Cecil County, Maryland

“ John Marchborn Cooley, the eldest son of the late Corbin Cooley, was born at the Cooley homestead, on the Susquehanna river, in Cecil county, a short distance below the junction of that stream and the Octoraro creek, on the first of March, 1827; and died at Darlington, Harford county, Maryland, April 13th, 1878. ”

“ In 1734, when George Washington was two years old, these Friends from Pennsylvania and Elk River in Maryland, applied for and were granted from East Nottingham Meeting in Cecil County, Maryland, a meeting for worship which they called Hopewell. The next year this was enlarged to a monthly meeting for business and discipline under what came to be called Concord Quarterly Meeting, composed of East Nottingham and Chester Quarterly Meeting held at Concord, Chester County, Pennsylvania, and attached to Philadelphia Meeting. ”

“ He is among the very best classical and literary scholars that his native county has produced. Mr. Cruikshank studied law for about a year in the office of Charles J.M. Gwinn, of Baltimore, but was compelled by the threatened loss of sight to relinquish study until 1865, when he completed the prescribed course of reading in the office of Colonel John C. Groome, in Elkton, and was admitted to the Elkton Bar on September 18th, 1865, and on the same day purchased an interest in The Cecil Democrat, and became its editor, a position he still continues to fill. ”

“ Johnston has been elected a member of the Historical Societies of Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland and Wisconsin.
On January 1, 1883, he became local editor of The Cecil Democrat, and was in such capacity connected with that newspaper for three years and a half.
Early in life Mr. Johnston was a pupil of David Scott (of James) , who then taught a school in the Fourth district of Cecil county, and whose sister, Miss Hannah F. Scott, he subsequently married. ”

“ After a residence of about eight years in Cecil county the family removed to Philadelphia, where Mr. Hall successively filled the offices of Secretary of the Land Office, and United States Marshal for the District of Pennsylvania. The family returned to Maryland in 1805, and resided on Mr. Hall’s paternal estate for about six years.
Mrs. Hall’s literary career commenced with the publication of her writings in the Port Folio, a literary magazine published in Philadelphia about the beginning of this century, and of which her son, John E. Hall, subsequently became the editor. ”

“ On her mother’s side she is related to the Jacksons, Puseys, and other well-known Friends of Chester county, Pennsylvania, and Wilmington, Delaware.
Mrs. Simpers’ early education was received at Waring’s Friends’ School, near the village of Colora, which was kept up by a few families of Friends in the neighborhood. She also attended the State Normal School in Baltimore, and qualified herself for teaching in the public schools of the State, in which she taught for about ten years in Cecil county, and also in Dorchester county. ”

“ What effect, if any, the pure atmosphere and picturesque scenery of the country along the banks and romantic hills of the Susquehanna and Octoraro may have had to do with producing or developing poetical genius, cannot be told; but nevertheless it is a fact, that William P., and Edwin E. Ewing, Emma Alice Browne, Alice Coale Simpers, John M. Cooley and Rachel E. Patterson were born and wrote much of their poetry, as did also Mrs. Caroline Hall, in that beautifully diversified and lovely section of the county. ”

“ McCauley was appointed County Surveyor by Governor Pratt, and served in that capacity for several years and has ever since practiced land surveying with much success in all parts of Cecil county. In 1857 he was elected Register of Wills and served until the Fall of 1863. In 1864 he was elected a delegate to the General Assembly of the State, and served in the session of 1865, and the special session of 1866. Mr. McCauley has always been deeply interested in the cause of education and was chairman of the committee on that subject in the House of Delegates. ”

“ In 1824, he was appointed to the village school in Charlestown, Cecil county, in 1826, established a private school in Baltimore city; in 1831 was elected principal of the Franklin Academy, Reistertown, and in 1834 principal of the Brookesville Academy, Montgomery county, both endowed by the State; in 1839, he was unanimously elected over forty-five applicants as principal of the Baltimore City High School which position he held for nine years, until asked by the Trustees of the Baltimore Female College, in 1848, to accept the organization of the institution. ”

“ Giles, 'tis but a little while since thou didst urge my taking Christopher Neville for my tenant yonder at Cecil Manor; and why? Because, thou saidst, he was the boldest and the truest and the faithfullest man in Maryland. So he was and is. Thinkst thou a man's soul is changed in a day or two days or a week? Fie! thou hast not enough knowledge of human nature to be ruler of a county, much less a commonwealth. ”

“ Charles Vanderford, great grandfather of the subject of this sketch, was a vestryman of St. Paul’s Parish, Centreville, Md., in 1719. Charles Wrench Vanderford was his grandfather, and a member of the Old Maryland Line, in the Revolutionary war. William Vanderford, his father, was a native of Queen Anne’s county, where the family held a grant of land of one thousand acres from the crown, located between Wye Mills and Hall’s Cross Roads, on which the old mansion was built of brick imported from England. ”

“ The educational advantages of a half century ago were not such as are enjoyed by the youth of to-day; but such as the neighborhood provided and his uncle’s means afforded, were placed at the disposal of the boy, who soon manifested an aptitude to learn. When but five years of age he was sent to what was then called a “Subscription School,” kept in the neighborhood. This he attended during the next seven years, and in the Winter time until the year 1849, when he took charge as teacher of a school, in the Center School House, situated near Fair Hill, in Cecil county. ”

“ For a few years afterwards he took no part in politics, his whole time and talents being engrossed in business, but in 1853 at the solicitation of his friend Ricketts, he consented to be a candidate for County Commissioner, and succeeded in carrying the Fourth district in which he lived, which was then known as the Gibraltar of Democracy, by a small majority, and securing his election by a majority of one vote over Griffith M. Eldredge, his highest competitor on the Democratic ticket. ”

“ Ewing became the proprietor and editor of the Cecil Whig, which was the Union organ of the county. Being a man of decided convictions, and unflinching courage, he never lost an opportunity to advocate the cause of the Union, to which he adhered with great devotion, through evil and through good report.
In 1876 he disposed of the Whig and the next year bought an interest in the Kansas Farmer and the Juvenile Magazine, published in Topeka, Kansas. He subsequently became connected with the Daily Capital, and eventually became sole proprietor of the Kansas Farmer. ”

“ Then what in life or death can harm
So long as thou art mine?
Tobias Rudulph. Tobias Rudulph, the subject of this sketch, was the third person of that name and was the grandson of the Tobias Rudulph, who was one of four brothers who emigrated from Prussia and settled in Cecil county early in the eighteenth century. For many years the family took a conspicuous part in public affairs. ”

“ Mr. Kimble moved with his parents to the Fourth Election district of Cecil county, in the Spring of 1855, and has been engaged in farming all his life, except two years spent in teaching in our public schools. He is a popular music teacher and performer on musical instruments, and has won local distinction as a debater.
In 1870 his first verses were published in the Morris Scholastic a newspaper published in Grundy county, Illinois. He afterwards wrote for the Cecil Whig. ”

“ At the age of fourteen her first verses, written on the death of a little friend of her own age, were published in the Virginia Sentinel. She was an occasional contributor to the Literacy Companion, Magnolia Weekly, and other Southern periodicals.
Mrs. Hardcastle was married in 1863 to Dr. Jerome H. Hardcastle, then a surgeon in the hospital at Liberty, Va. After the war they came to Maryland, and subsequently, in 1876, to Cecilton, in this county, where they have since resided. They are the parents of five daughters and one son. ”

“ Annie McCarer Darlington, the daughter of Charles Biles and Catharine Ross Biles, was born July 20th, 1836, at Willow Grove, in Cecil county, about four miles east of the village of Brick Meeting House, and near the old Blue Ball Tavern. ”

“ Mrs. Sallie Williams Hardcastle. Mrs. Hardcastle’s maiden name was Sallie Williams Minter. She was born in Bedford county, Virginia, June 19, 1841.
Reared in the shadow of the Peaks of Otter, whose lofty summits tower in magnificent grandeur far above the wooded heights and billowy green hills of the surrounding country, it is little wonder that the subject of this sketch should have been early imbued with the spirit of poesy, and led to the cultivation of tastes and the selection of themes which the grand and picturesque in nature are apt to suggest. ”

“ Edwin Evans Ewing, son of Patrick Ewing and brother of William Pinkney Ewing, was born on his father’s farm on the Octoraro creek, not far from Rowlandville, in this county, on the 9th of January, 1824. ”

“ A rainbow o’er a vale of tears.
George Washington Cruikshank. George W. Cruikshank was born in Fredericktown, Cecil county, Md., May 11th, 1838. He received his early education in the common school of Cecilton, and was afterwards sent to a military academy at Brandywine Springs, in New Castle county, Delaware, and graduated at Delaware College in 1858. ”

“ John A. Calhoun, My Joe John. A Parody.
This poem was the outgrowth of a newspaper controversy between John A. Calhoun, a school teacher of this county, and one of the trustees of Jackson Hall, who wrote above the signature of “Turkey,” in which Mr. Calhoun said some rather hard things about the school trustees of the county. The poem was written at the request of the trustee, who was the other party engaged in the controversy.
John A. Calhoun, my Joe John, “I wonder what you mean?”
You’re always getting in some scrape and getting off your spleen ”

“ Scott started a general warehouse business at the Elkton depot, in which he continued as head of the firm of D. Scott & Bro. until the time of his death.
In 1867 he was elected Clerk of the Circuit Court for Cecil county, and served six years with great acceptability.
In 1876 Mr. Scott was appointed Chief Weigher, and continued to have charge of the State Cattle Scales in the city of Baltimore, until the time of his death.
In 1852 Mr. Scott was married to Miss Mary Jane Wilson, of Newark. They were the parents of three children, two of whom are now living. ”

“ In 1840 he was appointed Deputy Marshal for Queen Anne’s, and took the census of that county in that year. In 1842 he sold the Sentinel and removed to Baltimore, where, three years later, he resumed his profession and founded The Ray, a weekly literary and educational journal, and the subsequent year published the Baltimore Daily News, and the Weekly Statesman, in company with Messrs. Adams and Brown, under the firm of Adams, Vanderford & Brown. The News and Statesman were Democratic papers. ”

“ From 1835 to 1837 he published the Caroline Advocate, Denton, Md., the only paper in the county, and neutral in politics, though the editor was always a decided Democrat, and took an active part in the reform movement of 1836, which resulted in the election of the “Glorious Nineteen” and the Twenty-one Electors. The press and type of the Advocate were transferred in 1837 to Centreville, Queen Anne’s county, where he founded the Sentinel, the first Democratic paper published in that county, in January, 1838. ”

“ The Hacks, as we have before pointed out, were also large landowners in Cecil County, one of the largest of their estates, Hackston on the northern shore of the Sassafracx River, consisting of eight hundred acres. ”

“ He and Hendrick Hendrickson, mentioned below, are known as petitioners for naturalization in 1674.
[238] Captain James Frisby, member of the Maryland assembly for Cecil County in 1678. George Fox held a notable meeting at his house in 1672. The first court-house of Cecil County was erected on the north side of Sassafras River, a short distance east of what is still called Ordinary Point.
[239] Captain Nathan Sybrey was a member of assembly for Cecil County in 1678. The Great Bay, above, means the Chesapeake. "Howel's Point" is noted on Herrman's map, at the mouth of Sassafras River. ”

“ The long desired drops, their welcome downward course pursue.
Once more Samaria’s people gladly tune their harps and sing
The praises of Jehovah, God, the everlasting King:—
Once more, the voice of gladness sounds where naught but anguish dwelt;
There, once again, the gush of rapture, absent long, is felt!
Mrs. Alice Coale Simpers. Mrs. Alice Coale Simpers was born in the old brick mansion known as “Traveler’s Repose,” a short distance south of Harrisville, in the Sixth district of Cecil county, on the first day of December, 1843. ”

“ Than all is turned to joy we see—
That star is Immortality.
John Henry Kimble. John Henry Kimble was born in Buckingham township, Bucks county, Pennsylvania, September 8, 1850. He is the second son of Henry H. Kimble, and is descended on his father’s side from English stock, being a lineal descendant from Governor John Carver, who came to this country in the Mayflower in 1620. On his mother’s side, his grandfather, Seruch Titus, was a prominent citizen of Bucks county, and, as his name indicates, was of Italian descent. ”