. The hands-on experience that this internship has afforded me has been invaluable. I have had opportunities in the archaeology world that I would not have otherwise had if not for this internship, such as the opportunity to observe ground-penetrating radar, help organize and store collections, and go on “behind the scenes” tours of museums like the Mt. Calvert House and the exhibits at London Town. I am also doubly as grateful to have these opportunities as a high schooler who had no prior experience with archaeology coming in to the internship. Having completed this internship has also hopefully given me a leg up in the college application process, which is fast approaching for me, as it is yet another extracurricular to add to my application. This internship has been an experience that not many high schoolers often get.

Abby (C) with 2022 interns Kaitlin (L) and Julia (R)

Overall, this internship was a very great experience for me. I was very lucky to get the opportunity to do it, and I had a lot of fun this summer. This internship has only solidified my desire to continue to do archaeology. I am planning to continue volunteering at the lab every now and then during the upcoming school year. I look forward to being able to expand my knowledge of history and archaeology.

Intern Spotlight: Abby Shackelford

13August2022Drew WebsterAfrican American history, Anne Arundel County, Arden, interns, plantation, tenant farming

This is the sixth in a series of posts highlighting our awesome summer interns!

“Hi! I am Abby Shackelford. I am a senior at Catonsville High School, and I plan to major in archaeological studies or anthropology in college. Most recently, I have been working at Arden, a mid-19^th century plantation. We have been digging shovel test pits around abandoned former slave quarters, which were later converted into a tenement. I hope to learn more about collections storage and artifact conservation this summer.”

Thanks, Abby, for spending your summer with us! We appreciate your hard work in the lab and field.

Abby (C) with fellow interns Kaitlin (L) and Julia (R)

Your support can help us provide internships to the next generation of archaeology and historic preservation professionals! If you are able, please consider making a tax-deductible internship donation to the Lost Towns Project today. Every contribution, no matter the size, makes a big difference in preserving local history. Thank you!