Piscataway

I’m a place south of Washington.  Tall ships, hogsheads of tobacco, and Scottish merchants are part of my early history.   I have an historic district and proud to know George Washington lived just a few miles away.

Too easy, right?

Well, yes, Alexandria is correct, but did you know that the above also applies to Piscataway?

Piscataway, both an unincorporated community and the smaller historic district within it, came across our radar screen when I was reading, “Along the Potomac Shore, in Prince George’s County.”   The book was written by the Tanta-Cove Garden Club, a group of caring members whose community-minded organization began in 1966.    

Note:  Piscataway, which is located east of Fort Washington, is not to be confused with Piscataway Park, which lies south of Mount Vernon.   They do share the history of being where the Piscataway peoples lived. 

As an historic village, Piscataway is not exactly a one-of-a-kind place.  Northern Virginia has the time capsules of  Millwood, Buckland and Waterford.   But from Alexandria, you have to invest some time to get there and back.  This one is just a half dozen miles south of National Harbor.

Piscataway is part of four mile stretch south of National Harbor that is rich in historical assets.   However, it’s a mixed bag.  Although one can visit Oxon Hill Manor, St. John’s Church, Fort Washington, and the Colonial Farm at Accokeek, some of the others stand in limbo.   

I have to confess I knew next to nothing about Piscataway until I read about it in this book.  As they say, half the fun is getting there.   Let’s take the plunge…

 

Almost a half-century before Alexandria was founded in 1749, signs of English life began to emerge on the Maryland side of the Potomac.   Around the first part of the eighteenth century, both Broad Creek and Piscataway got their start as tobacco ports.  Planter Thomas Addison built a brick mansion on top of Oxon Hill, long an early landmark in this part of Prince George’s County until fire took it down in the 1890s.  The site is the MGM Resort, just north of Oxon Hill Manor, built 1920s, in the above map).   

In terms of shipping activity and a place of some commerce, Broad Creek would not prosper like Piscataway.   But some of the first stories of that part of Prince George’s County took place there.   The parish vestrymen built the first of several churches, whose site is at or near the current St. John’s Church, about three miles north of Piscataway.     

An older sign in Piscataway says, “Established 1640.”   Perhaps that refers to “the Baptism of the Piscataway Chief Kittamaquund by Fr. Andrew White, S.J.”   Of course, the history of the Piscataway peoples here goes way back.   On this land they knew so well as their home, the new port town of Piscataway was founded.   Unlike Broad Creek, it emerged as one of Maryland’s four major ports (Annapolis, Upper Marlboro and Port Tobacco).  Like so many other ports, including Dumfries and Colchester, the ships would eventually stop coming to Piscataway.  The American Revolution rang the death knell and silting finished them off.   

Piscataway, however, had a hey day as a port and then held on as a hamlet with farming, some fishing, being a cross roads place, including the post office.   The village had a tavern, stores, a church, a school, and the post office.  The Maryland Gazette and Alexandria Gazette covered some of its shipping, steamer, and estate news, as well as obits.  Sadly, the coverage included ads for the selling of enslaved humans and reward notices for their return.   

Like Alexandria, Dumfries, Colchester and others, Piscataway provides windows into the area’s colonial past.   As Alan Virta points out in “Prince George’s County:  A Pictorial History,” Piscataway was a thriving little place.”   

The Scottish shipping firm of John Glassford & Company had trading stores in a number of ports in Virginia and Maryland (One of the great losses in Alexandria was the (1915) demolition of the company’s commodious brick and stone store at the corner of Lee and N. Fairfax).   The company was the Walmart of its day, with stores in Alexandria, Colchester, Dumfries, as well as Port Tobacco, Upper Marlboro, Piscataway and elsewhere.   The triangle of trade involved mostly tobacco from the Chesapeake, sugar and rum from the Caribbean, and the household goods from England.  Sadly, enslaved humans were part of the economic flows.   

Bringing some of the Piscataway story back to life is Thomas W. Cuddy and his book, “Revolutionary Economies.”   He first tells us about Ebenezer Cooke’s “infamous tale,” The Sot-Weed Factor, Or a Voyage to Maryland” (1708).  The setting for the long, satirical poem was “Piscato-way.”   

The port town seemed to get the last laugh.  It prospered and became a “substantial community.”    George Mason was a regular customer.   James Marshall, Alexander Hamilton (no, not that one!) and Thomas Clagett ran the trading stores so vital to the life of the planter community.    

Piscataway, closer to Mount Vernon than Alexandria, was in the orbit of George Washington.    With a good number of entries, Washington’s diary reflects his interest in Piscataway.   On May 13, 1762, he wrote:   “Got a Cask of Leith Ale from Mr. Marshall Piscataway.” 

That same month he wrote to the London-based Robert Cary & Company, another major shipper of tobacco.

The Tobacco’s of most of your friends upon Potomack (or that Ships from thence) lies within 15 Miles above & below this place, and as good, or the best harbour (Piscataway) is within sight of my Door.  It has this great advantage besides good Anchorage & laying safe from the Winds that it is out of the way of the Worm which is very hurtful to Shipping a little lower down & lyes in a very plentiful part of the Country.

Another future President and Founding Father, Thomas Jefferson, dined at Piscataway (August 4, 1775).  

The town was connected with the Virginia side of the Potomac by a ferry ride to Clifton Landing, modern day River Farm.  Martenet’s Map of the county in 1861 shows a road running northeast up to Upper Marlborough.  The modern day equivalent is roughly Piscataway Road/223 past Clinton.   

Horse racing was popular in Maryland and Piscataway held days for races and the accompanying festivities.   The  village did not make the cut for Eshelman’s “A Travel Guide to The War of 1812 in the Chesapeake,” but the townsfolk surely felt high anxiety during the British campaign and some may have heard the sound of gunfire during the Battle Of White House Landing at Belvoir.

At first thought, it’s tempting to say not much happened in Piscataway during the Civil War.   That is relatively true, but then we came across the story of Thomas Harbin (1833-1885).  He lived in Piscataway and was a Confederate agent.   At the beginning of the Civil War, Harbin was the proprietor of the hotel Harbin House, which later became Piscataway Tavern. 

Forgotten is the role he had in helping John Wilkes Booth and David Herold as they fled southward from Washington in April, 1865.   The military commission decided not to prosecute Harbin.  He later lived in Washington and worked as a hotel clerk.   In 1884, George Alfred Townsend, the famed chronicler of the war, interviewed Harbin.

Townsend wrote:

On one occasion he concluded to go into Piscataway, where he had once kept a hotel, and about all persons in the town knew him, and all knew that he was the chief Confederate in that part of the country. The bar-room was full of Federal soldiers, and a whole regiment was stationed in the neighborhood. He walked to the counter and asked them all to drink - soldiers and citizens. The citizens stood trembling for fear he would be arrested or informed upon. Harbin himself reflected a moment that he had better be cautious, so he had his horse sent to the neighboring house of Dr. Dyer, from which he departed.

After the Civil War, the African-American community of Chapel Hill emerged just north of Piscataway.   Like elsewhere, larger plats of land became smaller ones for farms.  

GM Hopkins map of Washington 1879 shows Piscataway as one of 14 districts in Prince George’s County.  The southern border of Oxen Hill was Broad Creek.  Piscataway ran from there down to Mattawoman’s Creek, about a mile south of Accokeek.  Names dotting the district included Dr. Hurttt, Dr. Edelen, Joseph Hostetter, and Joseph Hatton.  

The short lived Baltimore and Potomac RR (1872-1892) ran about five miles to the east.  That was too far away to make an impact for Piscataway.   In the other direction, perhaps young boys popped a blade of grass in their mouth and wandered over to the Potomac to wave at the steamboats or skip stones across the waters of the creek.    Maybe some climbed the step hill up to Fort Washington to get a better glimpse of Mount Vernon.

Memories can be sweet, but Piscataway was on a slow fade away from its former glories.  In 1905, a visiting writer with the Evening Star described it as “a shabby hamlet.”  Nevertheless, it still had its setting in “an amphitheater of splendid hills” and “a proud long past.”  The writer pointed out the main feature of Piscatway was the St Mary’s Catholic Church.  It was just one year old and had been erected on the site of a church in 1838.

In the 1920s, Prohibition gave a few in the village an opportunity.  In his indispensable guide, "This Was Potomac River," Frederick Tilp recalled “Piscataway Corn,” was a big hit in the Alexandria speakeasies during Prohibition.   

The post office in Piscataway closed in 1943 (became Clinton).  In the 1950s, Highway 210 gave motorists the faster, divided highway option.   For those hoping the highway would not portend the end of Piscataway's rural nature, they could be pleased that post war growth in Washington did not overtake this part of the region in the sometimes overwhelming way it did in other parts of the region.    

In 1992, however, Wayne Hardin ("Uneasy Times for Nice Little Village," Baltimore Sun) wrote a story about Piscataway.  Mary Forsht-Tucker, Piscataway Citizens Association president, said, “We’re tremendously threatened by development.”

Twenty years later, a new set of homes, Preserve at Piscataway, was built east of Piscataway Road.   The archaeological investigations there near the Edelen House (2445 Bailey's Pond Road) enabled Cuddy to pair the artifacts (12,793) with the Glassford records.    This helped further tell the story of the great reach of the Glassford company and also shined a light on the Edelen family.    

For now, there’s been no further encroachment.   The dozen contributing buildings along Floral Park Road provide a unique and special place.  

Below are our photos.   The final three are not part of this historic district but we include them for reasons noted.

St. Mary's Church

 

St. Mary’s Church is a striking landmark, rising tall in the Gothic style.  Catholic congregations here go back to the 1770s.   The convent and school were built in 1961.   

The cemetery holds the passed souls and reveals names of the past.

 

 

Contributing Buildings on Floral Park Road

Miller House, 2312 Floral Park Road 

Dr. Edgar Hurtt House, 2308 Floral Park Road 

Gallahan-Davis House, 2306 Floral Park Road

Hardy Tavern, 2305 Floral Park Road

Bond Bungalow, 2209 Floral Park Road 

Clagett Store/Harbin House, 2208 Floral Park Road

Stanton-Bladford House, 2207 Floral Park Road

Piscataway Tavern, 2204 Floral Park Road

Sarah Underwood House, 2004 Floral Park Road

Thomas C. Underwood House, 1908 Floral Park Road

 

 

 

 

Farmington Landing

Steamboats ferried passengers to and from here.  By the 20th century the landing had fallen out of commercial use due to the rapid accumulation of silt, but the spot remains a favorite for local fishers and kayakers.   Close your eyes and imagine George Washington sliding by.

 

 

St. James Hill

St James Hill lies on a small hill about a half mile south of the historic district.  It is also known as the Hostetter House.   The name of the dwelling might have come from a plantation of the same name.  Reverend John Fraser, the first rector of Piscataway Parish, owned the 700-acre tract.   This would have been around the 1710s and was where the Piscataway had lived south of the creek.    

In “Along the Potomac Shore, in Prince George’s County,” Pauline Collins shows a long list of owners and neglect.   Perhaps the most famous was Dr. Benedict Semmes (1789-1863), who married Emily Edelen.  He served at the House level in the State and then the US.

The build date is uncertain.  A Digital Maryland document shows the original frame part as mid eighteenth century.  The two and a half story brick is early 19c.   Collins tells us Lorena Boswell and her brother restored it in 1936.   They added a hyphen that connects to the brick part.  In 1976, Mr. and Mrs. Briesmaster acquired the home and restored it.  They added a wing. 

 

Piscataway House

This is a fascinating story, one touched on by the nomination form for the National Register of Historic Places for Piscataway.  Charles Wallace Collins (1879-1964), a lawyer, writer and librarian with the Library of Congress, acquired Harmony Hall in 1929.  He and his wife lived there.

Around the same time, he also purchased one of the homes in Piscataway.  It was a Tidewater-style framed house that was going to be demolished.   He had it moved brick by brick to a spot north of Harmony Hall.  Collins also dredged part of the canal to help facilitate the move by water.