Catoctin Furnace vs. Thurmont
by James Rada, Jr.
In September of 1838, a Mechanicstown, Maryland (present-day Thurmont), resident wrote a letter to the editor of the
Baltimore Gazette and
Daily Advertiser.
He told the following story. Earlier that month, shortly before sundown, around a dozen employees of Catoctin Furnace had had too much to drink. They came into town with two slaves for the purpose of “using up people.”
The men started a fight with two townspeople. “The people, anxious to persevere the peace, and apprehending the consequence of their remaining in town, used every means to persuade them from the place. They, however, refused to go and became more violent, until at length, one of the citizens, after in vain urging a Negro fellow to throw away some stones with which he had armed himself, attempted to take them from him by force; this the Negro resented, with violence, and the citizen knocked him down,” the newspaper reported.
Apparently, when at least one of these people tried to get back to his house, the Furnace mob followed him with clubs and knives, “invading and disturbing the peace and quiet of his family, compelling him to escape through a window to which fortunate circumstance probably he owned his life,” according to the letter writer.
The town constable got involved and arrested the slaves and imprisoned them. However, the Furnace workers instituted a jailbreak and freed them.
The letter writer said, “This act, though highly outrageous, the people were disposed to tolerate, as some of the rioters proposed to depart, and here it was thought the matter would end. We were, however, disappointed. Someone demanded more whiskey, and this the landlord refused to give, supposing no doubt, that they already had too much, and dreading the consequence of giving them more. Upon this, one of them left the crowd, but returned in a moment with an axe, swearing that the landlord who refused to sell liquor ought to have his sign post cut down, and accordingly commended hewing at the post.”
Finally, the people in town had had enough and fought back. One of the citizens tried to pull the axe away from the worker and received a severe blow. Suddenly, people were arming themselves with stones, bricks, bats, or whatever they could grab.
The workers were eventually driven out of town “some of them so severely beaten that they could not reach the Furnace, though but three miles distant, without having their wounds dressed,” according to the letter writer.
Interestingly, the letter writer noted that it was a good thing that the slaves left before the fighting began. He said that he had no doubt that if they had gotten swept up in the fight, they would have been killed.
Once the workers were driven out of town, residents appointed guards to patrol the streets. At the close of the letter, the writer pointed out that the people of Mechanicstown were peaceful and hardworking, but “any attempt to disturb the people hereafter, in a similar manner, will be opposed by an efficient force well prepared for the purpose.”
The story shows that there was tension between the blue-collar laborers and slaves of the Furnace and the small businessmen and farmers of Mechanicstown.
A unique aspect of this story is that slaves stood with Furnace workers during the fight. The white workers even rescued the slaves from jail.
This 1890 view shows the Ironworks, the Catoctin Furnace Supply Store, and the Manor House.
Photo Courtesy of Thurmontimages.com
