The Maryland Colonial Warrior
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THE VOLUME 45 MARYLAND WINTER NO. 1 COLONIAL 2018-2019 WARRIOR Governor’s Letter Dear Maryland Warriors: of Baltimore in the King- The Society of Colonial dom of Ireland and abso- Wars in the State of Mary- lute Lord and Proprietary land held it first plenary of the Provinces of Mary- meeting on the feast of land and Avalon in Saint Cecilia – November 22 America,” who “estab- – in 1893, to celebrate the lished in the Palatine of 260th anniversary of the de- Maryland for the first time parture from England of in the English speaking Maryland’s first colonists world freedom of religious on the Ark and the Dove. worship according to any This year’s Saint Cecilia’s Christian form and the Day therefore marks the Separation of Church and 125th anniversary of our State.” Society and 385th since our The freedom of reli- progenitors left Cowes. As gion was indeed a primary Vergil said of Rome: Governor Mortimer Sellers concern of Lord Baltimore, “Multa quoque et bello whose formal written in- passus dum conderet structions directed his urbem.” (“It took a lot of sweat and proaches we have acquired and re- brother and Maryland’s first gover- blood to build our beautiful repub- stored the bronze model for the nor, Leonard Calvert, to “be very lic.”) statue of Cecil Calvert that the So- careful to preserve unity and The simple act of trying to name ciety of Colonial Wars erected in peace” amongst all the colonists, to our Society’s “quasquicentennial” front of the Baltimore City Court- “suffer no scandal nor offense to be gathering illustrates the limited house in 1908, and which stands given” on account of religion, and grandeur of our accomplishment, there still, admired every day by all to treat all Christian sects with “as but it is notable that the length of who enter and leave our public much mildness and favor as Justice our corporate existence now nearly halls of justice. The design, casting, will permit.” This charge “to do matches that of the colonial period and installation of Calvert’s statue justice to every man without par- we celebrate. The founders of remains one of the signal accom- tiality” remained and remains the Maryland built so much of lasting plishments of our Society, and we watchword of Maryland, though value in so little time that we can have commissioned smaller bronze time has softened Calvert’s accom- never aspire to match their replicas to mark our celebration. panying strictures against Virginia achievements. At best, we can per- The carefully worded inscrip- and Virginians, concerning whom petuate the memory and accom- tion that our predecessors set on he warned we should have “as plishments of those who assisted in the plinth of Calvert’s statue edu- little to do with them as you can.” the creation and defense of Mary- cates the judges, lawyers, and citi- Calvert and his contemporaries land in her formative years. zens of Baltimore without exces- saw a striking parallel in the rela- This makes it particularly appro- sive exaggeration in the ideals of tionship of Virginia and Maryland priate that as our anniversary ap- “Cecilius Calvert, Baron Baltimore Continued on page 9 Page 2—The Maryland Colonial Warrior New Members’ Certificate By George Allen Hughes and that the new certificate should in- William Holland Wilmer III clude a brief description of the So- Last spring, Registrar Alfred ciety and its work. Gundry suggested that the Council Incorporating the new and su- of the Society of Colonial Wars in perb SCWMD emblem developed the State of Maryland (SCWMD) is- by Warrior Peter Janney Schwab, sue to new members a certificate and with the generous assistance of similar to one he received when he Governor Sellers and Warrior Jef- joined another hereditary society. frey Scott Watkins, the certificate A review of several hereditary so- that appears herewith was ap- cieties showed that at least four of proved by the Council at the Octo- the larger ones issue such member- ber meeting. ship certificates. Gov- ernor Sellers tasked the Installation Com- mittee with providing options to the Council. As the General Soci- ety can provide an elaborate certificate for about $70 in about four weeks, it was agreed that SCWMD should design a certificate that can be produced quickly and at a lower cost. It was also agreed THE MARYLAND COLONIAL WARRIOR is published by the Society of Colonial Wars in the State of Maryland Mortimer N.S. Sellers Governor Designed and printed by H./A. Heritage Publications, Inc. 410-391-2572 / e-mail: [email protected] A presentation of the colors precedes the installation of new members at the Spring Assembly The Maryland Colonial Warrior—Page 3 Historic Projects By Worthington Peter Pearre the similar restoration/conserva- Yellow Flagg 24 feet long and 16 The preamble of the Society of tion of the matching portrait of feet broad with the Union in One Colonial Wars begins with the fol- King Charles I. Corner.” lowing words: “Whereas, it is de- A grant was made to the Friends The third grant went to the His- sirable that there should be ad- of Fort Frederick to spearhead a torical Society of Gibson Island to equate celebrations commemora- campaign to erect a historically cor- continue our financial assistance tive of the events of Colonial his- rect flagpole tall enough to display with the ongoing archaeological in- tory which took place within the a correctly sized replica of Gover- vestigation of a 17th century build- period beginning with the settle- nor Horatio Sharpe's flag, which ing site. The dig is being conducted ment of Jamestown, Virginia, May was commissioned in 1755. At that by the Lost Towns Project of Anne 13, 1607, and preceding the battle time, it was described as “a Black & Arundel County. of Lexington, April 19, 1775; there- fore, The Society of Colonial Wars is instituted to perpetuate the memory of those events.” The purpose of the Historic Projects Committee is to help fulfill the pledge expressed in those words for the Society of Colonial Wars in the State of Maryland. The Committee makes recommenda- tions to the Council for funding worthy projects related to the pe- riod 1607–1775. The Council makes the final decision. Each project re- ceives an additional grant from the General Society. Past projects that have received funding in the name of our Society have ranged from the erection of a marble tablet in the nave of St. Giles-in-the-Fields in London in memory of Cecilius Calvert to the dendrochronology of the Beatty- Cramer House in Frederick County for determining its date of con- struction. This year the Society partici- pated in the funding of three projects. We completed our two consecu- tive-year grants to the Friends of Two views of Fort Frederick the Maryland Archives for the res- toration/conservation of the por- trait of Queen Henrietta Maria, for whom our State was named. The work has been completed, and the portrait will be returned to the State House in the near future. Our funding provided the impetus for Page 4—The Maryland Colonial Warrior A New Emblem for Our Society not include the red and white century was the “black and yel- Crossland Arms. The Crossland low” Calvert Banner. Maryland’s Arms represents the maternal side current state flag consists of both of the Calvert family and was not the Calvert and Crossland Arms generally used by the Colony or quartered, officially adopted by the known to its inhabitants. Our new General Assembly of Maryland in emblem highlights the Arms of 1904. George Calvert, first Baron (Lord) In his booklet “Flags and Seals of Baltimore, in “black and yellow” Maryland and the United States” (in heraldry, these colors are desig- (1975), our Society’s former Gover- nated “Sable and Or”). Calvert was nor Frederick T. Wehr refers to the granted this coat of arms in 1625 as Calvert Banner, stating that a reward for service by King James “Leonard Calvert carried it when I, and it was Maryland’s recog- he fought the Virginians at Kent Is- nized symbol during the colonial land in 1637” and “Again in 1655 at period. The shilling and arms illus- the Battle of the Severn the ‘black By Peter Janney Schwab trations below demonstrate this. and yellow’ was displayed. Refer- At its October 4, 2018 meeting, It is of interest to note that Mary- ences of the same flag appear in the the Council of the Society of Colo- land also adopted and used two records for 1741 and 1750.” nial Wars in the State of Maryland other Great Seals during the colo- (SCWMD) enthusiastically adopted nial period, which featured the a new alternative graphic emblem Royal Cyphers of William and for the Society’s use. The reasons Mary (1692) and Queen Anne for adopting the new emblem are (1706). threefold: to provide a strong, new image that appeals to new mem- bers; to provide a colorful alterna- tive design to the original, all-red seal; and to incorporate authentic symbols relevant to Maryland’s co- The Union Flag 1606 / 1707 lonial military heritage that were actually used by Maryland’s Colo- On April 12, 1606, the National nial Era warriors. Flags of Scotland and England The original red seal features the were united for use at sea. A royal quartered Calvert and Crossland decree declared that the ships of Arms taken from the 1634-48 Great the Kingdom of Great Britain "shall The Calvert Arms Banner Seal of Maryland. This will remain bear on their maintops the red our Society’s official historic seal.