"The devil is in the details"

Probably the greatest challenge facing any Archives is acquiring the resources necessary to properly store and make accessible its holdings whether on paper or electronic.  The Maryland State Archives is no exception.  Recently the Baltimore Sun featured our efforts to find space for the Baltimore City Archives to salvage a much neglected collection that reached back to the days of the founding of the city in the first decades of the 18th century, and included such much damaged treasures as all the details that went into the defense against the assault of the British in 1814.

One such detail was the moldy, water stained, and vermin eaten letter of the then Governor Winder, writing to Baltimore City Mayor Edward Johnson delegating his military authority to the General on the spot, Samuel Smith, as well as the assurance that he was doing everything within his power to supply the defenses of the town.  We saved the letter just in time before it disappeared altogether.

In our efforts to save Baltimore City's records, we were fortunate in getting a grant from the National Historical Publications and Records Commission to catalog on line what had survived and indeed images of this letter are also on line along with all the records we are finding that relate to the War of 1812 in which Baltimore played a key role in defining the future of America as we know it, as well as providing us with the inspiration for our National Anthem.

With the help of the city we also got some breathing room with regard to absorbing the annual demand for transferring permanent state records (about 6,000 cubic feet of records a year) and the pending state backlog (24,000 cubic feet).  The storage space is not ideal for archival records, nor are the other three warehouses where together we store over half of the archival heritage of the State.  As of this writing, we are out of space altogether and cannot take on anything more than a few more small transfers.  In terms of future efforts to understand the origins and development of public policy and the search for community and family roots, we are in crisis. A democracy cannot survive without a transparency in government that extends to the historical record and the ability to reflect on how to effectively build upon past successes while avoiding past mistakes.

At this point the question might arise as to why, instead of saving so much paper, we do not just scan and destroy to save space.  While we do scan and deliver images of our paper holdings as the research needs arise, the cost to scan wholesale and destroy the paper is vastly more expensive than properly storing them in an archival facility, not to mention that an image of a paper record cannot economically address all the issues of authenticity such as watermarks and the traces of intentional forgery.  It is true that one day we may be  a truly paperless government and our archives of the future all born digital records, but we seem to have a long way to go before that happens.

To date we have proposed two plans for the storage and access to our archival heritage  which I will call Plan A and Plan B.  Plan A, carefully researched and documented, called for the extension of our present facilities, largely underground, with public park above. I still think it the best approach and the best idea, but in these tough economic times it is simply unaffordable.   Plan B is to build or purchase and renovate a remote facility. It is an idea we broached several years ago with the Hall of Records Commission, modeled on the well-designed facility built by Johns Hopkins in Howard County as remote storage for their library system.

We returned to it with careful attention to what the private sector may have to offer, especially in a soft commercial real estate market for lease and/or purchase.  Our conclusions and detailed recommendations are now lodged with the Department of Budget and Planning.  Our hope is that they will be released very soon in response to the requirement of last year's Joint Chairman's report.  Our argument there is that for approximately $15,000,000 the State should purchase and renovate to archival standards a commercially built warehouse large enough to accommodate our projections of the accumulation of permanent archival records through the next 15 years, including consolidation from our current warehousing, and not renewing our expensive leases for non-archival commercial warehouse space as they expire.   In making this recommendation, we recognize that, given a robust records management program in all State and Local agencies, the private sector can more efficiently and cost effectively store and destroy temporary records.  Our recommendation for State owned and operated space extends only to the permanent historical records of the state so that, for example,  the proceedings of the legislature and the governor's correspondence of the future (both paper and electronic), do not suffer as Governor Winder's letter did.

We also need to do better by the employees who are  critical to the operations of the Archives.  At present approximately half are contractual, of whom a large number have worked hard and well for us for many years. We have proposed a plan of contractual conversion and have every hope that this year it will be adopted, especially because it is funded, not by general funds, but by special fund income derived from the archival services we provide at a reasonable cost to assist in the creation and maintenance of permanent records. For example, special fund income supported our creating one of the most successful cost effective electronic archives in the country, and is sufficient to fund contractual conversions.

While the basic infra structure of housing and caring for the Archival Heritage of Maryland is a cost most effectively and least expensively met by a State owned and operated facility, much of the value added work of the Archives can be and is supported through grants and the generous donations of private individuals.  Most recently our efforts to utilize the archival resources of the State to document the lives of slaves and those who claimed them as property have been supported by two significant grants from the U. S. Department of Education.  This has resulted not only in a remarkable research web site, but also a traveling exhibit that has excited public interest in, and additional support for, research and writing (http://www.mdslavery.net/exhibit/html/index.html).

Because of the down turn in the economy, however, there will be far less federal grant money, if any, available to help continue the work of  http://mdslavery.net. We are redoubling our efforts to find other sources of funding from the private and non-profit sector.

We do continue to receive gifts of manuscripts and funds for the restoration of a very small portion of our art and artifact collections.  Take for example the portrait of Governor Winder which is typical of the need for care and maintenance of all the artwork for which we are accountable.  With the assistance of the Senate the portrait was conserved and is now on display in the State House.

We are also grateful for the support for public exhibits such as the funding that came last year for restoration of the Old Senate Chamber and exhibits in the restored Old House of Delegates Chamber.  To compliment that funding, we have raised $200,000 in private funds for the building of an exhibit for the State House featuring Washington's draft of his resignation speech as commander in chief, and recently have been given a $20,000 manuscript letter that details the British reaction to all the effort that Governor Winder, General Samuel Smith, Mayor Edward Johnson, and the citizens of Baltimore put into defeating the superior naval and ground forces that attacked Baltimore in September of 1814. In part Sir Pulteney Malcolm, Vice Admiral, writes his wife Clementia from aboard the British Frigate Royal Oak, just after the battle and his good friend General Ross has been killed by sniper fire:

Our Army defeated the Americans but on their approach to Baltimore they found it defended by a strong entrenched Camp with double their numbers to defend it – we had got within shot of the Batteries – but they had sunk ships to prevent our approach – our Bombs could only throw Shells into the Forts[.] they could not reach the Town – Sir. A. Cochrine [Cochrane] was in the [frigate] Surprise and your friend in the Sea Horse with [Captain James] Gordon as fine a fellow as ever step’d[.]

 

It became a question wither the Camp should be stormed – it was considered that we might force the works, but that our loss would be more than our little Army could stand – it was therefore resolved to retreat which they did and embarked without molestation – If the General had lived he would have retreated, and there is only this to be said that on approaching Baltimore it was found to[o] strong and we [gave up] the enterprise having beat a superior force on the road

The Friends of the Maryland State Archives are actively working on behalf of the Archival program and are directly funding projects that get the word out about the importance and value of the State's Archival Heritage. Apart from raising the funds for the exhibit case for the Washington document and a member of the board giving the funds to acquire the British reaction to their Baltimore defeat, the Friends are funding a number of publications, one of which goes to the theme that if we want to learn anything new and possibly instructive about ourselves and our past, we need to pay close attention to the preservation and close examination of the details contained within our collections.

Indeed, as with all of the story of public policy and of history generally, the delight can be found in the archival details that are often overlooked and too often subject to neglect, such as once was the case with Governor Winder's 1814 letter.  For example, reams have been written about the U. S. Constellation and the controversy still rages in some quarters as to whether the current interpretation of that Baltimore City harbor attraction is correct.  In writing the narrative for a new Friends of the Maryland State Archives publication entitled "Views of Baltimore and Beyond" I found that one  of the maps from a private collection that was loaned to illustrate the book, had never been examined closely enough.  It was drawn ca. 1796 by a French expatriate engineer, and is the very first true topographical map of the city, a detail that currently is of great interest to those who are trying to recreate virtually what Baltimore was like during the War of 1812 to parallel their widely acclaimed reconstruction of Washington at the time the British burned the White House and the Capitol.  Imagine the surprise and delight to find that the engraver had added another detail over looked by the Constellation scholars: the very first known image of the U. S. Constellation, apparently firing a salute to the City just off Federal Hill.

Saving the details of the past in a reasonable program of appraisal and retention, providing a safe and secure housing for their care and retrieval, must be the primary publicly funded priority of any Archives.  Just how important those details can be was just recently the subject of another front page article in the Sun entitled "Laying Claim,"  that was published on February 1, 2012.

Because the Maryland State Archives has saved and cared for all of the surviving detailed records relating to the ownership of land in Maryland (the largest single component of our archival holdings), the Boy Scouts of Maryland may well be able to acquire and preserve a hitherto unowned tract of land in the midst of their Harford County campground, assuming they have mastered the details to win their argument before the Commissioner of Land Patents who happens to also be the State Archivist, an additional title that traces its origins back to the very first systematic keeper of the detailed public records of Maryland, the Second Lord Baltimore's chancellor for Maryland, Philip Calvert, his younger brother.

The old saying that "the devil is in the details" means that it is hard work and not without expense to extract answers from the historical record, but if we fail to even save the record, not only will we be without answers, we will lack the wisdom necessary to even ask the right questions.

Our archival heritage is at risk. We need your help both vocally and financially.
If you have found our on line and in person services at http://mdsa.net of use and important to you, you can make a donation in any amount on line to the Friends of the Maryland State Archives: https://shop1.mdsa.net/Donation/donate.cfm
You can also be vocal by writing directly to the governor, the comptroller and to the Maryland legislature,  including the Speaker of the House and the President of the Senate.  You will find their email addresses on our http://mdelect.net web site.

Candlesticks, Mark Twain and the Public Memory

Our archival heritage is at risk. We need your help both vocally and financially.

If you have found our on line and in person services at http://mdarchives.net of use and important to you, you can make a donation in any amount on line to the Friends of the Maryland State Archives: https://shop1.mdsa.net/Donation/donate.cfm

You can also be vocal by writing directly to the governor, the comptroller and to the Maryland legislature,  including the Speaker of the House and the President of the Senate.  You will find their email addresses on our http://mdelect.net web site.  If you are a Maryland resident, you can also determine who represents you in the legislature by your address.

The principal responsibility and legally mandated mission of the Maryland State Archives is to be the safe, reliable, and accountable repository of the State's public memory, accessible to all at as little cost for access as possible. It should be at the Archives where you can reflect on and build upon the lessons learned about what ought to be government's role in protecting the lives and livelihoods of it citizens, and to sharpen our personal understanding of our origins and obligations, both as citizens and as family members in search of our roots. As President Lincoln wisely pointed out, we need to reach to those the mystic chords of memory that touch the better angels of our nature. Those who remain ignorant of their past, be it personal or public, will wander lost through life, susceptible to the mob rule of others as ignorant and self-destructive as they are to themselves. Yet if we do not now provide the professional care and archival storage for our public memory we will be left with only candlesticks and no candles to light our way.

We can and do find some resources to restore some artifacts, such as this restored Garrett County sponsored candlestick from the State's Artistic property inventory. It, which along with the rest of the silver that the citizens of Maryland including countless school children with their pennies, purchased, was given to the Cruiser Maryland in a gala ceremony at the Annapolis dock in 1906. Money can always be found to polish silver, but apparently not to hold on to the memories of those who lovingly bought it, and gave it for the use of the officers and crew of first the Cruiser and then the Battleship Maryland. My favorite photograph of the U. S. S. Maryland, is of her, injured, but steaming forth out of the chaos of Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941 to do her duty.

Photo #: 80-G-19949 Pearl Harbor Attack, 7 December 1941
USS Maryland (BB-46) alongside the capsized USS Oklahoma (BB-37).
USS West Virginia (BB-48) is burning in the background.
Official U.S. Navy Photograph, National Archives collection

In many ways as State Archivist, in charge of keeping the public memory, I feel like a member of the crew on that valiant ship on that fateful day, not knowing how we will navigate our way out of the troubles we are in, but certain that we must and we can.

Records and Artifact Storage. While the Maryland State Archives has suitable storage capacity for paper records totaling 168,680 cubic feet, in its custody are 359,633 cubic feet of record material. Of these, some 190,963 cubic feet are stored in spaces ill-suited and even detrimental to their long-term preservation. Indeed, problems relating to records management in general and the Archives in particular have only gotten worse with time. The same is true for our extensive art collection which is ill housed and for which we have limited special fund resources for restoration of only a few of the treasures in our charge.

Since 2005, when the Archives first requested a capital allowance for records storage, the amount of space suitable to house permanent records has remained the same. The Archives’ main facility in Annapolis – the only suitable facility available – was filled to capacity (168,680 cubic feet) in the year 2000. Since that time, the Archives has taken on an additional 190,953 cubic feet of records. Thus, nearly 200,000 cubic feet of records - - well over half of the State’s total permanent holdings - - are housed in rented facilities that are totally unsuitable.

For the long-term preservation of record material and fine art, environmental control is vitally important. The impact of temperature, relative humidity, air quality/pollution, and light has been studied and recognized the world over. The lack of temperature and humidity controls at the adjunct warehouses of the Archives, without question, puts record material at risk. The consequence of inaction is the degradation and ultimate destruction of Maryland records and fine art.

Staffing and Succession Planning. Like many state agencies. The Archives has had difficulty over the years in retaining qualified staff. It has become quite routine for IT staff and junior archivists to get their training at the Archives and then move on to higher paying jobs. We know we will never be able to compete with the salaries of the federal government or that of the private sector, but our problem is seriously exacerbated by the fact that most of our junior professional staff do not have “PIN” positions with benefits. The real dilemma this portends for the future will be compounded by the fact that there are many of our senior staff who are now, or will be soon, eligible for retirement. Without trained, experienced junior staff to replace them, the Archives as an institution is in peril, not unlike the U.S.S. Maryland at Pearl Harbor.

At our last budget hearing, the budget analyst  asked that we address what we can do to rectify the critical storage problems we face right now. I have no easy answer. We have maxed out our ability to raise special funds. So much of what we have been able to earn through our entrepreneurial on line services has already been sucked away to pay for substandard warehouse rent. The short response is that in the short run we must have a direct appropriation for rent of a storage facility that meets minimal archival standards just to accommodate the permanent records that are sitting in expensive agency office space or are being thrust upon us because of the downsizing of government. Where will that come from? It is not allocated in this budget before you and I know of no private angel of mercy who will fund it for us, even though I have indeed tried to find one. The last time I tried unsuccessfully, Bernie Madoff had a great deal to do with why I was turned down. Perhaps by taking but a small amount from every other priority that is funded throughout the budget, a reallocation to us for temporary archival storage can be achieved while we await better times and a capital appropriation?

While we also realize that we must do more with less, we can't do anything if we do not have a core professional staff to manage our collections and to seek out new sources of special fund revenue, while maintaining the flow of what we already have which currently amounts to about 80% of what it cost to maintain our current inadequate level of storage and service.

This is not to say that we have not re-thought our staffing goals and reduced them significantly through the creative use of volunteers and utilization of what is called a 'cloud' approach to storing, indexing and accessing our records. What I mean by a 'cloud' is a techy term related to sharing resources privately and publicly owned. For example, our pioneering efforts to share electronic storage with a consortium of Libraries and State Archives, because of the leadership role we have played in creating a true electronic archives, should result in significant on-going support from the rest of partners for storing their collections in our electronic archives facilities.

Just recently the Library of Congress interviewed me as a digital pioneer, the pod cast of which was to be released on Valentine's Day. While I am flattered, what that means is that Maryland has been recognized by those in the business of preserving and making accessible electronic information as a leader in coming to grips with the storage and retrieval of permanent electronic records. Our on-line access to all the land records ever recorded in Maryland (at least those that survived court house fires) has no peer and is looked upon as a model electronic archival system. I fervently hope that what we have accomplished is not undermined by our inability also to properly care for the permanent paper records and artifacts poorly stored or awaiting transfer.
Despite the worrisome outlook for the proper care and management of our paper and artifact holdings, we do continue to deliver a very high level of service to the public and public agencies. Just a glance at the statistics of service accompanying our budget each year proves that point.

We also have an active Friends group that in small but meaningful ways assists us in salvaging records for public use that would otherwise be lost, and with helping us properly interpret the treasures in our collections. To date they have raised about half the funds necessary to exhibit Washington's draft of his speech that he gave in the Old Senate Chamber on December 23, 1783, establish firmly the principal of the primacy of the Civil Authority in our Republic. I was proud to be able to display that speech to Mrs. Obama and members of the Obama family last summer. Now all we need is to complete the work of the capital appropriation to restore the Chamber that the President of the Senate successfully sponsored last session.


A year ago the Friends of the Maryland State Archives came to the rescue of a fine private collection of records relating the history of Baltimore City, including this rare original Seaman's certificate which documents the beginning of the sailing career of a St. Mary's county mulatto by the name of Allen Thomas. Note the poignancy of what the document makes clear. He was 'free' but definitely not a citizen. That would take a civil war and for successive generations of his brethren, decades of struggle in and out of the courts for civil rights, a public record that we cannot afford to lose, yet is in danger if we don't store it well.


Mark Twain with Governor Warfield at Government House, May 1907

I suspect that by now you may be wondering where Mark Twain fits into all this discussion of preserving the public memory.

A year after the school children of Maryland labored to help pay for the Battleship Maryland Silver Service (which we will soon have on display again in the State House thanks to the generosity of the Senate and private donors) Mark Twain came to Annapolis, straight from his bed where he had been dictating his autobiography to his secretary Miss Lyon (Mrs. Twain was long dead but fondly remembered).
Twain's visit and the humor he dispensed on the occasion was widely reported in the newspapers of the day from Maine to Texas and beyond.

Twain came to raise money for the First Lady's favorite cause, her Presbyterian Church in Annapolis, which needed a new roof. The desire to hear from Twain was so great that his after dinner speech was moved from the Governor's Mansion to the recently dedicated, new House of Delegates Chamber, the one still in use today. He regaled the crowd with story after story. Peals of laughter filled the chamber as he told of the day he drowned, the watermelon he stole, and the tale of the drunken sailor who at the end of the story was heard through the darkness explaining to his wife “with a fervent, appropriate, and pious ejaculation. “God help the poor sailors out at sea.”.”

As was nearly always with Mark Twain, under the humor lay a serious message. It was a message of the importance of memory; remembering the good and evil that has befallen us, with humor yes, but as lessons not to be forgotten.

Take his memory of his life near Hannibal Missouri on the farm of his Uncle, John Quarles. And what he learned about slavery.

There was … one small incident of my boyhood days which touched this matter [of slavery] and it must have meant a good deal to me or it would not have stayed in my memory, clear and sharp, vivid and shadowless, all these slow-drifting years. We had a little slave boy whom we had haired from some one there in Hannibal. He was from the Eastern Shore of Maryland, and had been brought away from his family and his friends, half way across the American continent, and sold. He was a cheery spirit, innocent and gentle, and the noisiest creature that ever was, perhaps. All day long he was singing, whistling, yelling, whooping laughing –it was maddening, devastating, unendurable. At last one day, I lost my temper, and went raging to my mother, and said Sandy had been singing for an hour without a single break, and I couldn't stand it, and wouldn't she please shut him up. The tears came into her eyes, and her lip trembled, and she said something like this--
“Poor thing, when he sings, it shows that he is not remembering, and that comforts me; but when he is still, I am afraid he is thinking, and I cannot bear it. He will never see his mother again; if he can sing, I must not hinder it, but be thankful for it. If you were older, you would understand me; then that friendless child's noise would make you glad.”
It was a simple speech, and made up of small words, but it went home, and Sandy's noise was not a trouble to me any more.

One bit of good news that I am pleased to share  is that because of our efforts to document the history of slavery in Maryland, The U. S. Department of Education has awarded us us a grant of $739,000 over three years to continue our research on the this history slavery on Maryland's Eastern Shore. That in essence means that we can continue to have a nationally recognized research program without any significant drain on the general fund. (See: The Capitol, for 2/3/2010, http://www.hometownannapolis.com/news/top/2011/02/03-26/State-archivists-uncover-stories-of-slavery.html).

Paul W. Gillespe — The Capital: Chris Haley, director of the Study of the Legacy of Slavery in Maryland at the Maryland State Archives, and research archivist Maya Davis look over 150-year-old copies of the Baltimore American and Commercial Advertiser, where the news item about Harriet Tubman was discovered.


As to Mark Twain, he left Annapolis earlier than planned for his bed at home in New York, and further dictation to Miss Lyon of his autobiography, the complete edition of which he insisted could only be published 100 years after his death, largely because of the truthful things he said about a lot of people. So far only the first volume has been published, making it in 735 pages to dictation in 1906. I can hardly wait to read what he had to say about his Annapolis sojourn and Mrs. Warfield's benefit in 1907, but at least the prospects of doing so are near at hand. He saw to the recording and preservation of his memories. We must do the same with our public memory. We must find the resources to preserve, protect, and to access those memories to maintain our sense of mission, accomplishment, and humor in public affairs. I can but give what I believe is good advice and advocate for what I believe ought to be done as the Custodian of the State's public memory. I and the staff can only be as successful if the literally hundreds of thousands of people who use our on-line resources take to the virtual streets through tweets, blogs, and email to convince our executive and legislative leaders that it is imperative that they help us find the resources to meet the archival challenge of preserving and making freely accessible the collective memory of  the past.

A generation which ignores history has no past and no future.
Robert Heinlein, The Notebooks of Lazurus Long
US science fiction author (1907 - 1988)

"The mystic chords of memory, stretching from every battlefield and patriot grave to every living heart and hearthstone all over this broad land, will yet swell the chorus of the Union, when again touched, as surely they will be, by the better angels of our nature." Abraham Lincoln, First Inaugural Address.

Days to Remember: December 7 and December 9

Quentin Massys, The Holy Kinship, 1509, Brussels Museum

This year the fall meeting of the Hall of Records Commission of the Maryland State Archives is on December 9, Saint Anne's day. One of my favorite paintings, appropriate  for this holiday season, is an alter piece dedicated to St. Anne by Quentin Massys, commissioned in 1507 for a chapel in St. Peter's, Louven, and installed in 1509.  I like to think that it or a description of it given in a homily, may have inspired a member of the Mynne family to name their daughter Anne, and she in turn inspired her husband, George Calvert, to found a colony in the new world.  Indeed, it is the primary purpose of an archives to provide reliable, accountable, sources of information about the public and private contributions of family members to the world as it was, and to provide a path to understanding what it will come to be.

Anne Mynne Calvert died in 1621, eleven years before her son received the charter to Maryland from King Charles, and is entombed at St. Mary's Church in a small village, Hertingfurdbury, outside of London. She lies there peacefully in marble, flanked by the coats of arms of her family and that of her husband, the Calverts, with their shields joined together in the mantle above.

Anne Mynne Calvert's Tomb, courtesy of Tom Coakley

If you look closely at the detail of the lower left of the center panel, of Massys's alter piece devoted to St. Anne, now in the Brussels museum, you will find the the buttoned cross of the Mynne coat of Arms that now adorns the Maryland flag and the tomb of Anne Mynne.

 

St. Anne, the mother of Mary and the grandmother of Jesus, is usually depicted with a book or books, and in this case is clearly dispensing learning through reading and quiet contemplation.  It is that transfer of culture through reading and reflection of the permanent records of the past that is the principal goal of an archives and the singular challenge of being an archivist. 

The problem is that there is a perception of a debilitating scarcity of resources for archives, and the increasing feeling by those who are archivists, or think they want to be archivists, that their days are numbered, much like those of the dinosaurs watching the Ark depart without them in this greeting card cartoon of Dan Regan's.

Cartoon for Hallmark Cards by Dan Regan

Just recently a humorous video appeared on the internet that carried with it a serious message of an additional widespread feeling of under appreciation for professional archivists and the work we do:

The unsettling reminder of how bad the fiscal situation may be appeared Sunday, December 5,  in the New York Times, as a front page article,  Mounting State Debts Stoke Fears of a Looming Crisis  http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/05/us/politics/05states.htm. It was distributed the following day in a message from Governor Martin O'Malley to all employees of the State of Maryland in which he encouraged us all to "address these budget challenges and protect our priorities."  The Times article featured a scandal involving a failed incinerator in Harrisburg, PA which might yet lead to the largest municipal bankruptcy in history.  The photograph accompanying the web version of the article speaks with more than one meaning to me.  My son was instrumental in calling public attention to the corruption that infused the incinerator scandal..

Harrisburg, Pa., incinerator

When we permit the squandering of what fiscal resources we have through unwarranted hubris and corruption, and neglect preserving the records that make transparency in government at all levels possible, we are bound to get what we deserve.  When we fail to instruct our children and our grandchildren in the necessity of not only preserving the record, but also taking time to critically think and reflect upon it, we lose our souls as family and as a nation. The Governor is urging all of us to carefully shepherd what resources we have and to work hard to do better with less.   It is a hard pill to swallow, but one with a cure if we act wisely and in the spirit of St. Anne.

To the Governor's message might be added another front page New York Times article of December 7, Pearl Harbor Day, Top Scores From Shanghai Stun Experts. The accompanying table of international scores makes it clear, as the Governor has on more than one occasion, that as a nation and as a state, we must provide more than lip service to better educating our children and our grandchildren.  In doing so we as archivists also must assist in strengthening the message that archives are a critical source of useful knowledge and thoughtful contemplation, a vital resource intended to strengthen reading, writing, and analytical skills fundamental to the survival of our culture.

St. Anne reminds us how we can "protect" our archival priorities, if we work together to demonstrate the intrinsic cultural value of the records entrusted to our custody and care.

In practical terms, the Maryland State Archives faces some tough challenges ahead.  To survive and protect our mission as the chief source of reliable public information about the history of Maryland from earliest times to the present, we must constantly re-think how we go about preserving the historical record in as accessible and meaningful way as possible with a smaller, core staff of managers working with an expanded volunteer and short-term contractual staff.

All available management resources will have to be dedicated to

1) enlarging the base of functions and staff that are supported by dedicated revenue streams and not direct appropriations of tax dollars.  That will require raising public awareness of the importance of public archives and mounting a solicitation campaign for support not unlike the fund raising of public broadcasting and recent political campaigns that reaches out to the public at large for web-based donations large and small. It will also require more aggressive marketing of our scanning services and electronic archives  to government agencies on a fee basis that is competitive with the private sector. 

2) moving as much record material on line as quickly as possible at as little cost to the archives and the user as possible, following the Wikipedia model of relying on the public to assist in interpreting and adding value to the historical information in our care, as well as providing voluntary contributions to sustain it.

3) focusing staff time on income generating projects including private fund raising, grant writing, appraisal, and research projects designed to highlight the quality and importance of the records in the context of how they might be more effectively accessed by individuals and community oriented organizations.  Archivists, as much as they would like, cannot write the history, they can only hope to explain better the resources for historical and policy research, engaging the public in reading and writing about them, much like St. Anne is depicted with her grandchildren.

4) convincing the powers that be in government that it is in the economic best interest of the State to move all permanent electronic records at their creation into the joint custody of the Archives, if for no other reason than economies of scale, and true disaster recovery, while continuing  within the policies of the Archives a sensible program of timed release of public information that meets the policy planning and security needs of the public and the state.  By re-allocating to a centrally maintained, publicly owned electronic file system at the State Archives (sensibly distributed to more than one location), a very small portion of current public expenditure on privately owned, separate and poorly integrated paperless information systems that have proliferated in State Government, millions of dollars of current government expenditures could be saved while 'protecting' and sustaining the essential mission of the Archives.

5) seeking cooperative ways in which our storage and preservation needs can be met, without the large impact on the capital budget that we have already proposed.   By combining forces with other private and public institutions who have similar electronic information, book, and record storage issues similar to ours, we may well be able to build a safe and secure facility that will meet our storage and preservation needs for far less than seeking to go it alone.  An example might be to reduce our current capital budget request to encompass revitalization of an existing storage and reference facility that could serve both the State's archival storage needs and those of Baltimore City, in a way that also benefited the stability and future of the Maryland Historical Society.  Indeed it might be the first of cooperatively run regional storage and access facilities for permanent public records around the State that benefited and helped reduce the costs of county and local government record keeping.

The lesson of St. Anne to Archivists for this troubled holiday season is that our future as professional archivists lies in how effectively we enlist the grandparents of this generation in helping us reach their grandchildren and beyond with the stories and lessons to be learned from the often fragmentary records of the past. How we do that is up to us making the best of what limited resources we have.  If, as archivists, we are to shed the stereotype of the custodian pushing the crated ark of the covenant into the vast recesses of an inaccessible warehouse,

we need to help ourselves, and the public we serve by doing better with less, steaming forth like the Battle Ship Maryland at Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941. If so, we will emerge from the smoke of battle, resolute and capable of sustaining the fight for a well-informed republic based on a well-documented record of its past.

Photo #: 80-G-19949

Pearl Harbor Attack, 7 December 1941

USS Maryland (BB-46) alongside the capsized USS Oklahoma (BB-37).
USS West Virginia (BB-48) is burning in the background.

Official U.S. Navy Photograph, National Archives collection

Follow the Yellow Brick ....

A long lost Maryland Admiralty Case found in Sweden
leads back to Zekiah Swamp

[http://www.worthpoint.com/worthopedia/one-17th-century-yellow-dutch-brick-new-york]

At 17th and 18th century archaeological sites around the Chesapeake Bay are to be found yellow bricks of Dutch and Swedish origin. 

I was first introduced to yellow brick by Al Luckenbach and Julia King, two distinguished archaeologists.  Al was the first to thoroughly explore and expound the argument that even though there were navigation acts promulgated by the British prohibiting Swedish and Dutch trade in the Bay during the second half of the 17th Century, the trade flourished anyway. He had the Dutch tiles and bricks to prove it.  It turns out that even Jacob Leisler, the ill-fated rebel and resident of  the former Dutch colony, New Amsterdam,  may have owned land in Maryland, and, according to British rules, traded illegally in the Bay, although it is not clear that he sold yellow brick.

The Second Lord Baltimore, Cecil Calvert, (1605-1675) was under considerable pressure from the Board of Trade in London to enforce the Navigation Acts, and in 1673, his son and Governor, Charles Calvert, convened a court of Admiralty to condemn a Swedish ship, the Burgh of Stade, that had brought 50,000 Swedish [yellow] bricks to sell in Maryland. There is no record of the case in Maryland, and none has been found in England, but Professor Steve Murdoch found notarized copies of the court proceedings in the Archives of Sweden. Under the old calendar, which did not begin the New Year until March, the trial was convened on February 18, 1672/3, at Manahowick Neck on the Wicomico River, the boundary between Charles and St. Mary's counties, probably at the home of Thomas Notley, attorney for the Swedes, where the brick had been unloaded.  Notley's residence is shown on Augustine Herrman's 1676 map as Natly, on the St. Mary's county side of the river.

(Click on the map to see the details.  This excerpt is from the
Library of Congress's copy of Herrman's 1670 survey) 

I inquired of Julie King what she thought of the 50,000 yellow bricks:

I am not sure that anyone was building one big yellow brick house, but ... yellow brick occurs in great quantity [along] the Wicomico.  I assumed that it was being acquired & used in the way Al Luckenbach has written about for AA Co -- to dress up a fireplace or other architectural feature.  At Westwood Manor, built c. 1680, there is a lot of yellow brick, and red brick and floor tile as well.  That collection is owned privately, but the owner allowed my students & me to borrow it to create a catalog.  What is interesting (and we saw no signs of reused brick), is that while Al prescribes two sizes of brick, and I believe the two sizes have been found at St. Mary's City, only the larger size was recovered from Westwood Manor.  Fendall's house (which was subsequently occupied by Digges in 1683) also has quite a bit yellow brick; but more red brick, as at Westwood manor.

And Notley Hall, the site of which is known, is reported to have had yellow brick, but it has not been systematically tested.

In contrast -- Ed Chaney's & my excavations at Mattapany (Patuxent, Lord B) generated a small smattering of yellow brick -- 752 pieces, with 261,000 fragments of red brick.  A smattering of yellow brick was recovered at Compton (1650s-60s), as was a lot of Dutch pottery.  And, almost no yellow brick whatsoever on the south shore of the Potomac.

Al Luckenbach found 10,000 pieces of yellow brick at a site in Anne Arundel County.

What does this all mean?  ... I certainly can't say where those 50,000 brick ended up.  But... what is clear, yellow brick -- wherever it was coming from -- was sought after by those building in the Wicomico, and it became part of the landscape signifying wealth, and status and perhaps political power as well, although Thomas Gerard Jr, Josias Fendall, and Thomas Notley were not always on the same side. 

It must have been quite a landscape then, coming up the Wicomico, seeing fairly grand structures on either side, with Westwood House at the top of Allen's Fresh.  There are 17th century sites up in the Zekiah -- Moore's Lodge comes to mind, with the court house, its race track, and fancy floor tiles (although testing was limited).  We do know the ordinary keeper there was serving lemonade.  A couple miles further north, the assemblages look different yet again, and then, just above that, Piscataway [Indian]territory (email to ecp, 11/10/2010 8:10 AM)

Professor Murdoch, with his co-authors Edward M. Furgol and Angelo Forte, first published their findings in a Swedish journal, Forum navale, Nr. 60, 2004, pp. 94-113, and have provided a revised version with transcript which is available on line, along with the images of the original documents taken by Professor Murdoch.

(First page of the notarized transcript in the Swedish Archives, 

courtesy of Steve Murdoch)

The documents in Sweden provide an interesting puzzle for Maryland historians, especially those expert in admiralty law. The definitive work on courts of admiralty in colonial Maryland is  Courts of Admiralty in Colonial America, The Maryland Experience, 1634-1776, by David R. Owen and Michael C. Tolley. They include an appendix of every admiralty case they could find from the Maryland and British records that related to Maryland  (appendix A, pp. 237-337), but there is a curious gap between 1671 and 1676 into which the Burgh of Stadt case falls.

Features the Dove, by Peter Egli

I have an untested theory that the gap was deliberate, and represents an effort by the Second Lord Baltimore to assert the admiralty powers of his charter in new courts of admiralty which were based upon the extensive admiralty jurisdiction of the Bishopric of Durham.  After Cecil's death in 1675, his son Charles hastened home to defend his charter, and the administration of admiralty law  reverted back to the Provincial Court, thereby abandoning his father's wish that there be a separate admiralty court .

Whatever the answer is for the period from 1672-1675 as far as admiralty cases are concerned, the navigation acts were enforced after 1690, and trade was carried out primarily on merchantmen such as this, with bricks being made largely locally and rarely the sole cargo.

(Click to enlarge; Cross section of a 17th century merchantman)

Owen and Tolley clearly demonstrate that the admiralty courts in Maryland and elsewhere in the colonies were the models used for conferring admiralty jurisdiction on the Federal Courts under Article III of the U.S. Constitution and Section 9 of the Judiciary act of 1789, and that continuity from what was developed as practice and decided in colonial times, proved the rule under the Constitution.  To supplement their book, they provided transcripts of the proceedings of the Maryland Admiralty Court, 1754-1775, which is on line at the Maryland State Archives web site.  Conflicts over sailors' wages, health benefits, payment for injuries to passengers, maritime liens and mortgages, marine salvage, ship building, ship's chandlery, are all documented in admiralty court proceedings.  Peter Graham Fish provides a good overview of the admiralty side of the Federal Courts after 1789 in his Federal Justice in the Mid-Atlantic South: United States Courts from Maryland to the Carolinas, 1789-1835 (Washington, DC: Administrative Office of the United States Courts, 2002), and the National Archives film of the Minutes of the Maryland district is available on line off the Maryland State Archives web site, but the surviving case papers remain in the possession of the U. S. Circuit Court  clerk in Baltimore.  They include the first known admiralty case in Maryland following the adoption of the Constitution involving the Brigantine Juliana.  The original filings in the case have been conserved for the Court by the Maryland State Archives with images on line at the Maryland State Archives in MSA SC 5463. The recorded version of the case as been reviewed by Michael Tolley who reports that "Twelve complaints, called libels in admiralty, were filed by seamen against the brig Juliana for unpaid wages in the US District Court for the District of Maryland.  I've seen the original minutes of this early case in the National Archives in Philadelphia, and the best cite that I have for it is: Minutes of the U.S. District Court for the District of Maryland, 1790-1911, April 17, 1790 (not paginated) (Available at the National Archives, Philadephia, Pennsylvania)."

It is the role of the archivist to help researchers follow the yellow brick wherever it might lead, and to explain the value of the archival resources along the way.   The richness of admiralty court records in documenting the maritime world of Maryland remains largely unexplored, not unlike the material remains of the planters that sat in judgment of the Burgh of Stadt in 1673, and used its cargo of 50,000 bricks to build their homes in and around the Wicomico River between Charles and St. Mary's county.  It is a region rich in archaeological sites as yet unearthed with a 'swamp' at the head of the river that held the hunting lodge of Lord Baltimore and was once imagined as the site of a great canal.  There are limits to what archivists can do to help. Sadly the custodians of the first accurate mapping of that area by John Henry Alexander in the 1830s as the site of a canal, chose to sell his cartographically correct drawings to a map dealer, thereby removing them from public consultation and study unless purchased in facsimile or as originals by a generous benefactor. A much reduced and inaccurate version was published in 1835.  Sometimes the yellow brick leads to obstructions rather than a path forward.

Justice under Stress: Federal Courts in Baltimore during the Civil War

The Lincoln Pardon of Benjamin Brown, the case of John Merryman, and Federal Justice in the Midst of A Civil War


During the Civil War the Maryland Circuit Court consisted of two judges, Roger B. Taney who, as Chief Justice of the United States was serving as a trial judge on Circuit, and William F. Giles. There are contemporary photographs of both and the Masonic Hall in Baltimore that served as the Federal Court House.

 


February through May of 1861 was time of massive confusion and turmoil for the Nation.   In  many ways it was if a Katrina like hurricane had swept across the land leaving the existing structure of the Federal government in chaos, unable to function, not knowing what to do. By February 11, 1861, a Monday, there were two presidents claiming jurisdiction over all or parts of the Nation, both of whom set out on journeys that day to their respective capitals.  Abraham Lincoln, according to one historian seemed confused and rambled on in speeches at each of his stops along the way.  At one point in Cincinnati he told the crowd: "I hope that while these free institutions shall continue to be in the enjoyment of millions of free people of the United Staes , we will see repeated every four years what we now witness."  Did that mean he expected chaos every four years?  Joshua Wolf Shenk in LINCOLN's MELANCHOLY (Houghton Mifflin, 2005), argues that President Lincoln was suffering from acute genetically derived depression and that challenged his Presidency and fueled his Greatness.

In February and March of 1861, he had not reached his stride.  Indeed, convinced of a plot on his life,  he allowed himself to be secretly passed through Baltimore on his way to Washington, possibly in disguise, leaving a bewildered Mayor George William Brown to greet Mrs. Lincoln and the children who apparently were not considered to be in danger.

Arriving safe in Washington, Lincoln found himself confronted with hostility all around.  Desparate to build the defenses of Washington against a presumed attack by Confederate forces from Virginia, he called for support from loyal state militias and to facilitate keeping them out of harm's way on their journey to Washington,  suspended habeas corpus along the railroad routes in order to facilitate the capture and incarceration of any terrorists along the route who might be planning to disrupt the troop movements.

On April 19, 1861, the same day that in 1776 the first shots of the American Revolution were heard around the world, the first blood of the Civil War was shed on Baltimore streets as the mob attacked the Massachusetts troops trying to make their way across the harbor and to awaiting B&O trains that would continue them on their journey to the defense of Washington.  In those days there were no through trains through Baltimore because the haulers and carters  were a strong lobby in the city and wanted the business of moving goods and people among the three train stations in town.

Mayor George William Brown and Governor Hicks pleaded with President Lincoln not to send troops through the City, and in the midst of the violence of April 19, ordered the railroad bridges on the approach to the city to be obstructed.  For his efforts to prevent violence, he, much of the State Legislature and the City Council were thrown into jail without benefit of Habeas Corpus.  Brown would remain in Prison at Fort Warren in Boston Harbor until his term as Mayor ran out, never having a hearing or appearing before a Federal Judge.  After the war he would become the chief judge of the Baltimore Supreme Bench. The Administration's efforts to prosecute the war by throwing presumed dissidents and traitors into jail without benefit of the courts hit a major snag with the burning of the Baltimore Bridges.   As Judge Blake has pointed out in her essay on the Merryman case, drawing upon the original documents still in the possession of the Maryland District Court, when Federal Troops arrested John Merryman at 2 a.m. on May 25th and threw him into prison at Fort McHenry, the Federal Bench in the person of Chief Justice Taney acted decisively.   Much has been written about Ex Parte Merryman and more should be, in my opinion, especially in light of the Supreme Court's Guantanamo Bay opinions in which the Justices  ignored it altogether.

The English had an official observer at Taney's Court for the Merryman hearing.  He was the British Consul in Baltimore and recorded the proceedings in a letter that until not long ago lay undiscovered among the Consular papers of the British National Archives:

159

British Consulate for the State of Maryland

Baltimore, May 27, 1861

no. 24

My Lord,

I have just time to say that Chief Justice Taney issued a writ of Habeas Corpus this morning, directed to Genl. Cadwallader, calling on him to produce Mr. Merryman. The general replied that he had communicated with the President, who answered that he suspended the action of Habeas Corpus. The Chief Justice, remarking that he was bound to carry out the Constitution, & Laws, of the United States, has issued an attachment against General Cadwallader for contempt of the writ.


I have the honor to be
My Lord
Your Most obedient, humble, servant
Frederic Bernal
   

Right Honble
Ld John Russell MP

161
 

British Consulate for the State of Maryland
Baltimore, May 20th, 1861

no. 25

My Lord,

The continuation of my despatch , no. 24 of the 27th  instant, I have the honor to inform you, that I assisted the day before yesterday ceremony. I saw Chief Justice Taney- the head of the Supreme Court of the United States- a venerable old man of over 80 years of age- but still in full possession of all his intellect- a lawyer unsurpassed in all the world- whose boast it is that no decision given by him has ever been reversed- calmly, but boldly, in a crowded court, enunciate that great bulwark of Anglo Saxon liberty, the doctrine of Habeas Corpus. As your Lordship is is aware from my previous bespatch, an attachment was issued against General Cadwallader for contempt of a writ of Habeas Corpus issued
by the Chief Justice. The proceedings opened on the 28th by a return from the Marshall of the Court, stating he had been refused admittance into Ft. McHenry to serve the attachment. The Chief Justice then delivered his decision. "That the President cannot,  under the Laws,and Constitution of the United States, suspend the privilege of the writ of Habeas Corpus. That it is unconstitutional for the military authority to arrest anyone,
not subject to the articles of War, except in aid of the Judiciary Tower, & that even then the prisoner must be delivered over, immediately, to the Civil Authorities. That as it would be worse than -sele-s to summon a Posse Comitatus,(though such was the Law, ) and attempt to arrest Genl. Cadwallader in face of a superior force, he held the Marshall's Marshall's statement to be sufficient that he should reduce his decision to writing, & file it in the Clerk's Office, that all who wished might read it, and should call on the President to (using the very words of the Oath he had himself administered to him on his inauguration,) enforce the Laws, the Constitution, as he had sworn to do". I was introducted to the Chief Justice at the conclusion of the proceedings, & could not forbear telling him (privately,) how it had gratified me to hear him asserting principles so dear to all Englishmen. He made a very feeling reply, that he had been brought up to study, & revere, the English Common Law and that pained as he was to be so obliged, at such a moment, he would not shrink from asserting its glorious principles, which were likewise those of the Constitution of the United States. At any other time such a trampling on the Constitution on the part of the President would would have raised a tempest of  indignation throughout the land, but so demoralized is public sentiment, and so blinded by political passion are the masses, that he northern papers have either passed by this momentous question with a contemptuous silence, or have noticed it merely to load Chief Justice Taney, at other times an object to them of pride, and admiration, with every epithet of abuse, down to counselling (vide the New York Tribune) the President to arrest him. It was not so in other days- In 1807, at the time of Burr's Conspiracy, a Bill to enable the President to suspend the action of Habeas Corpus was introduced into the House of Representatives, and rejected, on the first reading, by a vote of 113, to 19-

...

 

President Lincoln was troubled by Taney's opinion.  He may have even agreed to an arrest warrant for the Chief Justice, confirming Bernal's rumor, but the authority for that statement, the Federal Marshall for Washington, D. C., Lincoln's bodyguard Ward Hill Lamon, who persuaded him to hide on his way through Baltimore to the inauguration, has not been corroberated.  But President Lincoln did what Taney told him he had to do:  seek Congress's permission for the suspension of Habeas Corpus, which Congress eventually granted.  On July 4, 1861 at a special session, the President sent a message to Congress defending himself with regard to the executive order suspending Habeas Corpus, arguing that under the Constitution he had the right to do so, but left it to Congress to decide whether legislative approval was necessary, which is what Taney told him he needed to do in the first place.

In the draft of his address to Congress Lincoln confronted the Chief Justice directly, but wiser heads prevailed in crafting the final version that took out all the "I's" and anything that might be interpreted as self-doubt on Lincoln's part.



This is what Lincoln actually wrote in his first draft, much of which was moderated and excised by the time it got to Congress.

[ Page Originally Unnumbered; Subsequently Numbered 19:]10


Soon after the first call for militia, I felt it my duty to authorize the Commanding General, in proper cases, according to his discretion, to suspend the previlege of the writ of habeas corpus -- or, in other words, to arrest, and detain, without resort to the ordinary processes and forms of law, such individuals as he might deem dangerous to the public safety. At my verbal request, as well as by the Generals own inclination, this authority has been and propriety of what has been done under it, are questioned; and I have been reminded from a high quarter11 that one who is sworn to "take care that the laws be faithfully executed" should not himself be one to violate them-- So I think. Of course I gave some consideration to the questions of power, and propriety, before I acted in this matter--
 

The whole of the laws which 

[ Page Originally Unnumbered; Subsequently Numbered 20:]

I was sworn to see take care that they should be faithfully executed, were being resisted, and failing of execution to be executed, in nearly one third of the states. Must I have allowed them to finally fail of execution, even had it been perfectly clear that by the use of the means necessary to their execution, some provision of one single law, made in such extreme tenderness of the citizens liberty, that more rogues than honest men practically more of the guilty than the innocent, find shelter under it, should, to a very limited extent, be violated?12 some single law, made in such extreme tenderness of the citizens liberty, that practically, it relieves more of the guilty, than the innocent, should, to a very limited extent, be violated? To state the question more directly, are all the laws, but one, to go unexecuted, and the government itself go to pieces, lest that one law be violated? Even in such a case I should consider my official oath broken if I should allow the government to be overthrown, when I might think the disregarding the single law would tend to preserve it-- But, in this case I was not, in my own judgment, driven

[ Page Originally Unnumbered; Subsequently Numbered 21:]

to this ground-- In my opinion I violated no law-- The provision of the Constitution that "The previlege of the writ of habeas corpus, shall not be suspended unless when, in cases of rebellion or invasion, the public safety may require it" is equivalent to a provision -- is a provision -- that such previlege may be suspended when, in cases of rebellion, or invasion, the public safety does require it. I decided that we have a case of rebellion,
and that the public safety does require the qualified suspension of the previlege of the writ of habeas corpus, which I authorized to be made. Now it is insisted that Congress, and not the executive, is vested with this power-- But the Constitution itself, is silent as to which, or who, is to exercise the power; and as the provision plainly was made for a dangerous emergency, I can not bring myself to believe that the

[ Page Originally Unnumbered; Subsequently Numbered 22:]

the framers of that instrument intended that in every case the danger should run it's course until Congress could be called together, the very assembling of which might be prevented, and in as was in-13 of which might be prevented, as was intended in this case, by the rebellion--
   

I enter upon no more extended argument; as an opinion, at some length, will be presented by the Attorney General-- Whether there shall be any legislation upon the subject, and if any, what, I submit entirely to the better judgment of Congress--

Clearly the opinion of the Chief Justice in ex parte merryman hit its mark and in the end Merryman was turned over to Civil Authorities and set free on bail with the promise he would not leave the State.  Two indictments for Treason were presented by Grand Juries, but Taney and Giles continued the cases on the docket until the war was over (Taney died in 1864 on the day that the Maryland Constitutional Convention abolished slavery), and was never tried.  He rose to be Treasurer of Maryland and his Hayfields farm became nationally known for his successful experiments in cattle breeding.

That is not to say that the suspension of Habeas Corpus did not continue to affect affect a considerable number of people.  Mark E. Neely's Pulitzer prize winning "The Fate of Liberty: Abraham Lincoln and Civil Liberties" documents the over 15,000 individuals incarcerated over the course of the war, unable to avail themselves of the great writ.  What Taney's opinion did do, apart from succeeding in getting Merryman transferred to Civil Authority and paving the way to his day in court, was to unleash a torrent of pamphlets and works on executive powers and habeas corpus that reaches down to the present day.  Few read Horace Binney and Anna Ella Carroll today, but their arguments and those of the other side are no less pertinent to today's tension among the President, Congress, and the Courts over the application of the Great Writ.


The stress that the Civil War placed upon the Federal Bench, let alone the State Courts, during the Civil War was intense and unremitting.  The Federal Court in Baltimore remained open throughout the war and persistently decided cases that went against the grain of policies promulgated by the Lincoln administration, especially in regard to State's and individual rights.  For example, in an officially unreported opinion not to be found in Westlaw or Lexis, Judge Giles, Justice Taney's partner on the Federal bench in Baltimore, forced the U. S. Treasury department to recind a tax on the movement of goods within the state of Maryland, even though they were probably intended to be contraband. Routine business of the Court as it affected the President directly continued as well and is illustrative of administrative burden the work of the courts placed upon the President of the United States.

Take for example, the need for a Presidential Pardon of Benajmin Brown. A few years ago, at the instigation of Judge Gauvey and at the invitation of Judge Motz, I was asked to offer some suggestions on how the Federal Courts in Baltimore  might develop an exhibit and interpretation center at the courthouse that would help the public better understand their rich and varied history. In the course of conversation, Judge Motz mentioned that while most of the historical records of his court had been transferred to the National Archives, a few treasures remained which the court was loath to give up because of their historical significance and the part they might play in an historical exhibit. This of course peaked my curiosity and he agreed that the Court Clerk, Felicia Cannon, could show me one treasure in particular, the Lincoln Pardon.

With the assistance of the Court Administrator, we found the pardon well cared for in a secure storage area.  Time had not treated the pardon well, however, and it was in need of conservation. I offered to have the document repaired at cost by our Document Preservation department and to investigate its history. To my delight I found that Judge James Schneider had written an unpublished essay on the pardon already, to which I added some new sources and the results of further research in order to provide a window into how the Federal system of justice actually worked in the midst of the Civil War with regard to life of one civilian prisoner, Benjamin Brown.



Thursday, June 18, 1863 was a routine day for President Abraham Lincoln in the midst of a far from ordinary war.  General Grant was before Vicksburg, having just relieved Major General John A. McClernand from command for being insubordinate, self-seeking, and incompetent.   General Lee was well on his march northward and in two weeks would be engaged in battle at Gettysburg where his reputation as a general would also suffer, although not to the degree of McClernand's.


In Washington, the President rose about 6 a.m. to begin a work day that would last well into the evening.  Between 6 and 7 a.m. he was at his desk in the White House reading correspondence and dispatches, occasionally sipping a cup of coffee sent by his wife.  Journalist Noah Brooks recalls how methodical President Lincoln was in his habits:  "he was scrupulously exact in all the details of his office, and his care for written documents was sometimes carried to an extreme;  he appeared to have the Chinese reverence for written paper."  Later scholars would discover just how scrupulous he was about the business of government.  Six letters he wrote that day have survived, ranging from mitigating a sentence of a garrulous physician, who in treating a family close to the confederate lines happened to say too much about Federal troop movements, to declining with thanks the offer of assistance from  an over zealous General of Canadian volunteers who by encoded telegram had written to offer his men in defense of Washington.   In addition to the general correspondence, sometime in the course of the day, the President's secretaries, John Nicholay and John Hay, presented him with a stack of military and civil pardons to sign.  How many we are not yet certain, but an article in the Washington Post a few years ago announced the discovery of 1,120 Abraham Lincoln signatures on military pardons alone over the four years of the war. 

Among the pending requests that day was also one for a civilian, Benjamin Brown.  Just how much the President may have known about the circumstances surrounding the request for a Pardon for Benjamin Brown is not known, although his attention to detail was such that it is likely he read the accompanying papers delivered to the Executive Mansion from the Attorney General's office by the Pardon Clerk. They included a letter signed by Brown and recommendations for approval by the U.S. District Attorney for Maryland and the U.S. District Judge for Maryland, William F. Giles, who presided over Brown's trial.  Brown had served his three year sentence for manslaughter, but could not pay the fines imposed and was thus effectively imprisoned for life.

As C. Dodd McFarland, his attorney, explained in the appeal to the President,  "the practice of the courts heretofore in similar cases has been to make application for the remission of the fine and costs which application is usually granted by the President."

In a letter to the President, Brown explained his view of the circumstances surrounding his conviction.   He told the President that he had been a cabin boy  on board the Barque George & Henry,

and one day whilst the Captain of the Barque was absent ...was playing with a gun in the cabin of the ... Barque, and whilst so playing with the ...  gun, the gun went off and killed  ... Thomas [George] Crozier.  At the trial of the case your petitioner admmitted the killing, but pleaded that it was purely accidentall.  Your Petitioner states that he has suffered, and satisfied, the judgement as far as it is in [his] power, that the terms of his imprisonment expires on the 23rd day of April 1863, and he further states that he is a poor colloured boy, and, is unable to pay said fine & cost, ...

The President heeded Brown's plea, and  signed the pardon, releasing him from having to pay the $666 in costs that had accumulated over the three years that he was confined to the Baltimore City jail. Two days later, on June 20, 1863, Benjamin Brown was free at last.


But who was this Benjamin Brown, what can we learn about the circumstances of the crime he committed, and how did he come to owe so much in the course of serving a three year sentence for manslaughter?


There is little that can be found about the personal life of Benjamin Brown.  Judge Schneider identified him in the 1860 census, the first year he was in the City Jail, which describes him as a black male, seaman, aged 19, born in Maryland. He was free, not a slave, and on the 14th of January, 1859 signed up with a fellow seaman, George Crozier, to serve aboard the Barque George & Henry on a voyage to Peru for a cargo of hides and nitrate of soda.  As the steward, or cabin boy as he refers to himself, Brown would not have earned more than the $8 a month owed George Crozier, which makes Brown's lost wages while imprisoned not more than $298, less than half of what he owed the Federal Government at the end of his prison term.

To unravel the mystery of what appears to be a rather excessive tab of fines and court costs, we need to return to the scene of the crime, to trace the story that emerges from a review of the surviving evidence, including the consequences of Federal sentencing practices one hundred and forty years ago.  To do so we rely heavily on  the newspapers of the day,  the consular reports from the port town of Arica, then in Peru, but now in Chile, and the Baltimore City jail records, for the court records themselves encompass only docket entries, brief minutes, and the final judgment.


About 9 a.m on the bright sunny morning of October 21, 1859 the Barque George & Henry was moored in the harbor of Arica, Peru, about ready with its cargo to depart for Baltimore.  Captain Travers was ashore.  Three of the ships company were in a boat at the stern.  While Henry Willis, the Ship's Carpenter, replaced a piece of moulding, Benjamin Fales and George Crozier were holding the boat steady, possibly standing at about eye level with the window of the Captain's cabin when a shot was fired from within.   The bullet, an ounce slug, pierced Crozier skull over his left eye.  He would die on deck a few minutes later. When  Benjamin Brown appeared on deck he saw Crozier's body and cried out "My God, I did not go to do it; they'll hang me, and I hope they will."

Brown was then taken before the American Consul in Arica, John Lansing, who took depositions, now lost, inventoried the deceased estate, and consigned the prisoner to Captain Travers who gave a $1,000 bond that he would deliver up Brown to arraignment in Baltimore on the ship's return.   Poor Crozier had been worth a total of $73.60, all in wages due, out of which advances from wages, his ship's jacket, the cost of a knife, postage for the letter home, and two pounds of tobacco were deducted, leaving  a balance due the deceased of $43.85.  The consul cabled his report to the State Department which arrived two months before the George & Henry and returned to business.


The George & Henry arrived in Baltimore on January 26, 1860, after a voyage of three months in which she encountered heavy northerly gales rounding cape horn, with a full cargo consigned to Fitzgerald, Booth and Company of 56 South Gay Street, and the prisoner contrite, but intact.  The U. S. District Attorney reported to the Solicitor of the Treasury Department that he had examined Brown concluding that "the evidence seems to establish no higher offence than that of a killing by gross & most culpable carelessness. After very careful examination of the witnesses before the U. S. Commissioner & also in person I was unable to detect the slightest evidence of malice in the prisoner  The Prisoner is evidently a very bad youth: in addition to the punishment which I hope to be able to have inflicted upon him for this offence-- the punishment appropriate to manslaughter, the crime of which I think he will be convicted.--I think there is evidence enough to convict him also of larceny." The larceny charge, based upon the Captain's assertion that Brown stole wine on the voyage, was never brought, and while the Government tried to prove murder in the first degree, the final verdict was manslaughter three months later when the case finally came to trial.  Because there are no transcripts of the trial, what the witnesses said after waiting three months in jail with the prisoner to  be heard, is not readily discernible, although the two quite different accounts in the Baltimore American and the Sun together, provide a substantive outline of the facts.  Unfortunately the depositions taken at the time by the Consul in Arica have been lost, but the court determined at the trial that they did not vary in substance from the testimony already presented and did not permit the defense to read them. At the close of the trial the court costs amounted to $40.75, including $20 each for the prosecution and defense lawyers.  How then did the bill mount to $666 over the next three years, the equivalent of approximately 7 years of wages for the average seaman?  The answer probably lies among the records of the Baltimore City Jail, among which only a very few accounting records survive.  In 1860 there were no Federal Prisons (a situation soon to be remedied by the Civil War) and Federal prisoners had to be housed in state or local facilities.  The docket record of Brown's confinement suggests that the Federal government had to pay for his care and did so on a quarterly basis of about $30, or $10 a month, two dollars a month more than he might have earned as a seaman. But even that exhorbitant rate does not account for the full bill, unless, of course, he was responsible for all charges with interest.


What happened to Benjamin Brown after his release is not known. That fall recruitment  into the United States Colored Troops would begin in earnest.  Perhaps he became a soldier, although with his background he would have been more likely to have gone into the Navy. We probably will never know, but at least for one brief moment, as one of many papers passing over the desk of Abraham Lincoln, Benjamin Brown had his moment of recognition and release from a system of justice that tried him fairly but might have trapped him unmercifully in a bureaucratic wrangle over who should pay for his confinement.


Note:
I would be remiss in writing this blog essay if I did not acknowledge my indebtedness to Judge  Fred Motz, Judge Susan Gauvey, and Felicia Cannon, who introduced me to the Lincoln Pardon and the original documents relating to Ex Parte Merryman still in the possession of the Court, to Judge Jim Schneider whose pioneering work on the history of the Maryland District Court and its judges, and his own notes on the history of the Lincoln Pardon which he shared with me, were indispensable to my own journey in search of the saga of Benjamin Brown, and to Judge Catherine Blake, whose sparkling essay on the Merryman case, I have drawn upon here.