“Dogs delight to bark and fight, but ...

children’s little hands were not meant to scratch each other’s eyes.”  

         - a favorite expression of Miss Mary Chew, Owensville’s public school teacher 1865 to 1905.

  

Mary Chew's grandneice, Kate Chew, described the Owensville school in 1914:

“We entered at the left.  There was a little hallway, then a room on the left which held the water bucket and our lunch pails and wraps.  An identical room on the right had textbooks, chalk boxes, and piles of paper.  Straight ahead, the schoolroom had windows only on the left, with blackboards front and right, and a stove which extended into the room.  We had double desks with ink wells.

“Our teacher, Miss Mary Biscoe, dominated the room.  No question:  she was to be obeyed... 

“Once, one of the older boys had to be whipped, and we were all sent outdoors where we grouped fearfully to listen to his screams, but we didn’t hear much except the swish of the stick.  When we were sent for, slinking in, he was sitting in his corner seat, head down.  Miss Biscoe had no trouble with anyone.  All of us were good as gold.

School House c 1900 (Clemence Burwell photos)

“Recesses and lunch hour were lots of fun.  We played Fox & Hounds and Hide & Seek in the woods behind the school, or jumped over the little stream.  The area near the privy at the foot of the hill was taboo.  In the front yard, baseball was played with a hard ball and simple rules (no strike-outs, no balls, no umpire).  Girls and boys played together, and Miss B with us, sometimes doing her own running in her long skirt and high heeled shoes.

“Hot, tired, thirsty, we would be called in by the bell and lined up to get a drink using the same dipper.  Then, while we were tired, we might have poetry.  When it was “The Village Blacksmith”, it was real.  Mr Wayson had his shop next door, and the chime of his anvil was part of the day...  

"We were like a small family, about thirty of us, all ages, 6 to 16.”

St-James-the-Less

In 1852 a chapel of ease was built in Owensville as part of the St James parish. 

It was located between two existing Episcopal churches: All Hallows, 6mi to the north, and St James, 5mi south.  The chapel was named St-James-the-Less.  Traveling to church on Sunday now became a lot simpler for Owensville's Episcopalians.

For ten years all went well.  Then as arguments about slavery began to heat up,  two groups of congregants within the parish found themselves marching to different drummers, literally. Owensville sons marched off to fight for the Confederacy. The St James mother church was not pleased. 

What happened next is a matter of dispute.

Christ Church c1900 (Burwell photo)
  

The official record states that St-James-the-Less was "granted permission in 1862 to set up an independent parish named Christ Church".

In fact, descendants of that time claim the Chapel was “kicked out” of the parish for its pro-slavery views.

Whichever, a new larger sanctuary was built in Owensville in 1867.  The money came  from a bereaved mother, in memory of her children, using an inheritance from Mississippi.

Eleanor Hall McCaleb Burwell, born in the Owensville-West River district, had married James McCaleb of Mississippi in 1839.  He and all three of their children died young, the last one, Annie, in a sledding accident on Owensville Rd at the bottom of Catholic Church Hill in 1867.  That same year Eleanor placed the cornerstone for a new Christ Church.  She chose a design from the sketchbook of Richard Upjohn. 

Thanks to the fame of Upjohn the architect, 
Christ Church is today recognized as a 
national historic site. 

Eleanor is buried with her children in the 
church yard.  Her stone reads: 

“I have finished the work thou hast sent me to do.”

Christ Church c1930 (Burwell photo)

 Eleanor Hall McCaleb Burwell's stone

World War I Comes to Owensville

In the summer of 1917 a company of US Army soldiers was marching from Fort Foote in DC, to the rifle range at Glen Burnie MD.

They broke ranks on Solomon's Island Rd, at the corner of Owensville Rd, and prepared to pitch tents in Mrs Cheston’s pasture.

They were headed for the battlefields of France.

Sam Chew, Owensville’s storekeeper, described the scene for The Baltimore Sun:

“Automobiles, carriages, wagons, and buggies, loaded with laughing girls bearing fruit, cake, confectionary, & food of every description, deposited their gifts beneath the shade of the elms and left to return again and again with the offerings of the neighborhood.

Officers were importuned to allow the boys to be entertained in the adjacent homes.”  

In one home over the hill from the camp lived a young woman, Lillian Shepherd, a school teacher.  Among the soldier boys who went to the Shepherd home that evening was Hal Nye from Montana.  A romance was kindled.  Hal and Lillian agreed to exchange letters while he was "over there".

“At dawn the next morning the sound of the bugle wafted over the West River country, and residents near the camp came down to the highway to watch the soldiers march away toward Annapolis.  After a few weeks, army transports carried the company across the Atlantic.”

Lillian and Hal Nye c1930

Seven years later Hal Nye came back to Lillian.             

On Dec 4 1924 they were married in Owensville’s Christ Church.  

The following week they boarded a train west to take up married life on Hal’s ranch.

Sam Chew wrote afterwards: “Are there still some who say that romance is dead?”

1917 Gazette news article

 

Nye gravestones at Christ Church, Owensville Md

Lightening Underfoot!

The West River Telephone Exchange opened in 1907 with 15 customers.  

Martha Welch was the Operator.  The Switchboard was in her home.  

In 1909 Martha Welch's daughter Martha Wayson became Operator.  She built an addition on her house to accommodate the ever larger switchboard.  

Irene Wayson, Martha's daughter-in-law, worked shifts at the switchboard:

    “All the young women in the village worked there at one time or another.

There were two operators on duty during the day.  Martha had the night shift.  We sat on benches.  

    "Big cables with telephone wires passed under our feet feeding lines into the switchboard which stood in front of us.  It was about 9 feet wide - you couldn’t see over it when you stood up.  It was a ‘drop’ system:  if someone was ringing the operator, the cord plugged into their socket would ‘drop’ out.

    "If a lightening storm hit some part of the district, the drops connected to the houses in that part would all drop out at once.  We’d have to scramble to put them all back quickly in case someone was trying to make a call.  Meanwhile the lightening would be running around the floor right under our feet, following the wires into the switchboard. 

   "It didn’t hurt us because we were grounded, but it didn’t feel too good either seeing that lightening running around the room!” (Irene Wayson)

West River Telephone Exchange 1940 (Doris Phibbons photo)

By 1926 there were 400 telephone customers in West River.

In 1931 the telephone company built a new house for the Switchboard.

Essie Hardesty became Operator and moved in with her family in 1933.

In 1947, modern dial equipment put the Switchboard out of business.  

The switchboard room was turned into the Post Office, and Essie became the 18th West River Postmaster, the first woman to hold the job.

William Peake's Moment

During the 1860's everyone wanted a house by William Peake Jr. 
He was the contractor of choice in the West River Country.

Peake was born in Owensville in 1837, the third of 13 children.  He attended school at the local Classical Institute.  

He became an accomplished carpenter, but more than that, he appears to have been fascinated by new trends in architecture as shown in published pattern books, such as "Villas and Cottages" by Calvert Vaux. 

In order to jumpstart his career, Peake did something clever.

He introduced the new styles to Owensville by building a stylish house for himself.  

His house featured five cross gables with enclosed Gothic arched windows, Gingerbread trim along the gable eaves, and a full width porch encasing a projecting front bay.  

William Peake's own house built c1865 

At about this same time, a proposed new rail line through West River caused a flurry of land investment and building activity.  Peake, functioning as a designer and general contractor, began rolling out new houses with Gothic Revival and Italianate flare.  Singlehandedly he changed the architectural face of the West River neighborhood.

But William Peake's moment in the sun was short lived.  Forces outside his control crushed him.  

The Financial Panic of 1873 ended hopes for the Baltimore to Drum Point Rail Line.  

After the Civil War, without slave labor, farmland lay fallow and incomes plummeted.  

There were bank failures and a second Financial Panic in 1893.  

Many in Owensville moved to Baltimore in search of work.

Wm Henry Peake Jr (1913)

   Peake's last documented job was the GrandStand at the Marlboro Fair Grounds in 1893.

   By 1897 he had lost his beloved house in Owensville and joined the exodus to Baltimore.  He lived in rental properties with his son's family, and worked on and off at carpentry.  

   After 1910 he and his wife Jennie retired to a small dwelling in Galesville, an addition to the home of her sister Carrie Weedon. 

   William died in 1920, but his picturesque stylish houses live on:

Ashland, built for William Hill 1867

Quarter Place, for Augustus Hall 1860's

Tamarack Hill, for Nathaniel Chew 1867

Farmhouse updated 1864 for James Owens 

Village house completed by 1870 for Hank Owens

Drunkards are as rare as the eclipses of the sun.

Owensville came to life in the early 1800’s when Isaac Owens established a store at a crossroads near the West River of the Chesapeake Bay.

       

1860 Martenet Tax Map of Owensville

By the 1850’s, the crossroads had become a small metropolis, with two general stores, a wheel-wright shop, a harness shop, a blacksmith, a tailor, a cobbler, a post office, two churches, a parsonage, elementary school, Masonic lodge, and The West River Classical Institute of higher learning .

The W River Institute had day and boarding students. 

Its catalog described Owensville as a place of great morality where “the visits of the inebriate are as rare as the eclipses of the sun.”

The Institute closed in 1860, 

and Christ Church began using the building as a Parish Hall for community suppers, minstrel shows, piano recitals, and Christmas entertainments. 

Sunday Schoolers used the grounds for Easter egg hunts and games of London Bridge and Blind Man’s Buff.

The building was finally torn down in 1923.  

"For awhile the tall gray building 

was missed, 

and then forgotten." 

(Kate Chew)

West River Classical Institute 1851

A Confederate Pony

     In 1838 young Dr James Murray built a house in Owensville and opened a medical practice. His great uncle, Dr William Murray, had recently retired, leaving the village without a doctor.

Js Murray's first house (photo taken 1893)

   Tragically, in 1840, James' pregnant wife fell down the stairs to the basement and died.

  Dr William's wife Harriet described the incident in a letter:

  “Death has made his appearance lately in our neighborhood in most afflicting form...  A young Physician settled himself within a half mile of us; and in November married a lovely girl... They appeared to be at the summit of human happiness, he succeeding within his business; and she to all appearance in the vigour of health;  in which state she retired for the night.  

  “About three o’clock she complained of not being well...  five o’clock she was seized with spasms... She was a corpse at the hour of eleven.  She was six month of pregnancy.  Poor dear girl!  Her husband is the picture of despair.”

  James Murray, after 2 years, remarried and built a new house all on one floor, with no basement stairs.

Js Murray's second house "Arden", built 1842  (Hiatt photo-1974)

   

  Another few years went by,

then the outbreak of the

Civil War.  

James moved his family

to Warrenton Va and

joined the Confederate 

Army as a surgeon.

    As was common during the War, the soldiers and deserters from both Armies ransacked the countryside.  

All the Murray livestock were eventually stolen, except for one pony which belonged to the children.  They smeared it with grease and claimed it had a skin disease.  
It was saved! 

In 1876 “...disaster struck”

 - Sam Chew,  storekeeper & storyteller

                 “I was born in 1874, nine years after the Great War, and when I became nineteen my father told me to go to the Store and go to work.  I never disputed my father.  He was the best man I ever knew. 

“I had read Blackstone’s ‘Short History of the English People’... 

I had read the immense volumes of  ‘The Congressional Directory 1860 to 1866’...  

I had read the burning speeches of Daniel Voorhees, Thomas Benton, and Jefferson Davis... 

“But the Village Store was where I learned the history of the West River country in which I was born.

  

Owensville Store and Post Office c1900

“It was a finishing school...  

a gathering place.

“Here could be found the justice of the peace, the carpenter, the blacksmith, the farmer, the bricklayer, the gentleman, the veteran, and the doctor.” 

The doctor around the time of the Civil War was Dr Estep Hall.

“One morning [in 1876] Dr Hall was driving to Annapolis behind a pair of spirited horses when disaster struck.  As they were descending the hill to the South River, the team became frightened and were soon beyond control of the driver.  The team galloped toward the bridge and collided with the railing throwing Dr Hall out violently, his head striking the abutment. He lived only 24 hours.  His attending physician was Dr Morris Cheston who had but recently graduated from the University of Pennsylvania.”    

In 1881 Dr Morris Cheston bought Dr Hall's house in Owensville.  He became the fifth doctor to live there. 

Dr Morris Cheston, wife Sally, and 4 children. 1893

Dr Cheston's Last Call

In 1881 Dr Morris Cheston moved into the corner house at the Owensville crossroads. 

“After breakfast each morning he would come over to the store to supply himself with Virgin Smoking Tobacco from Marburg's factory in Baltimore.  It was the brightest tobacco on the market.  He rolled his own cigarettes which he smoked incessantly.  When he came into the sick room he carried the fragrant odor of tobacco with him.

“He was the typical country doctor who mastered circumstances and delved into surgery.  He removed a cancer from the breast of one patient, and performed an emergency hernia operation on another with no light save that which came from the feeble glimmer of an oil lamp.  These operations were successful and the patients outlived him by many years.

"Kind and lovable, he was never known to turn his back on any patient, no matter how humble, poor, or unfortunate.

                           Dr Cheston's House c1900.  Door to the doctor's office is at right.

Dr Morris Cheston b1850 d1898

“The last professional call Dr Cheston made was on old Alec Pratt, a destitute ex-slave who, in the last days of his illness, sent for ‘Dr Morris’ who came willingly although hardly able to sit in his buggy.” 

                         - Recollections of Sam Chew, Storekeeper 1893-1937