Tag: Baltimore MD

Wikipedia says: Baltimore is the most populous city in the U.S. state of Maryland. Baltimore was designated an independent city by the Constitution of Maryland in 1851.

Prior to European colonization, the Baltimore region was used as hunting grounds by the Susquehannock Native Americans, who were primarily settled further north than where the city was later built. Colonists from the Province of Maryland established the Port of Baltimore in 1706 to support the tobacco trade with Europe, and established the Town of Baltimore in 1729. The Battle of Baltimore was a pivotal engagement during the War of 1812, culminating in the failed British bombardment of Fort McHenry, during which Francis Scott Key wrote a poem that would become “The Star-Spangled Banner”, which was eventually designated as the American national anthem in 1931. During the Pratt Street Riot of 1861, the city was the site of some of the earliest violence associated with the American Civil War.

The Baltimore and Ohio Railroad, the oldest railroad in the United States, was built in 1830 and cemented Baltimore’s status as a major transportation hub, giving producers in the Midwest and Appalachia access to the city’s port. Baltimore’s Inner Harbor was once the second leading port of entry for immigrants to the United States. In addition, Baltimore was a major manufacturing center.

Civil War

Maryland, a slave state with abundant popular support for secession in some areas, remained part of the Union during the American Civil War, due in part to the Union’s strategic occupation of the city in 1861. The Union’s capital, Washington, in the state of Maryland (geographically if not politically), was well-situated to impede Baltimore and Maryland’s communication or commerce with the Confederacy. Baltimore saw the first casualties of the war on April 19, 1861, when Union Soldiers en route from the President Street Station to Camden Yards clashed with a secessionist mob in the Pratt Street riot.