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RiverView
Farm and the New Neighbors
1809
A map
of Jefferson County, Virginia was produced by Charles Varle, published
in Philadelphia. The only landowner shown on the map in the Terrapin
Neck area is Abraham Shepherd, though land records show that the
Browning heirs owned some Terrapin Neck property until at least
the 1840s.
On the 6th of April, young Samuel Swearingen, described in the deed
as a resident of Ohio, sold his 137 acres of Springwood behind the
house next to the river to uncle Abraham Shepherd for $3654 (JCDB
10, p. 109). Shepherd’s neighbor to the west, Van Swearingen
(grandson of Col. Van), still owned a narrow corridor pointing eastward
from RiverView farm out to Terrapin Neck, effectively splitting
Shepherd’s property in two and possibly not allowing direct
access from the direction of Shepherdstown (this corridor can be
seen in the 1797 map)
Thomas Swearingen, mill operator at Hardscrabble, apparently concerned
over his brother Andrew’s handling of financial matters related
to the family’s Kentucky lands, decided to take action. In
October 1809 he required his brother Andrew to sign a mortgage for
his share of the Kentucky lands, giving Andrew six months to pay
off his debt of $2853. The entry in the deed book states that “management
of which lands has been committed entirely to the said Andrew Swearingen
by the said Thomas Swearingen his brother”. Of perhaps greater
interest is the description and location of the various parcels,
which totaled more than 33,000 acres!, only 2600 of which were described
as unpatented (Bourbon County DB G, p.247). This total does not
include the acreage also patented in Kentucky by various other Swearingen
family members from the Shepherdstown area, including Joseph Swearingen
and Benoni Swearingen’s heirs.
1810
Census
records showed Hezekiah Swearingen living in a household with one
free person, and 11 slaves. His son Van listed a white female (wife
Elizabeth Morgan) and 4 slaves.
Neighbor Abraham Shepherd and his family were attended to by 18
slaves, and further to the south Marcus Alder and his wife Priscilla
had 7 slaves.
1811
Thomas Swearingen died,
grandson of Thomas of the Ferry and founder of “Hardscrabble”.
In his will he divided the old “Jones Mill”, his
house and lands between his wife, his sisters’ families,
and his brother’s children. His brother Andrew’s
children in Kentucky were given all the land that Thomas held
or claimed in Kentucky (BCWB 4, p434). Sometime later the mill
burned, and a free black woman was blamed and arrested. The Executor
of Thomas’s will is “(his) friend” Abraham
Shepherd. The witness was Martha (Keating) Vansant, one of the
Browning heirs and a relative newcomer to the neighborhood; she
may have moved here to escape a bad marriage in Maryland - she
apparently renounced any claim to property left her in her first
husband’s will (Hulse and Schneider, 1997 unpublished).
1812
In October, Van Swearingen
and Abraham Shepherd began a deal that would simplify the boundary
between their respective properties and allow a more direct route
from Shepherdstown to Shepherd’s recently acquired dwelling
at Springwood. A little over ten acres comprising the narrow
corridor pointing east to Terrapin Neck was sold by Van Swearingen
to Abraham Shepherd for $450 (JCDB 7, p.364). About the same
time, Abraham Shepherd sold an adjacent 15 acre narrow triangle
to Van Swearingen, which is now located on the west side of Shepherd
Grade across from the entrance to NCTC; the price was also $450
(JCDB 7, p.360). A road was likely built shortly after this time,
extending from the Terrapin Neck road to the Shepherd estate
house along the new property boundary, which eventually became
known as Shepherd Grade.
1813
Abraham
Shepherd sold an old family property again - he subdivided Pell
Mell on the Maryland side of the river into three parcels. The Blackford
family, now operating the Ferry, would now incorporate part of Pell
Mell into their Ferry Hill Plantation (WCDB Z, p.282 - 286).
1815
The
War of 1812 culminated this year in a British defeat at the hands
of Andrew Jackson’s rag-tag army in New Orleans. In a letter
written after the great Battle of New Orleans, Commander Daniel
Patterson wrote to the Secretary of the Navy commending R.D. Shepherd
(son of Abraham Shepherd) for having “rendered me very essential
assistance” as an aid-de-camp (Brannon, n.d.). R.D. Shepherd
had first arrived in New Orleans in September of 1802 at the behest
of the shipping business he was working for in Baltimore. Shortly
after his arrival in New Orleans, which had recently become an American
territory, he cornered the market on sugar which made him and his
employer a bundle of money. This allowed him shortly thereafter
to go into business for himself. This success was tempered by the
loss of his 25-year-old wife Lucy, who had died at Sweet Springs,
Monroe County VA, (now WV) on August 23, 1814 (Martinsburg Gazette
Sept 8, 1814, p3. c.3). She died about 3 weeks after the death of
one of her children at the same location (Smyth 1909); a single
daughter Ellen would survive, and R.D never remarried. R.D Shepherd
was later described as “one of the most successful, prudent
and sagacious merchants ever engaged in commerce” in
New Orleans, and “never embarked in any enterprise which
did not have a profitable and generally brilliant result”,
and was “by far the largest property holder in the city”.
Within a few years R.D.’s brothers, especially James, would
be attending to the business in New Orleans while R.D. traveled
in Europe and attended to his young daughter’s education in
Boston (Kenamond 1963, and obituary in New Orleans Daily Picayune,
18 Nov. 1865).
1816
Uriah Brown, a surveyor
from Maryland, in his journal described the landscape between
Martinsburg and Shepherdstown:
The First 6 Miles from Martinsburg
Mountainous & Piny poor Ground
bad farmers, plaster would help;
now in Jefferson County Virginia,
the next Six Miles to Sheppards Town,
a Delighful Valley of Land (farmers
good for nothing except 4 or 5) the
Lime Stone too Troublesome in the
roads and farms, Very Little wood
not Enough to Spare to burn the Lime
Stone, as the Land is worn out & would
be a good thing to have those troublesome
Stones Burned up & Strewed over
the ground; at any rate a few years
a very few years will force some
of you to take some of those Lime
Stones to make fences with your Land
will afford it, but your Wood will
not Afford you wood to make fences
with use Plaster freely & you
have as good Land in 4 or 5 years
as heart Could wish...(in Dougherty
1972)
So it would appear that, by Brown’s standards at least, the farms in
the area by this time were poor and worn out, with few trees and a lot of rock.
Diversified farming methods would be required to maintain a livelihood under
these conditions, and many in the lower Shenandoah Valley, including the Swearingens,
continued to develop extensive orchards along with their livestock and grain
crops. It was still difficult to ship raw fruit to market, so it was commonly
distilled into brandy and other spirits that could be stored and transported
easily.
James Bell, having apparently branched out from his tailoring trade, advertised
in a local paper this year that he had four boats available for floating barrels
of flour down the Potomac to Alexandria, at a cost of a dollar per barrel (Dandridge
1910).
1817
Hezekiah Swearingen
died, and passed his remaining property to his son Van. (Hezekiah’s
daughter Mary was married to a neighbor James Foreman). Van was
married to Elizabeth Morgan and by this time they had 3 sons,
William, Hezekiah and James, and 2 daughters, Rebecca and Almira.
The size and quality of the house on RiverView Farm, the list
of property divided some years later, and archeological work
done on the site in the 1990s all indicate that this was still
a relatively wealthy family for the time (see Hulse and Desaules
1997). There are no records indicating which of the houses they
may have lived in after Hezekiah’s death, so Van and his
wife may have moved into Hezekiah’s nicer stone and brick
home at this time to get more room for their large family, now
the site of the Lone Drake farm, though this is conjecture; it’s
also possible that Van and Elizabeth had always lived with Hezekiah,
who had never remarried after his wife’s death more than
35 years before, and the RiverView Farm portion of the property
that is now NCTC was utilized by employees or slaves during the
first few decades of the 19th century.
The Potomac Company’s annual report indicated that even despite the past
season’s unusual low water, boats loaded with 50 to 60 barrels of flour
had continuously passed down from Harpers Ferry (Corra Bacon-Foster 1912).
1820
The
federal census showed the Van and Elizabeth Swearingen household
with 5 white males, 4 white females, 10 male slaves and 12 female
slaves; he listed his occupation as Farmer.
1821
A daughter
of Van and Elizabeth was born this year and died a year later -
she may have been the first to be buried in the new Swearingen graveyard
on RiverView Farm (it’s unknown where Hezekiah was buried
in 1817- his wife was buried at Springwood back in 1781, but the
site was owned by the Shepherds at the time of his death and therefore
probably unavailable for his interment – so he may have been
the first buried there, but there is no record or marker to suggest
this). This new Swearingen graveyard is located just south of NCTC’s
wastewater treatment plant.
At the
port in New Orleans, the brig Mexican, under Master John Wales,
delivered its manifest which included a 14 year old female slave
named Lucy, listed as 5 feet in height. She was shipped by Goodhuct
& Co, of New York, and was delivered to R.D. Shepherd &
Company in New Orleans. R.D. Shepherd’s brother James was
running the business in New Orleans and he received about the same
time, aboard the Baltimore brig Intelligence under Master Benedict
Jenkins, a shipment that included a 35 year old female mulatto slave
named Phoebe Black, along with her two very young daughters. Their
heights were not listed (Woodtor, n.d.).
1822
Shepherds
Town lawyer Thomas V. Swearingen, 38, living at the Bellevue tract
originally owned by Thomas of the Ferry, died during his second
term in Congress of an epidemic of “bilious fever” perhaps
malaria (Aler 1888). Swearingen heirs would hold the property for
a few more years, but it would eventually be sold to Henry Shepherd,
Capt. Abraham’s son, reportedly as a present for his wife.
Speaking of Abraham Shepherd, he also died this same year. He gave
“To son Henry, the farm on which I now live, 321 acres formerly
owned by Col. Van Swearingen”, while son Abram received the
“Neck Place and the 100 acres where he now lives, known as
Boidstone’s place”. Henry was then 29 years old, recently
married to Fanny Briscoe, while Abram Jr was 35. Their brother R.D.
had already struck it rich in New Orleans by this time. The probate
inventory (shown in full in the appendix) suggests some of Abraham’s
activities on the property that has become NCTC, which included:
7 “barshear” plows, 5 shovel plows, 64 hogs of various
ages, 5 horses, 26 beef cattle, 5 milch cows, 190 head of sheep,
2 stills, 20 still tubs, 110 gallons of apple brandy, wheat, rye,
oats, corn, and flax seed. At least 22 slaves were listed in the
inventory, amounting to nearly 70% of the value of his personal
property (JCWB 4, p.85.) When the estate was finally settled several
years later, the accounts indicated that the slaves Emily and Amy,
with their young children, were sold after his death for a total
of $600 (Amy’s two older children, Bev and Harry, stayed behind),
and that he owed $49.91 to John Blackford, probably for ferry services
(JCWB 6, p.222).
Henry and his wife Fanny now settled in the old stone home built
by Van Swearingen during the French and Indian War, with Henry’s
mother Eleanor and her servants probably living in the new wing
that was added in the 1820s. Their first child Mary, born in 1824,
lived only a year. Their second child was born in 1826 and was named
Rezin Davis. Later siblings included Ann Elizabeth, Henry Jr., John,
Abraham, and James Touro, born in 1838.
1827
The Potomac Company
annual report indicated that toll collectors had been appointed
at Williamsport, Shepherdstown and Harpers Ferry to gather tolls
from freight boats passing these locations, in hopes of “a
handsome increase of revenue” (Corra Bacon-Foster 1912).
The company had struggled financially from the very beginning,
and this may have been a last ditch effort to clear a profit.
Forward-thinking businessmen were now planning a canal along
the Potomac that could provide a more reliable method of transporting
goods.
1828
On RiverView
Farm in January, Van Swearingen’s wife Elizabeth died, 43
years old. She left behind 5 teenagers, William, James, Hezekiah,
Rebecca and Almira, and 1 newborn daughter Elizabeth - suggesting
the mother died from complications related to childbirth. In June,
Van added 187 acres on the south side of the farm, purchasing it
from the Webb family. This area is now the site of the Wild Goose
mansion and surrounding property.
1830s
A cholera epidemic
devastated several towns near the Potomac River, and had a particularly
harsh effect on the Irish immigrants working in gangs constructing
the new C & O Canal along the Maryland side of the river.
Cholera can kill within a matter of hours, and accounts of September
1832 and 1833 describe horrific scenes of many unburied bodies
of canal laborers lying about in fields adjacent to the Potomac
River (Hahn 1993). Many fled the region, including John H. Bennett,
great-grandson of Col. Van Swearingen. An obituary in the Chillicothe
News Advertiser (March 23, 1903) described how he and his family
initially fled to Missouri in 1831, where cholera soon caught
up with them anyway. The surviving family members traveled back
east to Chillicothe, Ohio by 1836.
The 1830 census shows the Van Swearingen household at RiverView Farm with 4
white males, 3 white females, 11 male slaves and 7 female slaves. He was one
of the top 10 slaveholders in a county that averaged 2 or 3 slaves per middle
class farm (Hulse and Dessaules 1997).
1831
A wedding at RiverView
Farm! Van’s oldest daughter Rebecca, 20 years old, married
George S. Kennedy on September 21, the ceremony conducted by
Rev. William Monroe.
Henry Shepherd, living next door at Springwood, noted in his account ledger
in October and November the payment of $1.50 for “hauling flour to the
boat”. The following February he paid for hauling another 150 barrels
of flour “to the river” (Shepherd Family Papers 1790-1862). His
accounts for the 1830s and 40s mention a Merino ram, a Berkshire boar, and
an Ayrshire bull put out to stud, as well as beef, pork, mutton, apples, cider,
brandy, clover seed, oats, wheat, corn and potatoes. According to the American
Livestock Breeds Conservancy website, the Ayrshire breed originated in Scotland
before 1800, and is known for its red and white markings, long graceful horns,
ability to graze under adverse conditions, and its milk production, suggesting
that the Shepherd’s farm activities included a dairy operation; the Ayrshire
breed is now on the ALBC Watch List because of its rarity. By the 1740s Henry
and his brother R.D. owned equal shares in “blooded stock” that
were kept on their lands near Terrapin Neck; the details carefully spelled
out in R.D’s precise handwriting. Politically Henry was a stalwart Democrat,
and like his parents was active in the Episcopal Church in Shepherdstown. Two
long-time workmen for Henry during the 1830s and 1840s are a George Price and
a Robert Evans (Shepherd Family Papers, sect. 4). A typical notation in the
account book:
Robert Evans has agreed to work and manage for Henry Shepherd for one year
for the sum of one hundred and sixty dollars in cash and 12 bu of wheat, 16
bu corn, 300 lot of pork.
1834
Construction
of the C & O Canal on the Maryland side of the Potomac River
had now reached the Shepherdstown area. A dam across the Potomac
designed to feed water into the new canal, first started in 1832,
was finished just upstream of RiverView Farm near the mouth of Jones
Mill Run (now Rocky Marsh) and the old site of Thomas Swearingen’s
mill.
1836
Another
Swearingen sibling from RiverView farm married - Hezekiah H. Swearingen,
23 years old, married Isabella Lyle Henshaw on February 18. The
ceremony was officiated by Rev. Woodbridge.
1837
In March young newlywed
Hezekiah Swearingen, apparently feeling a financial pinch at
the time, had a friend named M.J. Brown pay off his debt of $119.50
to Robert Magruder. In return Hezekiah deeded to Brown a sorrel
saddle horse and a workhorse named Sam, though Hezekiah was to
retain possession of the animals until he could pay off the loan
(JCDB 21, p. 391).
In May of that year, Hezekiah’s brother William Swearingen, 22 years
old, bought a neighboring tract of 60 acres at auction “near Jones Spring
Run” (JCDB 22, p. 92). He apparently left for Chillicothe, Ohio soon
afterward without paying for the property, because in November his father Van
agreed to pay $1966.43 for the property in his stead (JCDB 22, p.338). So it
would appear that William was also a little short of cash and perhaps felt
he could find better opportunities elsewhere. (Chillicothe, Ohio, seems to
be a frequent destination when the going got rough for the Swearingens along
the Potomac - Eleanor Swearingen Worthington at Adena died in 1848). Estate
records several years later reveal that Hezekiah and William also owed their
father $207.50 and $150, respectively, for debts incurred during this time
period. The Swearingen brothers weren’t the only ones experiencing a
shortage of money just then. Nationally this phenomenon became known as the
Panic of 1837, possibly one of the worst financial depressions experienced
in the United States. President Andrew Jackson’s federal banking policies
exacerbated a severe shortage of gold needed to back the currency being issued
across the country. Tens of thousands of people across the country went suddenly
bankrupt, many more experienced imminent starvation, over 600 banks failed
between May and December, and many more suspended payments in gold (note that
William purchased a property in May about the time of the banking crash, then
by November we see he can’t pay for it). Workers, if paid at all, were
paid in an endless variety of locally issued scrip. The depression would last
until after 1843. Particularly hard hit were many banking institutions and
large businesses in New Orleans, then the fourth largest city in the country.
It’s unknown how badly R.D. Shepherd and his brother James fared financially
in New Orleans, but for James it was all over anyhow - he died in New Orleans
on July 27th (a large monument now marks his grave in the Shepherd graveyard
in Shepherdstown). R.D had to travel to New Orleans to get things in order,
and seems to have taken a stronger interest in his old Virginia home after
this time. His business acumen may have seen possibilities on the Potomac now
that the C & O Canal was in operation across the river, and the B & O
Railroad was beginning to haul freight and passengers along roughly the same
route. The Swearingens on RiverView Farm were better off than most in that
they still had land, crops, livestock and labor, but ready cash seems to have
been in short supply.
1838
On Sunday, Feb. 18
Van Swearingen died at his residence “at an advanced age” (Henley,
n.d.), though his tombstone claims an age of 59 years, 2 months
and 20-odd days. His will, written in January, specified that
some land be sold, with the rest divided between two of his older
children. He left 200 acres of his father’s old “mantion
track”, a 22-year-old negro named Henry, all the farming
tools, kitchen furniture, and the choice of four houses to his
oldest son James. Daughter Rebecca Kennedy was to get the balance
of this property, including a part of 14 acres purchased from
a Dr. Henry Botelar. He specified that the 187-acre tract of
land on the southern end of the farm, purchased from the Webbs
in 1828 (JCDB 15, p.188) was to be sold, with son Hezekiah receiving
$1500 from the proceeds. Almira was to receive $1000 from the
land sale proceeds, a six year old slave girl named Ann, and
a feather bed. (It seems to have been common practice for the
Swearingens and perhaps others in the region to ensure that when
young slaves were given away that they were outfitted with a
feather bed and oftentimes a horse as part of the package.) The
remainder of the selling price was to go to son William and daughter
Elizabeth; one Edward Southward became the guardian of Elizabeth,
and he acted as the agent for both William and Elizabeth (JCWB
9, p.265). William was also to receive 2 slaves, named Lewis
(21 years old) and Hardridge (22 years old), while Elizabeth
was to receive the slave Susan (6 years old), a feather bed,
and a riding horse. The other 12 slaves were to be divided between
James and Rebecca, except for the slave named Andrew Jackson
who was given “liberty to choose which of my children he
shall belong to.” What was so special about Andrew Jackson
that he alone was given this seemingly benevolent choice of masters?
Andrew Jackson was 16 months old when the estate was appraised.
To meet these obligations the executors in October sold 192 acres
of the southern portion of RiverView Farm, acquired ten years before
in the vicinity of “Rattlesnake Spring” (near the present-day
Wild Goose mansion), to Charles M. Shepherd, 38- year old son of
Capt. Abraham Shepherd for $10,072 (JCDB 24, p.260); Charles was
likely acting as the agent for his brother R.D. Shepherd. This sale
was apparently interesting enough to make it into John Blackford’s
Ferry Hill Plantation Journal on Oct 19, where he recorded that
“Kenady and Swearingen sold the farm at $51.75 per acre to
Moses Shepherd”. (John Blackford had acquired rights to the
Shepherdstown ferry after marrying Sara Swearingen, daughter of
Benoni, and by later buying out her brother’s share). Van
was buried in the Swearingen plot on RiverView Farm next to his
wife, where his headstone can still be seen on the hill above the
water treatment plant. Son William Morgan Swearingen was by some
accounts now headed for Texas, where he would spend the rest of
his life. Daughter Rebecca and her husband George Kennedy at some
point moved to Jericho Farm near Boonsboro, Maryland.
Van’s estate included 20 slaves, numerous farming tools and implements,
38.5 acres of wheat, 58 sheep, 53 gallons apple brandy, 426 bushels corn, 12
horses, about 23 cattle and several dozen hogs. An estate sale was held after
Van’s death, at which James and Hezekiah Swearingen bought back much
of the livestock. For example, James bought a brindle bull, several brindle
cows and calves, 15 sheep and 45 hogs, 7 1/2 bushels of oats, 250 bushels of
corn, 10 bushels of potatoes and 266 pounds of bacon, while Hezekiah purchased
a horse, 5 sheep, 50 bushels of corn and 38 acres of wheat still in the ground
(JCWB 9, p. 265). This suggests that James and Hezekiah had plans to continue
farming the land first occupied by their great-grandfather.
Neighbor Henry Shepherd was not listed as a buyer in the sale, perhaps because
he was busy overseeing the additions being appended to the old Van Swearingen
house he lived in next door, or attending to the Bellevue mansion originally
built by Joseph Swearingen which he had recently bought for his wife Fanny.
Henry and Fanny’s last child, James Touro, was also born this year (Touro
is from Judah Touro, Jewish business partner and friend of R.D. Shepherd in
New Orleans. R.D. saved his life during the Battle of New Orleans when they
were both young men)
1839
On February
9, the executors of Van’s estate sold the 60 acres that Van
had been forced to buy because of William’s lack of cash two
years before, to neighbors George and John Hollida for $1832 (JCDB
23, p. 265). In March, neighbor Henry Shepherd purchased for $100
about 4 acres of land next to the spring on the Swearingen property
line west of his house, now the location of the cottage and pond
near the sharp turn in the road next to the Hendrix life estate
(JCDB 23, p. 270). This would now give Henry Shepherd complete access
to both heads of the spring there; this was once the “wet
meadow” set aside for old Hezekiah Swearingen back in 1788
in his father’s will.
Van’s daughter Almira Swearingen, 24 years old, married James
Markell on November 7, and had a daughter Elizabeth (Betty) one
year later. Markell would at various times list himself as a farmer,
tanner, businessman, and merchant. He and partner Willoughby L Webb,
from Lancaster, Pennsylvania, had a business - Webb and Markell
- on German Street in Shepherdstown in the early 1840s, described
as occupying the western portion of Lot 1 (JCDB 27, p. 137). A Markell
family member from Shepherdstown had lost all 3 children including
6-year-old John Baker Markell in St. Charles, Missouri within a
9 month period the year before (in Henley, n.d., Virginia Free Press,
Charles Town, VA, March 29, 1838, p. 3, c.4), though the exact relationship
to James Markell is unknown. In the 1840 census James Markell is
shown living in Virginia with 2 white females, presumably his wife
and daughter, and two female slaves.
Isabella Henshaw didn’t stay long in the Swearingen family
- on June 18, Hezekiah Swearingen, her husband of three years, died
an untimely death “at the home of Mrs Henshaw” (Henley,
n.d.). James Swearingen would now have to continue farming without
the help of his brother.
In 1839, J.F. Cannell, 18 Castle Street, Liverpool England printed
a little pamphlet entitled “A CATALOGUE OF SHORT-HORNED CATTLE,
Leicestershire Sheep, BERKSHIRE AND SUFFOLK HOGS, Selected by J.C.
Etches, of Barton Park, Near Derby, for R.D. SHEPHERD, ESQ., of
Shepherdstown, Virginia and New Orleans, United States IN MAY, 1839.”
The pamphlet then itemized various animals including their previous
owners, extensive genealogies, and various prizes won at area livestock
shows. One example is for:
MINNA, light roaned heifer, calved February 14, 1838, bred by
R. Pilkington, Esq., of Windle Hall, got by Windle, (bred by the
Rev. H. Berry, by Henwood, 2114), dam Annetta, by Hopewell (2135),
g d Bellona, by Belvedere (1706), gr g d by Blucher (1725), gr gr
g d Mr. Stephenson’s favourite Red Cow. This heifer, as a
calf, won the sweepstakes at Liverpool, in October, 1838; her dam
won the premium at Liverpool for the best one-year-old heifer, in
1836, the two-year-old premium and sweepstakes in 1837, and in 1838
she was shown for the best dairy cow and sweepstakes, also for the
best cow of any breed, all of which prizes she took; and in the
same year was shown as a three-year-old at Manchester, and obtained
the premium. Neither cow nor calf has ever been beat!!!
1841
Rezin
Davis (R.D) Shepherd, son of Capt. Abraham Shepherd, after making
several million dollars in business and real estate and somehow
surviving the financial disasters of the past several years in New
Orleans, bought 468 acres of land west and south of his brother
Henry, which included 196 acres of RiverView Farm that had been
purchased 3 years before by his brother Charles, as well as the
portion of RiverView Farm that Rebecca Swearingen Kennedy had inherited
about the same time. Shepherd began building his Wild Goose mansion
shortly thereafter (Kenamond 1963). He filled his new stables, barns
and pastures at least partly with imported horses, cattle, sheep
and hogs from Europe, each animal of known and impeccable pedigree;
some of these animals he and his brother Henry owned jointly. R.D
and his brother Henry Shepherd, along with their relatives and heirs
would own the majority of the Terrapin Neck area for about the next
60 years. R.D. Shepherd signed a petition to Congress along with
numerous other “planters and sugar manufactures in the
state of Louisiana” in June of 1842 that asked for an
increase in the duties on imported sugar. This suggests that he
still had a strong financial interest in the sugar industry in New
Orleans, which, according to the petition, was in danger of outright
destruction and could result in “ a national loss to an
extent beyond calculation, would lead to expropriation of almost
every planter connected with it” (Louisiana State Courier
October 1984).
On July 12, James Swearingen, new owner of what remained of RiverView
Farm, married his sweetheart Margaret Darby. He had about 200 acres,
several houses, livestock, slaves, and now a 16- year-old wife to
begin a new life on RiverView Farm. The Swearingen farm was now
considerably smaller than when his father was alive, a large portion
having recently been incorporated into the Shepherd’s new
Wild Goose farm.
1842
The
little rock-walled cemetery on RiverView Farm hosted another funeral--James
Swearingen’s wife Margaret died, 17 years old (he was 32).
Her headstone can still be seen. An infant son of Margaret and James
is also listed as buried there, suggesting a contributing factor
in her death.
October 1842 entries in Henry Shepherd’s account book include:
To cash paid for Negro Lam $445.00
To cash paid for hats for Negro Men $2.25
1843
James
Swearingen had enough. After losing a father, wife, infant son,
and brother within a 4- year period, and seeing much of his boyhood
home sold to the Shepherds by his sister, his remaining small farm
on the Potomac and the Shepherdstown area in general had undoubtedly
lost some of its charm. In a deed dated 1st April, 1843, he sold
the remaining 197 acres of RiverView Farm to his 15-year-old sister
Elizabeth Swearingen, and his 3-year-old niece Elizabeth Morgan
Markell, for $10,000 (JCDB 26, p. 519). One account shows James
re-marrying to Mary Gleeves, moving to Missouri, and then on to
Texas, perhaps to be with his brother William (H.H Swearingen 1884).
His choice of Missouri as a new place to settle may have been influenced
by Missouri being a slave state. RiverView Farm was now owned by
a teenager and a toddler.
Why didn’t James sell the farm to his sister Almira rather
than Almira’s little daughter? Almira, wife of James Markell,
died a few months later on Sept. 10, suggesting she may have been
dangerously ill back in April when James sold the farm. She left
behind her husband, a young daughter, and three remaining siblings.
RiverView Farm and the Swearingens had surely seen too many deaths
during the past several years.
1846-47
Widower
James Markell served two terms as mayor of Shepherdstown, then moved
to Baltimore for a time.
1848
Another owner of RiverView
Farm is buried - James Markell’s now 8 year old daughter
Elizabeth (Betty) Morgan Markell died on Feb 23. The RiverView
Farm property was now owned by 20-year-old Elizabeth Swearingen,
with an interest retained by little Betty’s remaining “heir”,
her father James Markell.
1850
Elizabeth Swearingen
and James Markell apparently found they had a lot in common in
addition to joint ownership of RiverView Farm, and the shared
experience of having attended many of the same funerals over
the last 11 years. Elizabeth Swearingen married her deceased
sister’s husband James Markell, recently returned from
Baltimore, in Frederick County, Maryland on the 18th of June
(Frederick Cty, Md Marriage Records via Karel Whyte). They eventually
had 4 daughters, the first in 1852 when Elizabeth was 24 years
old. They seemed to have taken up farming at RiverView Farm after
their marriage, as Markell’s occupation was listed as a
Farmer on various birth and death records of the time.
Elizabeth seems to have had a rather tragic young life - her mother died within
days of her birth, she lost her father and became an orphan at 10, lost a brother before
she was 11, lost a sister-in-law at 14, lost her sister at 15, lost her niece
at 20, then at 24 married a man she had attended many of these funerals with--her
sister’s widower--before starting a family. At least one of her four
daughters died young in the 1850s, and she buried her husband when she was
43. Elizabeth died in 1901, 73 years old.
The 1850 census shows that R.D. Shepherd, described as a 65-year-old white
farmer, had an overseer named Eli Sloan, a 26-year-old stonemason named Conrad
Smith, and a gardener named George Beck. The Beck family included his wife
Louisa and five children ranging in age from 14 years to 1 month; some of these
employees and their family members were likely living in the house built by
Hezekiah Swearingen at the present-day Lone Drake Farm. Interestingly Conrad
Smith and George Beck were both born in Germany, and seem to have come to Virginia
in the early 1840s at the time that the Wild Goose Farm was first developed,
based on the birthplaces of the various Beck children. This also corresponds
well with the Conrad Crowe family, shown living on Terrapin Neck road in 1852
in an area now known as the old Foutz farm on the eastern side of NCTC. The
Crowe family was also from Germany, with the first children born in Germany
and the later children in Virginia after about 1842; the Crowes seem to have
owned their own small patch of land. Napolean Hiteman, also born in Germany,
was listed along with his wife and 5 children living with the Henry Shepherd
family (he appears in Henry’s account book for the first time in 1847).
This suggests that many of the employees, as well as the livestock, of the
extended Shepherd farming operations were imported from Europe; the number
of slaves at this time is unknown, but the presence of an “Overseer” at
Wild Goose Farm is suggestive. R.D Shepherd had property valued at $240,000
dollars, while Henry’s was valued at $25,000. Henry and R.D’s mother
Eleanor, now 91 years old and still living with Henry in the home acquired
by her husband Abraham back in 1809 (Springwood), had property worth an additional
$10,000; she died about two years later.
1852
S. Howell Brown produced
a map of Jefferson County Virginia, made from actual surveys
of farm limits. The map shows numerous land divisions adjacent
to and east of Springwood once owned by the Browning heirs, including
small farmsteads owned by, in addition to the Crowes listed above,
G.W. Sappington and Joseph Entler, respectively, who were both
hotel keepers in Shepherdstown (now the eastern portion of the
NCTC campus).
Henry Shepherd’s account book for 1852 includes a conversation he must
have had with his neighbor:
James Markell recipe for coff drops
take 2 oz of liquirish ball one oz of salts of Tarter
add three pints of water and let it boil about half a way,
take a table spoon full at a time for a grown person
Henry’s children and slaves may have given him more than a passing interest
in cough remedies over the years. Henry Jr was now managing his uncle’s
business in New Orleans after having graduated from St. James College near
Hagerstown, Maryland; his youngest siblings were still teenagers. Henry Sr.’s
account book for the 1850s includes frequent mention of “hog killings”,
the ledger indicating several dozen hogs at a time killed at various times
of the year. This suggests that hogs may have been the predominant livestock
raised for food or possibly income at this time (Shepherd Family papers 1790-1862).
In 1853, the Jefferson County Death Record indicates that Sally, one of Henry’s
slaves, died of unknown causes; Sally’s mother’s name was Effie
(Death Register Bk 1, p6, L. 3). Henry and R.D.’s mother Eleanor also
died in September of 1853, at 93 years of age.
1857
This
year the internationally acclaimed Shakespearean actress Charlotte
Cushman was pleased to have received a visit from her bent old white-haired
- but rich - benefactor from Boston, R.D. Shepherd (Leach 1970).
The Wild Goose Farm in Virginia was still his part-time country
residence at this time, while business interests and his daughter
kept him in Boston and other cities much of the year. His nephew
Henry Shepherd II had been entrusted with the family business in
New Orleans eight years earlier in 1849. Aler in 1888 described
R.D Shepherd as “...strong in intellect, rigid in system,
firm and inflexible in conviction, of uncompromising integrity and
extraordinary executive ability. Still he was generous and kind-hearted,
distributing large sums of money among those of his kin whom he
deemed worthy...”.
1858
In New Orleans, on
June 10, Henry Shepherd married Azemia McLean, daughter of a
Scottish merchant. Four sons would be born to them in the coming
years, the first in 1859, the last in 1871. The drumbeats of
war were sounding, and New Orleans would prove to be an interesting
place for a prominent merchant in the shipping and real estate
business; his father’s home in Virginia would also prove
to be located near much of the coming conflict.
1860-64
Civil War - Local men
entered both armies in large numbers. The Shepherdstown area
was repeatedly traversed by small and large military forces throughout
the war, with neighboring families often on opposite sides of
the conflict. Proximity to railroads made the area of strategic
value, which played a large part in Jefferson and Berkeley counties
becoming part of the new state of West Virginia.
In 1860, the census shows James Markell (age 48) and his wife Elizabeth (31)
with 2 daughters (Elmira age 8, and Mary age 2) living at RiverView Farm. They
were also living with a white laborer named William White (25), a black laborer
named Wilson Ross (25), and a mulatto laborer named Frederick Butler (30).
Markell at the time listed his occupation as tanner, though it is unknown if
his tannery was at RiverView Farm, or he operated one of several tanneries in
Shepherdstown. In the 1850s the Jefferson County Births and Deaths records
indicate the death of 1 child, three slave births and 4 slave deaths, the cause
of deaths included dysentery and pneumonia (Hulse and Dessaules 1997). The
Markell’s real estate was appraised at $11,080, and the personal estate
at $6980; in comparison neighbor Henry Shepherd Sr. at Springwood had $30,000
in real estate and $30,000 in personal estate; this accounting does not include
the value of slaves.
Neighbor Henry Shepherd’s account book shows a pronounced drop in activity
starting about midway through 1860; only a handful of transactions were recorded
through 1862, when the account book finally ends. Two of Henry and Fanny’s
sons died during the war: R.D. died in November of 1862; he had been married
to Elizabeth Boteler, daughter of Alexander Boteler of Shepherdstown who served
on Stonewall Jackson’s staff and in the Confederate Congress. James Touro
Shepherd, youngest son of Henry and Fanny, also died during the war.
Nov.
24,
1864
-
A
party
of
two
hundred
and
fifty or
three
hundred
Yankees
passed
through
town
on
their
way from
Martinsburg
to
Harpers
Ferry.
Some
of
them
went
to
Tom
Butler’s
and
there
arrested
John
Keplinger
and
then
to
Henry
Shepherd’s
and
arrested
and
took
him
away.
Dec. 1, 1864 - Henry Shepherd released and returned home...
(Extract from a diary kept by a Shepherdstown resident, submitted by D.C Gallaher
to December 1996 Magazine of the Jefferson County Historical Society, vol.
LXII). It’s unknown if this entry refers to Henry Shepherd I, b. 1793
or his son Henry II, b. 1831, who may have been visiting. In either case the
Yankees arrested a Henry Shepherd at Springwood. At the time the Union forces
were scouring the area looking for anyone associated with Mosby’s raiders,
who were a notorious irregular military group fighting on behalf of the confederacy
that banded together to inflict surprise raids on Union forces, then disbanded,
disappeared and resumed their roles as innocent farmers and shopkeepers. According
to several genealogical sources with no supporting documentation, Henry Shepherd
Sr.’s son Abraham was captured by Union soldiers at one point and condemned
to hang--a penalty usually reserved for spies and raiders such as Mosby’s
- but was exchanged for captured Union soldiers instead. Another source says
he was imprisoned at Ft. McHenry in Baltimore for nearly a year (Am. Hist.
Soc., 1923). Aler, in 1888, wrote that “Like hosts of Southerners
(Henry II) was crushed financially by the war, but with a business capacity
that rebounds from reverses and overcomes them unaided, and by the force alone
of his own energies, he has recuperated his fortunes and risen again to the
comforts of plenty”.
(Note: A Civil War era Union army belt buckle was discovered on the Entler
Farm (just east of the Commons building) during an archeological survey prior
to construction of NCTC. There are no records indicating the Entler’s
activities during the war, though the whole region was deeply divided, with
passionate debate continuing even to this day.)
The Civil War, of course, put an end to the slave-based agricultural economy of
the area, and it was slow to recover. The Markells at RiverView Farm seemed to
have fallen on hard times, while the Shepherd family at Springwood managed
to maintain their property ownership and continue their life near Terrapin
Neck, albeit without their slaves.
1865
An advertisement
appeared in the Shepherdstown Register on September 9:
JEFFERSON LAND FOR SALE. The subscriber wishes to sell at Private
Sale about 223 ACRES of the BEST LIMESTONE LAND, susceptable of
a division in two Tracts, lying between R.D. and Henry Shepherd,
one mile from the Chesapeake & Ohio Canal, and 7 miles from
the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad. Improvements good. Has upon it
two fine Large Orchards and about 50 OR 60 ACRES of the very best
TIMBER. Well watered, there being six or eight springs. Terms made
to accommodate the purchaser. J.S. Markell. September 9, 1865.
In November, R.D Shepherd died of typhoid fever, after having retired
and become a recluse on his Wild Goose Farm some years before. The
war had to have been a tremendous burden on R.D. during the last
years of his life: much of his business was still in New Orleans,
a southern port city fought over and occupied by northern military
forces for much of the war, while his daughter, grandsons, and other
business interests were located in the Yankee bastion of Boston.
His Wild Goose Farm heard the footsteps and cannon of armies on
both sides of the conflict, so it can perhaps be understood why
R.D. would look for peace in a world gone mad. His will specified
that various family members could keep everything that he had given
them over the years, and all his property, including the “Medford”
estate in Middlesex County, Massachusetts, and his real estate holdings
in New Orleans, were to be divided between his daughter Ellen Brooks
and her two sons, Peter Brooks and Shepherd Brooks (JC Recorders
WB, p.21). It is assumed that nephew Henry, already in New Orleans,
continued to manage the operations there for the Brooks family members.
Henry Shepherd II took over ownership of the Wild Goose Farm at
some point, thus creating the necessity of distinguishing between
his Upper (Wild Goose) and Lower (Springwood) farms. Henry would
come back to live in Virginia full-time with his wife, Azemia (McLean)
Shepherd, daughter of a prominent New Orleans merchant, and four
children sometime in the 1770s (in the Jefferson County, VA 1880
census he listed an 8-year-old son born in Louisiana, suggesting
the family moved back to Virginia after 1772).
1869
RiverView Farm, now
down to 152 acres, was sold. Thornton W Mason and wife Ellen
paid $660 to James Markell, and also had to pay off two other bonds
of $1231 and $1891 held by a trustee E. J. Lee, suggesting a
foreclosure was at least imminent (JCDB 4 - 1869-70, p. 231).
The 1870 census shows the Mason household at RiverView Farm with 9
children, and a 10-year- old mulatto day laborer named James
Brown. Continuing the tradition of many previous owners of RiverView
farm in the 19th century, Thornton died within a couple of years
of acquiring the property.
1870
Henry Shepherd Sr.,
born in 1793 and the owner of Springwood, died in October 1870 of “general
debility”. He was survived by his wife Fanny (Briscoe)
Shepherd, and four of their remaining children, among them Henry
Jr who had spent much of his adult life in New Orleans, but would
soon be managing the upper and lower farms near Terrapin Neck.
A description of the farms during his era of ownership is included
in the appendix. Henry Sr.’s will mentions the four remaining
children: Henry Jr, Anne Elizabeth, John and Abram, and mentions
that his son R.D. is deceased, with the heirs already amply provided
for by both Henry Sr and R.D. Sr. The will specified that his
entire estate in Jefferson County was to go to his wife Fanny,
and upon her death the property was to go to both Anne Elizabeth
and Henry Jr. Henry Jr could in turn buy out his sister’s
half when the time came for $8000 (JC Recorders WB p. 153)
1872
James Markell died.
He was reportedly living in a boarding house in Shepherdstown
and died of erysipelas, a bacterial disease of the skin
1876
RiverView Farm was
purchased by Henry St. John Shepherd, grandson of Abraham Shepherd
and cousin of Henry, after the death of Thornton Mason. Edgar
Mason, the 25-year-old eldest son of Thornton (clerk in a dry
goods store in 1870), contested the sale in court, with his mother
as the defendant. The dispute wasn’t resolved until 10
years later.
1881
Fanny
Shepherd, widow of Henry Shepherd, died of “old age”
at the age of 81. Her son John had recently died of a “spinal
affliction” two years prior, and her unmarried daughter Anne
Elizabeth died two years later of cancer at the age of 52. Presumably
Henry Jr. paid his sister Anne $8000 for her half of the property
before her death, as specified in their father’s will.
1886
RiverView
farm was finally assimilated into the adjacent Shepherd family domain
when the court ruled that it had been purchased by Henry St. John
Shepherd. A life-long bachelor, Henry St. John may have rented the
place to tenants or to Henry Shepherd next door. RiverView Farm
seemed to continue its long period of decline after this time. Henry
St. John apparently was the first to refer to it as RiverView Farm
in a deed. When he died in 1901 of dropsy at the age of 76, he was
living in a room in a building owned by Thomas Files, and gave the
farm to his sister Mary in return for the $3500 he had borrowed
from her (JCWB C, p.5). His will was not witnessed by anyone, and
specified that his funeral should not cost more than $100.
1888
The Shepherd family’s
upper and lower farms were given a glowing report in Aler’s
(1888) book of the history of Berkeley County (though the property
had become part of Jefferson County in 1801); a photo of Springwood – the
lower farm – ca. 1870’s is shown above. Henry Shepherd
Jr’s son Rezin Davis (R.D.), after attending Washington
and Lee College and the University of Virginia at Charlottesburg,
and pursuing a short career in real estate in New Orleans, had
by this time become a renowned Shakespearean actor, “tragedian
and artist” using the stage name R.D. MacLean
Aler also described R.D.’s brother, a young industrious Henry Shepherd
(III) with “already marked business capacity” who has
been given “the general supervision of his extensive farming operations”,
with his “thorough knowledge of the best methods of raising and developing
thorough-breds of all kinds”. Aler confidently predicted “an
honorable and prosperous future - and that he will prove a worthy successor
to his illustrious father”. Another family genealogist described
young Henry III as “a fancy stock breeder and farmer” (Smyth,
1909).
1891
Henry
Shepherd II died of “paralysis” at 62 years of age (JC
Death Register, B5, p. 45). He gave the paved road between his two
farms, Shepherd Grade, to Jefferson County at this time (Smyth,
1909). He divided all his property between his four sons: R.D.,
Henry, William and Augustus, each getting a certain percentage based
on their ages (JCWB B, p.24). The Aler account quoted above suggests
that his son Henry, then in his early 20s, after having been schooled
at the Virginia Military Academy and St. James College near Hagerstown,
MD.
was now supervising the farming operations.
1893
Henry Shepherd III
married Minnie Rinehart; an infant son, also named Henry, died
soon after.
1895
A plat
recorded in the Jefferson County courthouse on 3 March describes
a “plat of W.J. and A.M Shepherd Stock Farm containing 312
acres formerly “the lower” farm of Henry Shepherd and
adjoining George F. Turner, the Potomac River, J.R. Johnson, R.D.
Shepherd, Henry St. John Shepherd, the Terrapin Neck Road, Shepherd’s
Pike and Shepherd Island” (Thompson 1984). A copy of this
plat was found in the attic of the estate house at Springwood some
years ago, and now hangs on a wall there. The date suggests that
Henry III had sold his portion of the lower farm to his two brothers,
Augustus and William and had developed other interests besides being
a fancy stock breeder on the old family estate.
1896
Young
Henry Shepherd III died on March 4 at 29 years of age, his honorable
and prosperous future as a fancy stock breeder somewhat short-lived.
His death was not recorded in the Jefferson County courthouse records,
suggesting he died elsewhere. Springwood was now being operated
as the “Shepherd Stock Farm” by young brothers William
and Augustus Shepherd. Augustus, after an education at St. James
College in Maryland and a short stint at the University of Virginia,
for a time had aspired to the stage like his older brother R.D.
but moved back to Virginia in the mid 1890s. His brother William
graduated from the University of Virginia in 1893. The oval racetrack
seen today near the entrance to NCTC is probably one of their contributions
to the cultural history of the property. One report describes them
as owning “such noted horses as Queen Gothard, 2.14 _, Nellie
D, 2.18 _; Jennie C, 2.23 _; Royal Penn, 2.10 _; and Director Joe,
2.09_”. (see Shepherd postings by Nel Hatcher at Rootsweb
link at http://homepages.rootsweb.com/~nhatcher/miller/index.htm
)
Within a few years, the Shepherd family’s ownership of these
historic properties came to an end. The Shepherd Stock Farm operation
lasted about another decade, when it was sold to a Col. Johnson
in 1907. RiverView Farm, after the death of Henry St. John Shepherd,
was sold out of the family by his sister in 1902. William and Augustus's
famous brother R.D. sold the Wild Goose Farm about 1911 and moved
to Hollywood to try a career in the movies; silent film credits
include The Bishop of the Ozarks (1923), Bag and Baggage (1923),
Don’t Neglect Your Wife (1921), Number 99 (1920), The Silver
Horde (1920), The Little Shepherd of Kingdom Come (1920), Full of
Pep (1919), The Best Man (1919)). R.D. died in California in June
of 1948.
    
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