An Unexpected Discovery

Between 1767 and 1773, two neighbors-Thomas Johnson (father of Maryland's first state governor) and Walter Smith-twice went to court to settle a dispute about the boundary of Smith's plantation of St. Leonard. Many local residents were called to testify, and a plat was drawn of the property. The depositions and the plat contain wonderful descriptions of the plantation's buildings, fences, and fields, including old structures that were in ruins by the 1770s. Armed with this landscape information which often is not available to researchers, the JPPM Public Archaeology Program began to investigate the area that was the heart of the Smith plantation in the early 1700s.
In the mid-1600s, Richard Smith, Sr., Maryland's first Attorney General, settled at St. Leonard. According to the plot, his home and the family cemetery were located next to the museum buildings that now stand behind you. Archaeologists believe that the Smith family lived in 3 different houses between the 1650s and the 1710s. In the colonial period, people often stayed in a house for only a few decades before moving to a new location on their farm. Because of this, people sometimes assume that any old house standing today dates to when a property was first settled, when in fact it may be much younger.
(Inscription under the image in the lower center) View of the field in front of you, showing the locations of some of the buildings marked within the circle on the 1773 plat at the right.
Historical Evidence "...ye Dwelling House wherein the Plaintiffs' Grandfather lived; on ye Gable end of which is Set, in Brick 'ye following Figures...1711."
Detail from the 1773 plot, giving the year the plantation's main house was built.
"Joshua Sedwick...standing in an Old Road Deposeth that when...he was not more than Ten or Twelve years of age a Gate stood there..." Deposition of Joshua Sedwick, age 57, on February 11, 1773, showing that detailed landscape information provided by the court case.
Funding for this project was provided by the Maryland Humanities Council and the Friends of Jefferson Patterson Park and Museum.

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Show me all markers in:  Saint Leonard, MD  |  Calvert County  |  20685  |  Maryland  |  United States of America

The Search for the Chesapeake Flotilla
"We Must Have Done Them Considerable Damage"
Attention to Detail-Gertrude Sawyer, Architect
The Government at St. Leonard's
John Stuart Skinner
Valor at St. Leonard Creek
"The Commodore Can Beat Any...Barges...Sent Against Him"
Land Battle Evidence
What is this Big White Building?
Sukeek's Cabin: A Proud Tradition Lives On

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