This Month In Frederick County History

March

From John Ashbury's - '... and all our yesterdays'

March 7

Seldom is a simple school teacher as revered as was Esther Grinage. She devoted her life to the education of children and was honored in 1937 by friends Elizabeth Browne and Edna Dykes when they named the first kindergarten for African-American children after her.

For more than 35 years she was an elementary teacher and at the time of her death on March 7, 1947, at age 54, was teaching at the Lincoln School on Madison Street.

She was also the widow of William Grinage, who painted the portrait of Francis Scott Key, commissioned by The Kiwanis Club of Frederick, which hung in the lobby of The Francis Scott Key Hotel for many years and is now on permanent loan to Heritage Frederick, formerly known as The Historical Society of Frederick County. Mr. Grinage died on February 25, 1925.

Mrs. Grinage, who died at her home at 22 West All Saints Street, was a member of Asbury Methodist Episcopal Church and served as its Sunday School superintendent. She was survived by three sisters, Mary Wise and Mrs. Delia Saunders, of Frederick, and Mrs. Myrtle Supples, of Pittsburgh. Two nephews, William Ross and Franklin Saunders, also survived.

Following services at her church, she was buried in Fairview Cemetery. Funeral directors M. R. Etchison, which displays paintings by Mrs. Grinage's husband, was in charge of arrangements.

March 14

Little did the residents in Emmitsburg know back in 1809 that within their midst was residing the person who would become America's first native-born saint of The Roman Catholic Church.

Elizabeth Seton was born in New York City on August 28, 1774, just two short years before The American Revolution. She was the second daughter of Dr. and Mrs. Richard Bayley.

Early in her life hardship struck for the first time when her mother died. Dr. Bayley remarried, and Betty's stepmother was much less than a fair replacement. She actually grew up with numerous aunts and uncles, despite her great love for her father.

On January 22, 1794, she married William Seton, the son of a well-known and prosperous merchant. In short order there were five children - Anna Marie, William, Richard, Catherine Joseph and Rebecca - all born within eight years of the marriage.

It became apparent in the months that followed Rebecca's birth in August 1802 that Mr. Seton was not well. He had kept in touch with a business associate of his father in Italy - Filippo and Antonio Filicchi in Leghorn, so a working trip was planned.

All during these trying time, from the death of her father in 1798 to 1803 when they sailed for Italy, Betty's Episcopal faith ever increased, especially after the Reverend John Henry Hobart was appointed rector of Trinity Church, where all five children had been baptized.

On October 2, 1803, William and Betty Seton, with daughter Anna Marie, left New York for Leghorn. Mr. Seton health seemed to improve on the voyage. But upon arrival the family was quarantined because yellow fever had been reported in America. When they were released on December 19, Mr. Seton had to be carried to a carriage for the trip to the Filicchis. Just eight days later he died.

This particular tragedy set the final stage for Betty's conversion to Catholicism. While coping with her grief, Betty visited many cathedrals and was struck by the obvious faith of those she witnessed praying in them.

Perhaps the most profound influence on her was the Filicchis themselves. They provided her with a strength she had not realized before. Their reliance on their beliefs in Jesus as the Savior exerted a subtle but powerful spiritual pressure on her.

For weeks she daily battled religious conflict within her soul. She was devoted to her Episcopal faith, but the peace she observed in the Fillcchis drove her to internal questions.

Her first scheduled voyage home in January was delayed. When it came time in February for the ship to leave, both Betty and Anna were ill with yellow fever. So not until April 8, 1804, did they depart Leghorn. Antonio Filicchi went with them to conduct some business in New York.

During the two-month voyage, Antonio and Betty spent many hours discussing their religious faiths. Over the next several months, family and friends became distant each time she mentioned she was thinking of converting to Catholicism. But she was as determined as was the young America to retain her independence.

And so it was on March 14, 1805, that Seton took the first step that would eventually lead to her canonization. In the presence of Antonio Fillicchi and Father Mathew O'Brien, in St. Peter's Church in New York City, she was accepted into the Roman Catholic Church.

March 21

One of Frederick's greatest contribution to the outside world was made by Jacob Byerly, who perfected the use of daguerreotypes in recording the history of his day.

Byerly was born on February 5, 1807, in Newville, Pennsylvania, the son of Henry and Rebecca Birely.

Notice that at some point Jacob changed the spelling of the last name. According to his great-granddaughter, Mrs. Howard Kelly, Byerly was a school teacher in the early part of his adulthood, and that probably had some effect on the spelling change.

In 1839 a Frenchman by the name of Louis Mande Daguerre invented his box for taking pictures, a crude camera created by modifying a portable camera obscura, a device artist had long used as an aide to their work. Daguerreotypes is a photographic process using silver-coated copper plates treated with iodine vapor.

In 1842, having become fascinated by this new instrument, Byerly opened a photographic studio at 27-29 North Market Street. For nearly 100 years, Byerly, his son, Davis Byerly, and his grandson, Charles Byerly, operated the business from the same location.

The work of Jacob Byerly was apparently the best of its kind in the photographic business. Because of a flood in New York in 1972, very few of his daguerreotypes remain.

Arnold Crane, who lectured nationally on the history of photography, and George Rinhart, borrowed the family's collection of Jacob Byerly's work to restore them. A year later, John Byerly wrote a letter to Rinhart asking about the restoration. The reply he received indicated that everything Crane and Rinhart had borrowed had been ruined not very long after they took the photos to New York by a flood.

John Byerly filed a suit against Crane and Rinhart for the return of the materials "in any condition whatever," but had to settle out of court for $2,500. One daguerreotype that was not destroyed is of Jacob Byerly himself. It shows him looking into the viewing screen of his camera, a plain box with a lens.

Byerly's personal life is somewhat of a mystery, as is that of his death. Various sources list his death date as March 31, 1883, March 20, 1883, and March 29, 1883. However, The Frederick Examiner of Wednesday, March 28, 1883, carried the following notice: "Death of Jacob Byerly. This gentleman died at his residence, West Second Street, this city, on Wednesday afternoon last, in the 77th year of his age.

March 28

With all the interest in the historical figures who make up a significant portion of Frederick County's illustrious history, it is almost inconceivable that one man who made a distinguished mark on our nation's history would be little known today.

But such is the fate that has befallen James Cooper. He was born in Frederick County in 1810 and received a rudimentary education in local schools. He attended Mount Saint Mary's for a time, but he graduated from Washington College in Pennsylvania.

He then studied law under the famous Thaddeus Stevens and became involved in Pennsylvania politics. In 1838 he was elected a congressman and served two terms. After a five-year absence from political wars, he was elected a U.S. senator and served one full term, after which he retired.

Cooper then formed a law partnership with Humphrey Marshall in Washington, but when The Civil War erupted, and Marshall sided with the Confederacy, he renounced that alliance and offered his services to the federal government in any capacity.

In 1860, he had returned to Frederick and purchased the home of Frederick A. Schley on Court Street. A year later when the Brengle Home Guard was formed, Cooper was named a second lieutenant. That was on April 24.

By May 17, just three short week later, Abraham Lincoln commissioned him a brigadier general and ordered him to take the responsibility of forming all the Maryland volunteer units into a regiment.

He was involved in some early battles of the war in Virginia, but in the winter of 1862-1863 he was assigned to Camp Chase near Columbus, Ohio. It was there that he contracted pneumonia and died on March 28, 1863.

His body was returned to Frederick, and after a 24-hour delay because of inclement weather, he was buried on April 1 at Mt. Olivet Cemetery with full military honors.

A final footnote to his life was made by an unknown sympathizer of the southern cause who waved a Confederate flag at the passing funeral procession from the South Market Street home of A. L. Eader. Newspaper accounts indicated that Eader was not at home at the time of the incident and gladly took the oath of allegiance when asked. The culprit was never identified.