Maryland Historical Magazine, 1938, Volume 33, Issue No. 4
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Vol. XXXIII DECEMBER, 1938 No. 4 MARYLAND HISTORICAL MAGAZINE <b AJ PUBLISHED BY THE MARYLAND fflSTORICAL SOCIETY ISSUED QUARTERLY ANNUAL SUBSCRIPTION,$aOO-SINGLE NUMBEBS, 75CT*, BALTIMORE Entered as Second-Claaa Matter, April 24, 1917, at the Postoffice, at Baltimore, Maryland, under the Act of August 21, 1012. THE MARYLAND HISTORICAL SOCIETY INCORPORATED 1843. H. IRVINE KETSEB MEMORIAL BCILDINQ, 201 W. MONUMENT STREET, BALTIMORE OFFICERS. Yice-President {Acting President), GEORGE L. KADCLIFEB, Y ice-Presidents J. HALL PLEASANTS, SAMUEL K. DENNIS. Corresponding Secretary, Recording Secretary, WILLIAM B. MARYE. JAMES E. HANCOCK. Treasurer, HEYWARD E. BOYCE. THE COUNCIL. THE GENEBAL OFEICERS < AND REPRESENTATIVES OF STANDING COMMITTEES: G. CORNER FENHAGEN, Representing the Trustees of the Athenaeum. W. STULL HOLT, " Committee on Publication. L. H. DIELMAN, " Committee on the Library. WILLIAM INGLE, " Committee on Finance. MRS. ROBERT F. BRENT, " Committee on Membership. LAURENCE H. FOWLER, " Committee on the Gallery. DOUGLAS H. GORDON, « Committee on Addresses. CLINTON LEVERING RIGGS, 1806-1938 President, Maryland Historical Society 1935-1938 /»54 SC 58%l~l~/3^ MARYLAND HISTORICAL MAGAZINE VOL. XXXIII. DECEMBER, 1938. No. 4. Clinton letoting Biggjs General Clinton Levering Riggs, the President of the Mary- land Historical Society, died suddenly on Sunday night, Sep- tember 11, 1938, in the Union Memorial Hospital from heart disease, in the 73rd year of his age. He was buried from his home in Baltimore on Tuesday, September thirteenth. Although he was born in New York, September 13, 1866, his family for many generations, dating back to the seventeenth century, had been identified with Maryland public and social life. His father was Lawrason Kiggs, and his mother before her marriage was Mary Turpin Bright, the daughter of Senator Jesse Bright of Indiana. His early education was acquired at St. Paul's School, Con- cord, New Hampshire. He was graduated from Princeton University in 1887 with a degree in civil engineering. While a student, he took active interest in athletics. Football and lacrosse among the manly sports especially engaged his attention. Clinton Riggs later took a post-graduate course in political economy at the Johns Hopkins University. During three years spent in the West after his graduation from Princeton, he was associated with the Chicago, Burlington and Quincy Railroad. Returning to Baltimore, he took up mechanical engineering with the Robert Poole & Son Company, and subsequently with the Detrick & Harvey Machine Company. He was Vice-President of the latter concern until he retired therefrom in 1903. 303 304 MARYLAND HISTORICAL MAGAZINE. His military career, although interrupted several times, won him high praise from his superiors and civic leaders. Elected to the Fifth Regiment, Maryland National Guard, as a second lieutenant in Company E in April, 1890, he rose in rank rapidly. He became captain of Company F in February, 1891, and was placed in command of the First Battalion with the rank of major in October, 1895. In that capacity he served with the Fifth Regiment during the Spanish-American War. General Riggs resigned from the regiment in June, 1899, and in January, 1904, he was appointed Adjutant General of Maryland by Governor Edwin Warfield. During his four-year term in office, he was one of the high-ranking officers in com- mand of the troops which guarded property in Baltimore after the great fire of 1904. His love of the service caused him to return to the ranks in 1915—this time as a private—and during a training course at the State camp at Saunders Range, he shared the burdens of the other rookies. Later he served as a colonel in the Maryland National Guard. He retired in August, 1920, with the rank of Major General. President Wilson named him a member of the Philippine Commission in the fall of 1913. Arriving at Manila in March, 1914, General Riggs acted as Secretary of Commerce and Police until he resigned the next year. Ill health caused him to return from his post in the spring of 1915, and his resignation was sent to President Wilson in June. President Wilson accepted his resignation in October. For a number of years he was President of the Riggs Build- ing Company, which operated the Latrobe Apartments, and was prominent in real estate circles. He served as President of the Real Estate Board of Baltimore, retiring in JSTovember, 1927. Later he was Treasurer of the Board, resigning that post in September, 1930. Governor Ritchie appointed him a member of the Board of Regents of the University of Maryland in December, 1933, of which Board he remained a member until his death. Active in social affairs, he entertained at his town house, CLINTON' LEVEEING EIGQS. 305 606 Cathedral Street, and on his 500 acre farm in Baltimore County, near Catonsville, with generous hospitality. His efforts, along with those of other prominent Baltimoreans, were responsible for making Fort McHenry a Goverment reser- vation commemorating the birth of " The Star Spangled Banner." His interest in his city's welfare led him to become one of the organizers of the Baltimore Criminal Justice Commission, and one of the group which revived the old Efficiency and Economy Commission, originally appointed by Mayor Jackson, and organized it on a permanent basis as the Commission on Governmental Efficiency and Economy. He was a member of the Baltimore Country Club, the Bachelor's Cotillon, the Sons of the American Eevolution, and the Society of the War of 1812. His wife, who predeceased him, was Mary Kennedy Cromwell, daughter of Richard Cromwell. He was survived by a daughter, Mrs. T. H. G. Bailliere, a son, Richard Cromwell Riggs, four grandchildren, and by four brothers, Lawrason Riggs, Jesse B. Riggs, Alfred R. Riggs and Henry G. Riggs, all of Baltimore, and all prominent in the social and business life of the city. General Riggs was elected to membership in the Maryland Historical Society April 8, 1908, on the nomination of Mendes Cohen, President of the Society at that time. He served as a member of the Council from 1921 to 1938. He was one of the Trustees of the Athenaeum from 1917-1924, and Chairman of said Trustees from 1921-1924. He was Vice-President of the Society from 1925-1934, and in 1935 he was elected to the Presidency of the Society in succession to the former deceased President, the late W. Hall Harris, and until his untimely death performed the duties of that office with marked fidelity, and presided over its meetings with dignity and graciousness of manner. He was assiduous in attending the meetings of the Society and of the Council and of the Trustees of the Athenaeum, and in all of their deliberations gave thoughtful consideration to their problems, and used his wise judgment 306 MAETLAND HISTOBICAL MAGAZINE. born of wide experience in their solution. He was cordial, genial, friendly. A man whose companionship one always found agreeable and interesting. When one whose life has been long, active, useful, whose activities have been in varied fields, who "has well served his city, his state, his country in positions of trust and responsi- bility, who has exhibited rare qualities of patriotism and citizenship, who has gained esteem of all, the affection of many and the abiding love of friends, enters the door through which some day all of us must pass, to the wider life of the hereafter, it is fitting that his earthly career should be commemorated, and it is eminently fitting that in this Maryland Historical Society where he served long and faithfully., there should be preserved a brief memorial of what he did, and what he was, and of how highly he was esteemed by its members and of their grief that in these Halls his presence will no more be seen. To this end, this minute is adopted by the Society, and it is ordered to be spread upon its records. PEIVATE MANOES : AN EDITED LIST. 307 PEIVATE MANGES: AN EDITED LIST. By DONNBLL MACCLUEB OWINGS. Although the feudal manors erected in early Maryland have long been objects of some interest, little exact information about them has been gathered.1 This consideration has led the author to submit the accompanying list of private manors and to add these informal remarks by way of preface. The list itself will suggest many problems which, in a projected book on the development of Maryland's provincial aristocracy, the author plans to discuss at some length. The manors actually erected in Maryland fall easily under two heads, those granted to private adventurers, sixty-two in all, and those taken up by the proprietary himself, about half as many. Of the latter class we have no very exact records: few certificates of survey were recorded, and no patents were drawn up. As is generally known, the manor differed from other large freeholds in that the owner, or lord, as he was called, possessed certain privileges of a feudal kind: if the manor lay in Mary- land, a special clause in his patent enabled him " to enjoy within the said Manner a Court Leet and Court Baron, with all things thereunto belonging, according to the most usual forme and custome of England. ..." 1 The oldest authority in this field, John Kilty's Land-Holder's Assistant and Land-Office Guide, Baltimore, 1808, contains a brief chapter on manors and reserved lands. John Hemsley Johnson's " Old Maryland Manors with the Records of a Court Leet and a Court Baron," Johns Hopkins Uni- versity Studies in Historical and Political Science, Series 1, no. 7, Balti- more, 1883, describes the legal aspects of the manor and prints the only record of a memorial court we have—a court held at St.