Living Through History,
The Story of an American Family.
Gray Publishing, Wellesley, MA, 2005.
Chapter 4, pp. 34-42.
Family History
An excerpt from a family history, of the Dawson family, residents of Rocky Glen
Farm. The farm was south of Rockville, just beyond the fairgrounds.
Today, the homestead and outbuilding foundations are adjacent to Dawson Farm Park, off
Ritchie Parkway in the Hungerford neighborhood. The account below is based
on family history, primarily through the accounts of (Mollie) Mary Elizabeth
Dawson Comer; this is related from her point of view.
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Gray, Mary Dawson, Living Through History, The Story of an American Family. Gray Publishing, Wellesley, MA, 2005. Chapter 4, pp. 34-42. |
Mollie's Story
With an agricultural economy closely bound to slavery, people in the area identified with the social and cultural traditions of the South. Most planters had slaves and believed that the Constitution protected the right to own slaves. Before the Civil War this issue had rarely been raised in Montgomery County. Lawrence Dawson had several slaves. He received three when he started to farm, as part of his inheritance from his father. Mollie knew that “their” William had won plowing contests at the fair in the years before the Civil War.
For her father, the concept of the Union was of the utmost importance. He followed the national struggle over how the new western states would enter the Union , as slave or free. By the election of 1860, the Republican Party opposed slavery, so while others sought various compromises, Lawrence Dawson cast one of only 50 votes in Montgomery County for Lincoln. It was a very unpopular position to hold in a town of about four hundred. Mollie told her nephews and nieces that during this period she and her little brother, Hal, walked across the field together to their Rockville school, where they were frequently jeered and taunted by the other children because their parents were known to support Lincoln.
Some of her father’s family in Dawsonville felt that Maryland should join the Confederacy and some of them fought for the South. The Lawrence Dawsons, however, were firm in their support for the Union . Thought her mother’s family lived in Virginia, the Kiger men fought for the North. When the Civil War started, Mollie’s favorite uncle, John P. Kiger, called “Colonel Pat”, raised Company K of the 8th Virginia Regiment, U.S. volunteers, and fought in the Union army until his discharge in 1864. He participated in many hard-fought battles, serving for a time as an aid to General Rosencrantz.
Influenced by both parents, the Dawson children were aware that in the community theirs was a decidedly minority view. Their life became more difficult in 1862 when their father became one of two Union Enrollment Officers in charge of registering men ages 20 to 45 in the Union Army. Volunteer enlistments lagged after the early battles when the nation realized the war would last for some time and result in serious casualties. Conscription began, unless one could pay a $300 commutation fee to be excused from a particular draft or get a substitute to serve. Maryland, which could have joined the Confederacy, was kept in the Union by strong actions of President Lincoln who considered the border states to be crucial to the Union cause. Each state had to raise troops for the Northern army, but in areas where the popular sentiment supported the South, this became increasingly difficult. Lawrence Dawson held this unpopular position throughout the war, giving up his law practice to do so.
When Mollie talked about the Civil War, she told her nieces and nephews about hiding Union soldiers and their horses in the woods to the rear of the farm, and how Hal had carried food to them under the pretext of tending cattle. When an army passed by, families had to hide their own horses and livestock, lest they be confiscated. As troops moved in and around Rockville, local citizens had problems from stragglers, deserters, and other troop followers who sometimes robbed and looted, stole from gardens, hen houses, and pig pens. For a time, federal troops of the Rockville Expedition were assigned to the area to safeguard the approach to Washington and to try to protect local farms from military stragglers. The fairgrounds, with shade trees and abundant water, was the favorite camping ground for army units. Immediately adjacent to the Lawrence Dawson property, only an open field separated it from the house in the shady glen.
Like others along the Pike, Mrs. Dawson was asked for food whenever troops from either side were in the vicinity. She gave them whatever she could, milk, corn bread, what she could spare. Occasionally they simply took what they wanted to supplement what was supposed to be a daily ration of bread, soup, coffee and salt pork, a ration frequently not available. Southern armies, especially late in the war, had few supplies and were expected to live off the land.
Sometimes soldiers needed medical care. Like the Misses Beall who later dragged a wounded Union soldier into their house, and Dora Higgins who rescued a young infantryman, Mary Elizabeth Dawson nursed at least one Union soldier early in the war. In gratitude he later sent her a pewter coffee pot inscribed “To Mrs. Dawson from a Soldier December 16, 1861.”
Mollie told of her mother giving food to soldiers of both armies. While her sympathies for the Union were well known, she had friends and relatives on both sides of the conflict. We have few details, however, about the soldier who sent the coffee pot. Since she took care of him in 1861 one wonders if he was ill or wounded. That year 38,000 Union troops were in Montgomery County, many from New England. Had he been wounded at Bull Run in July of 1861 when cannons could be heard in Rockville and disorganized, inexperienced Union soldiers escaped into Maryland and came along the Pike seeking food and water? Or at Balls Bluff (October 1861) across the river near Poolesville? Or was there some other military incident in December 1861? Perhaps he was a member of the Rockville Expedition and the victim of an accident or an illness. Family reports that he came from Maine cannot be substantiated though the 23rd Maine Regiment was with the Rockville Expedition. For whatever reason, he was concealed at Rocky Glen until his recovery. At that time, enlistment periods were brief and when he returned home, he wanted to express his gratitude to a woman who had helped him. Though she probably helped others, they did not send gifts. After her husband’s capture in 1863, Mary Elizabeth Dawson was undoubtedly more cautious in offering extended help.
Army of the Potomac, Antietam Campaign
Mollie and Hal remembered seeing army units, large and small. In late August 1862, they watched for three days as McClellan’s Army of the Potomac marched along the Rockville Pike, the Second, Sixth and Twelfth Corps, 95,000 men with their heavy wagons, artillery, and horses on their way to Frederick, South Mountain, and Antietam. They used the old courthouse in Rockville as a temporary hospital for sick and exhausted soldiers. General McClellan spent the night with the Misses Beall (at the Beall-Dawson House) describing one of them in a letter to his wife as “an old maid of strong Union sentiment.” In September, after Antietam, they saw the wagon trains of wounded come back down the Pike. Mrs. Dawson knew the hospitals in Frederick and Baltimore were full of wounded and that the less severe cases were dropped off in places like Rockville courthouse which could not accommodate all of the wounded, ill, or exhausted soldiers left there. They filled the building and lay all over the grounds. People from around the area brought straw fro bedding and came to help as the wagon trains of other wounded continued to Washington.
With both Confederate and Union troops moving about the area, Mollie remembered the need for vigilance. Her most frightening memory was of a Sunday in June when JEB Stuart, the famous Confederate cavalry general, took over the town.
On that Sunday morning, June 28, 1863, Lawrence Dawson, who was probably accompanied by his family, went to Christ Episcopal Church in Rockville. Mrs. John Higgins was getting her children ready for Sunday school. Suddenly the quiet of the morning was shattered by two columns of Confederate troops riding into town on both the Falls Road and the Darnestown Road (Route 28). Major General JEB Stuart’s cavalry corp, Army of Northern Virginia, took over the town. Under Sturat’s command were two other famous southerners, brigadier Fitzhugh Lee and Brigadier General W.H.F. Lee. Confederate sympathizers in Rockville gave them an enthusiastic welcome, especially the young ladies at the Rockville Female Academy who smiled, waved, and sang to the troops. Union sympathizers, however, were terrified.
Mrs. Higgins saw a column of troops “charging furiously” past a neighbor’s house, firing muskets. They captured a 17-year-old Union soldier she had taken into her home to recover from a war injury. Knowing that he was not yet well, she pleaded that he not be taken away as a prisoner. When he was forcibly removed, she ran through the back way to the Episcopal church to warn her husband and Mr. Bowie, Mr. Dawson, and Mr. Williams to stay in the vestry room because they were in danger. She told them she would let them know when it was safe to leave. Just in case they might be captured, her husband and Judge Bowie gave her the substantial amount of money they were carrying which she hid on her person and later buried. Then she gathered her children and ran home with them through the chaos.
As soon as they heard the town was in Confederate hands, Lawrence Dawson and other prominent Unionists in the congregation moved quickly to the vestry to avoid being seen. Dora Higgins went to protect her store and we assume that Mary Elizabeth Dawson took her children home as quickly as possible to protect their black servants, horses, and the farm. When any troops were in the area, black field hands and horses had to be kept out of sight. Mary Dawson might also have felt that their presence in church would draw attention to her missing husband.
Dora Higgins spent much of that day protecting her store. When threatened that unless she opened the store to southern troops, it would be forcibly entered, she appealed directly to General Stuart who told her to stay in front of the store and dare any soldier to resist her. So for six hours she personally stood guard in front of the closed, locked building. Thought the Confederates bragged that they were gentlemen and did not distress women and children and destroy dwellings, they were clearly eager to capture supplies and any horses. The Higgins’ son had tried to bring their horse into their house, but his mother had hidden him from view behind the bushes in her garden where he remained undetected.
The Rebel forces had about 8,000 soldiers. That morning, Charles Abert, a Rockville gentleman who kept a detailed diary, had seen through his binoculars a Union wagon train of 150 wagons, each drawn by a team of six mules, rapidly approaching the town along the Rockville Pike. Stuart’s forces captured the supply train, which was intended for General Meade, then in pursuit of Robert E. Lee’s Army of Northern Virginia which was approaching Gettysburg.
Mrs. Dawson and her children may have seen Confederate soldiers bringing the wagon train up the Pike. As the Southern forces spread through the countryside around Rocky Glen, they encountered another small Union Force near the Poor House, not far from the back of the Dawson farm. After a brief skirmish, the Federal troops retreated. Perhaps these were the Union soldiers that were hidden nearby in the dense pine woods and may have been the ones to whom Hal had taken food.
In their sweep around the town, the Rebels brought about 600 prisoners, blacks, soldiers, and civilians to be confined in the courthouse.
Mary Elizabeth Dawson was deeply worried about her husband in the town. Her children were frightened when he did not return during the day. In the town some local men, George Peter and other Southern sympathizers, appealed to the Confederates that the Union men should not be molested and property should be protected, which, according to Dora Higgins, may have had some effect. In any case, her store was not entered.
At about 6:00 p.m. the Rebel forces started to leave and Mrs. Higgins went to tell the men hiding in the church that in an hour or so, she hoped it would be safe to leave. Suddenly a Confederate squad appeared at the door asking for the men by name. Mrs. Higgins described the scene she witnessed in a letter to here mother. “There was an ominous ‘Halt!’ outside and the door opened. The gentlemen never stirred. I never changed my position. Emma Holland gave a slight sob. There was a dead silence, but in the growing dark I could see that Mr. Higgins and Mr. Bowie were deadly pale. Then; ‘Is Mr. Dawson here?’ ‘Yes, sir.” Rising, he walked out.” As the names of the other men were called, the group gathered and marched to the courthouse to join the other prisoners. They realized that someone in town had given General Stuart a list of the men that supported the Union.
General Stuart’s troops cut the telegraph wires and spent time reorganizing the captured supply train and incorporating the large number of prisoners into their line of march. They left Rockville going through Norbeck and Olney toward Brookeville. Charles Abert was returning from afternoon church services in Olney when he was stopped by Confederate pickets and then by a large cavalry unit from which he was questioned by General Stuart himself. Mr. Abert noted in his diary that JEB Stuart was well dressed in his gray uniform with a row of buttons around the collar and appeared quite prepossessing. He invited Mr. Abert to wait for a while so that he could see some of his friends pass by as prisoners but the Aberts wanted to get home as quickly as possible because it was growing dark and their children were at home.
The prisoners walked with the military units to Brookeville where, by Monday, Stuart knew that another large Union force was in the area and he needed to join General Lee as fast as possible. He could not be encumbered by prisoners on foot, so he stopped in Brookeville, paroled the prisoners, and went on to Gettysburg. Some of the prisoners had been roughed-up by Confederates, but Lawrence Dawson, paroled on Monday, walked home weary and famished, having had no food since Sunday morning.
The delay caused by the decision to lose a day in Rockville prevented Stuart from fulfilling his cavalry role of scouting the area around Gettysburg to provide vital intelligence to General Lee in preparation for his battle. Some historians believe that this Stuart failure was critical to Lee’s defeat at that all-important confrontation.
Mollie, then 11 years old, remembered how frightened all the children had been when their father had not returned for Sunday night supper. When word reached the family that he had been taken prisoner, they were desolate. Their mother tried to help each one deal with the disturbing news, from 17-year-old James to five-year-old Tom. Mollie was terrified.
With no further news, Monday was a dark day for the family until he came walking down the lane. Then there was incredulous joy and relief. From that day, however, Mollie remained terrified of any group of gray-clad soldiers who approached her family.
Jubal Early Marches through Rockville
About one year later, on a hot July day in 1864, Confederate troops again occupied Rockville and again Mollie was filled with terror.
Jubal Early, the famous Southern general, had crossed into Maryland on his way to attack the fortifications surrounding Washington. Reacting to Union burning and looting of the Shenandoah Valley, Early threatened to burn Frederick and other towns that stood in his way unless they paid ransom. Word of harsh treatment by his troops spread throughout the area and families were tense. No one knew where the army was actually headed. From her family in Winchester, Mollie’s mother was acutely aware of the dangers to those who lived in the paths of armies on the move.
Just as the news spread about fighting in Monocacy, a settlement above Dawsonville, one of Early’s cavalry brigades rode down the Gaithersburg road heading toward Rockville!
A Union force rushed to meet them a mile outside the settlement, with a second line of defense within the town limits. When the incoming Confederates broke both lines in a vigorous battle, the Union forces fell back through town and down the Pike to a hill near the edge of Rocky Glen in the vicinity of today’s Edmonston Drive. The southern troops brought up artillery and as Mrs. Dawson gathered her children inside the house, the sound of exploding shells would have echoed in the air. It was a brief encounter with the Union troops retreating into the woods further down the Pike and the Confederate soldiers setting up camp on the fairgrounds.
Sometime alter a small group of soldiers in gray came riding down toward Rocky Glen. They tied their horses to the old persimmon tree at the edge of the field in front of the house and came to the door demanding food. Directing her children to be quiet and calm, Mrs. Dawson met them with a composure that belied her fears. Had they randomly selected this house for food, or were they really after her husband? They had an arrogance bordering on insolence. Mollie, Nan, and their mother hastily set out a meal. As they ate, one soldier kept bragging about his horse, Fleety. When they finished eating, they rode off. No one was harmed. However, with a huge Confederate Army occupying the town, no one knew what to expect. Twelve-year-old Mollie had a deep fear that her father would again be taken prisoner. As long as she lived, that bragging cavalry officer and his horse, Fleety, remained vividly in her memory.
The next morning Early himself arrived in Rockville, leading 8,000 infantry, 40 artillery pieces, and two other cavalry brigades. At the fairgrounds he split his forces, and Mrs. Dawson and her children watched as the cavalry rode down the Rockville Pike in an attempt, we now know, to test Fort Reno in Tenlytown, one of the defenses of Washington. The bulk of Early’s men went down what is now Viers Mill Road.
Early’s advance had taken Washington by surprise. General Hunter, whose army was supposed to protect the capitol from advancing Confederate forces, had inexplicably retreated to West Virginia. This blunder had given Early an open pathway to approach Washington whose impressive ring of defenses was lightly manned by ill-prepared, inexperienced troops. With Early’s advance, the city had been desperately combed for available men to defend the capitol. Quartermaster clerks with no combat experience were issued weapons and sent to the forts. Convalescing soldiers were taken from military hospitals to work with a regiment of the District of Columbia militia and National Guard troops on 100-day duty. As Early’s seasoned units probed the defenses, the fort and the city were saved by the veteran Sixth Corp which had been rushed by steamer up the Potomac. They arrived by mid afternoon to take over the trenches while the President himself watched from one of the fort’s parapets. Reassessing his risks, General Early withdrew his forces and came back through Wheaton to Rockville on July 12. Most of his troops passed through the town the next day and his rear guard established a defensive line a mile out of town on Darnestown Road. When following Union troops pressured this line, the Confederates First Maryland cavalry charged the Union troops in an engagement fought throughout Rockville—in the streets, alleys, yards, and gardens. Most Rockville families took refuge in their basements, but some hardy souls watched the melee from their windows. The Beall sisters saw the fighting surge back and forth through their orchard. When a Union soldier was shot at their front gate, they went out and carried him into the house where they cared for him.
The Union forces were driven to the edge of town near Saint Mary’s Catholic Church and the fairgrounds. Then they withdrew down the Pike along the Dawson fields and beyond, near what is now Woodmont. The Confederate cavalry reversed course and, leaving a few men to hold the town, headed through Dawsonville toward White’s Ford and escape. Ambulances picked up the wounded in Rockville and took them to the courthouse. Some of the Rebels rested for a while in Dawsonville but finally Early’s entire army crossed the river. A large Union force continued in pursuit and returned through Rockville several weeks later.
Relatives in Dawsonville complained throughout the war of considerable damage to fields, livestock, and crops. Animals had been taken, crops destroyed, and fence rails burned for firewood. Mollie’s mother knew, However, that their damage was much less than that suffered by relatives across the river in Winchester, which had changed hands many times during the war and had been devastated by various armies.
Slavery was finally abolished in Maryland on November 1, 1864 when a new state constitution went into effect. This was almost two years after the Emancipation Proclamation (January 1, 1863), which ad freed slaves only in states then in rebellion and hence did not apply to Maryland. Doe the Dawsons, the end of slavery apparently brought little change. For the blacks, however, such a change was incalculable, even though the same families continued to work for the Dawsons as free blacks, through an entire second generation. Old Barker, who was both deaf and mute, was born into slavery and lived at Rocky Glen until he died, well into the next century, Lawrence Dawson paid wages for work done and at least one family lived nearby on land that was given or sold to them.
When the war ended in May 1865, life gradually returned to normal. The Dawson brothers kept their souvenirs. Hal had found a rifle in the field next to the fairgrounds. The Dawson boys kept it with the mini balls that they had picked up in the field, along with some flints of the type that General Braddock’s men might have used. The family, however, was growing up. The boys attended Rockville Academy but girls were not admitted until 1897.
A few years after the war, Lawrence Dawson and his wife built a large addition to their house in the American Gothic style. Not long after it was completed, Lawrence Dawson died on August 8, 1875. Two years later, Mary Elizabeth Kiger Dawson died in December 1877.