THE FOUNDING OF TALBOT

Talbot County was named for Grace Talbot, the wife of Sir Robert Talbot, by her brother, Caecilius Calvert, the second Lord Baltimore, and the first Proprietary of the Province of Maryland.

This county was originally more than three times its present size, as it embraced the whole of Queen Anne's, all of Caroline, east of the Choptank River, and the southeast part of Kent County, including all that territory between the head waters of the Choptank and Chester Rivers, extending eastward to the Delaware line.

The first settlement of white people on the Eastern Shore of the Chesapeake Bay was on Kent Island. Captain William Clayborne having established a trading post at the southern extremity of this island in 1631, under a grant from Charles I to trade with the Indians along the shores of this bay, which he had pvreiously explored.

When Lord Baltimore's colonists settled at Saint Maries near the mouth of the Potomac River in 1634, they claimed, in the name of the Lord Proprietary, authority over Kent Island, including Clayborne's little trading settlement, and the contest for its possession and control led to numerous conflicts between Clayborne and Lord Baltimore, even after the report and order of the Committee of Trade and Plantations, which, on the 4th of April 1638, had decided in favor of Lord Baltimore's claims. To show the authority of Lord Baltimore over this territory a commission was issued to John Langford as Sheriff for the Isle of Kent, on the 7th of February 1637-38 (Md. Arch., 1, 361; 3, 62). The establishment of the shrievalty usually implies the existence of a county, and this date has been adopted as the date of the erection of Kent County.

In the commission appointing Richard Thompson and William Luddington commissioners on the 2nd day of August, 1642 (Md. Arch., 3, 105), the territory is spoken of as the "Isle and County of Kent." This is apparently the first definite calling of Kent County as such.

Prior to the establishment of Baltimore County in 1659, and Talbot County in 1661, the scattered inhabitants living along the Eastern Shore of the bay apparently transacted their business either at Kent Island or at St. Mary's City.

With the erection of these two new counties, the jurisdiction of Kent appears to have been limited to that part of the Eastern Shore about

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Eastern Bay, while Talbot exercised jurisdiction over the growing settlements about the mouth of the Choptank. No exact limits then separating these two counties can be given, as the order or act by which Talbot County was erected, has never been found. The first suggestion of Talbot's western limits are found in the proclamations of the Governor appointing landing places for vessels during the years 1667 to 1669. From these it would appear that the northwestern boundary of Talbot passed along the eastern shore of the Front Wye northward to the head of Harris Mill Branch, and thence down Tanyard Branch, and possibly, up Langford's Bay toward Worton Creek on the bay shore. To the west of this line would be Kent County with its county court held on Kent Island until 1686, when it moved to New Yarmouth on Grays-Inn Creek. To the east would be Talbot to the eastern limits of the province. The earliest reference to the founding of Talbot appears in the temporary appointment of Mr. Moyses Stagwell, as Sheriff of Talbot County, February 18, 1661-62, upon which date there were also appointed commissioners (Md. Arch., 1, 425; 3, 448). Richard Woolman was the first Burgess from Talbot in the Provincial Assembly in 1662. The only exception to this generalization that Eastern Bay was the dividing line, appears to be with regard to Poplar Island, which originally contained 1000 acres, and was joined to Kent County according to the following enactment passed the 24th of September, 1657 (Md. Arch., 1, 361).

It is enacted and declared in the name of his highness the Lord Protector of England, etc., and by the Authority of this present General Assembly, That the Island commonly called Poplars Island lying near unto the Island of Kent be adjoyned unto the County of Kent, and from thence forth be of all persons so accounted and taken to be

Subsequently, by proclamation recorded in the Kent County Land Records, Liber A No. 1, p. 54, and dated June 21, 1671. "The northeast side of Chester, as far as the bounds of Talbot County were formerly on that side," was added to Kent County, "as also Poplars Island, and do hereby require that the Sheriff of Talbot County presume not to recover any quitt rents from the inhabitants living and residing upon the places above specified, they being within the County of Kent."

From this, it is evident, that Poplar Island had become a part of Talbot County in 1661 upon the erection of this county.

The first sharp statements of the boundary line between Talbot and Kent, occur in the Act passed May 22, 1695, which enacted

That from and after the twenty-third day of April next (1696), after the ends of this present sessions of Assembly, the Island of Kent shall be added to and made part of Talbot County and deemed, reputed and taken as part thereof, and that part of Talbot County lying on the north side of Corsecia Creek running up the main eastern branch to the head thereof and thence with a course drawn east to the outside of the province shall be the Southerly bounds of the County of Kent, and on the north by the County of Cecil, any Law, Statute or usage heretofore to the contrary notwithstanding. By this Act Kent Island, which had given the name to the County was removed from its jurisdiction to Talbot, while what is now the northern half of Queen Anne's County was taken away from Talbot and given to Kent. Baltimore County which was erected in 1659, only two years before Talbot, extended around the head of the Chesapeake Bay and as far south as the north east branch of Chester river, across which branch a ferry connected East Baltimore County with Talbot County. In proof of the assertion that Talbot County did extend beyond the head waters of Chester River, reference is here made to a deed from Mathew Tilghman Warde and Mable Warde, his wife, (who lived at Rich Neck Manor now (1912), the handsome country-seat of Henry H. Pearson, Jr.), to John Salter of Kent County dated June 16, 1701 recorded in Liber 9 Folio 126, one of the Land Record books of Kent County, "for all that tract of land called 'Ward Oake,' formerly granted to Mathew Warde by letters patent under the great seale of this Province of Maryland, bearing date 5th day of January 1672, situate lying and being formerly in Talbot County now in Kent Co. and on the north side of Chester River containing four hundred acres of land, more or less."

In 1706, when Tribot had enjoyed but 45 years of existence, nearly one-half of her then remaining territory was taken from her and given to the newly created county of Queen Anne's. The General Assembly of 1706 enacted a law entitled,

An act for the dividing and regulating several counties on the Eastern Shore of this province, and constituting a county by the name of Queen Anne's County, within the same province. When this law was enacted there had been already erected on the Eastern Shore the Counties of Cecil in 1674. Kent, 1637, Talbot, 1661; Dorchester, 1669, and Somerset in 1668. The latter two embraced all the territory south of the Choptank river, while the first three covered the territory north of this river. By the law of 1706 the region between the Sassafras on the north and the Choptank on the south was divided into three counties, the third being the new county of Queen Anne's. This law reads as follows: "From and after the said first of May, 1707, the Island called Kent Island, and all of the land on the south side of Chester river, to a branch called Sewell's Branch, the said branch to the head thereof, and thence with an east line to the extent of this province and bounded on the

south with Talbot County to Tuckahoe bridge and from thence with Tuckahoe Creek and Choptank river to the mouth of a branch falling into the river, called or known by the name of White Marble Branch and from thence with a northeast line to the extent of this province, shall be and is hereby constituted, founded and incorporated into a county of this province by the name of Queen Anne's County and to have and enjoy all right, benefits, privileges equal with the other counties of this Province.

The eastern limits of the province of Maryland remained undefined and unsettled during the years of controversy between the proprietors of Maryland and those of Pennsylvania, who had acquired control of Delaware, until the chancery decision of 1750, and no line was run to indicate its location until a decade later when the local surveyors, who immediately preceded Mason and Dixon, cut a vista along the boundary line, as it now is, in their efforts to establish a true tangent line. The boundary was not marked until 1765, when Mason and Dixon erected the well known monuments which had been imported from England. The Act of 1706, chapter 3, for the formation of Queen Annes County defines with precision the boundaries of Talbot, which have continued unchanged for over two hundred years. It enacts, "That the bounds of Talbot County shall contain Sharps Island, Choptank Island and all the land on the north side of the Great Choptank River, and extend itself up the said river to Tuckahoe Bridge, and from thence in a straight line to the mill formerly called Sweatman's Mill and thence down the south side of Wye River to its mouth and thence down the bay to the place of beginning, including Poplar Island and Bruffs Island."

After 67 years of existence Queen Anne's was compelled, in 1774, to surrender up about one-half of her territory, which she had acquired from Talbot and Dorchester to the newly organized county of Caroline. This county was named after Caroline Calvert, sister of Frederick, the last Lord Baltimore, and wife of Sir Robert Eden the last colonial Governor of the Province of Maryland. The uncertainty as to the eastern boundary of the province and the consequent doubt of the validity of titles granted by the Lords Baltimore restrained the early settlers from devoting themselves to the clearing and improving of tracts within the disputed territory, hence the land along the eastern bounds of the province were the last to be settled upon. During the session of 1773 the question of erecting a new county for facilitating the transaction of business in this newly opened country was considered, and the General Assembly, on November 16 of that year, passed the following Act.