Writing for the Maryland State Archives

From May to November 2016, I worked at the Maryland State Archives as a researcher on the Finding the Maryland 400 Project. While there I wrote a number of blogposts, which are as follows:

1. 1. Col. Gaither: Seven years on Georgia’s frontier (re-posted on this blog and on academia.edu). I expanded upon that blogpost in my post on this blog titled “From the Revolutionary War to the 1790s: the Creek Nation in the Southern Gulf Region”
   2. Col. Barton Lucas: more than a military man (re-posted on this blog and on academia.edu)
   3. Sickened Marylanders and the Philadelphia Bettering House (re-posted on this blog and on academia.edu)
   4. Persecuted in Revolutionary Baltimore: The Sufferings of Quakers (re-posted on this blog and on academia.edu)
   5. A “little groggy”: the deputy sheriff of Baltimore and his “bowl of toddy” (re-posted on this blog and on academia.edu)
   6. The political climate of Baltimore in 1776 (re-posted on this blog and on academia.edu)
   7. A “dull place” on the Patapsco: Baltimore and the Marr Brothers (re-posted on this blog and on academia.edu)
   8. “Flecking the hedges with red”: Palmer’s Ballad on the Maryland 400 (re-posted on this blog and on academia.edu)
   9. “The misfortune which ensued”: The defeat at Germantown (re-posted on this blog and on academia.edu)
   10. A Short Fight on Hobkirk’s Hill: Surprise, Blame, and Defeat (re-posted on this blog and on academia.edu)
   11. British “masters of the field” : The disaster at Brandywine (re-posted on this blog and on academia.edu)

Many of these posts were noted in a SAR report

I also wrote 91 biographies of Revolutionary Marylanders. They were on the following individuals:

1. Hezekiah Foard (bio re-posted on this blog and academia.edu)
2. Barton Lucas (bio re-posted on this blog and academia.edu)
3. John Mitchell (bio re-posted on this blog and academia.edu)
4. John Sears (bio re-posted on academia.edu)
5. Henry Mitchel (bio re-posted on academia.edu)
6. William Dawson (bio re-posted on academia.edu and Find A Grave)
7. John Lowry (full text of bio re-posted on academia.edu since previous bio was not archived) [since been been changed by current researcher Natalie Miller, current changed version here]
8. John Neal (bio re-posted on academia.edu and Find A Grave), and his wife Margaret, adapted from that.
9. John Hardman (bio re-posted on academia.edu)
10. John Plant (bio re-posted on academia.edu)
11. George Lashley (bio re-posted on academia.edu)
12. Andrew Meloan (bio re-posted on academia.edu)
13. Robert Ratliff (bio re-posted on academia.edu)
14. William Marr (bio re-posted on academia.edu)
15. Solomon Slocum (bio re-posted on academia.edu)
16. Henry Chew Gaither (bio re-posted on academia.edu)
17. Samuel Goslin (bio re-posted on Find A Grave)
18. Josias Miller (bio re-posted on Find A Grave)
19. Matthew Murry (bio re-posted on Find A Grave)
20. Michael Nowland (bio re-posted on Find A Grave)
21. Ezekiel Pearce (bio re-posted on Find A Grave)
22. Benjamin Ford
23. Charles Smith
24. John McGlaughlin
25. Neal Dearmond
26. Thomas Donolan
27. Richard Doyle
28. John Gorden
29. William Grimes
30. Thomas Hamilton
31. John Haney
32. Thomas Holland
33. William Martin
34. James Matthews
35. William McGlaughlin
36. Thomas McGuire
37. Edward McKinzie
38. Joseph Mongomery
39. Charles Pritchard
40. James Reed
41. Patrick Reed
42. Samuel Thomas
43. Joseph Dixon
44. Edward Ford
45. Alexander McConaughey
46. James Murphey
47. John Harris
48. Isaac Buttrim
49. John Callenan
50. Christian Castler
51. Richard Cheaney
52. Samuel Elliott
53. James Garner
54. Godfrey Gash
55. William Hammond
56. Philip Harley
57. James Hogg
58. George Horner
59. Thomas Hunter
60. Nicholas Marr
61. James Marr
62. John McCoy
63. Alexander McMunn
64. James Mutton
65. Mathew Neeley
66. William Nevitt
67. John Reed
68. Thomas Reed
69. William Rogers
70. Charles Turner
71. Thomas McLanhlan
72. Thomas Stern
73. John Read
74. John Redman
75. Richard Goldin
76. Edward Marr
77. Thomas Certain
78. Patrick McCann
79. James McHendricks
80. John Marr
81. John Porter
82. Richard Pursel
83. Benjamin Quimby
84. William Stibbings
85. William Thompson
86. Barnet Turner
87. Stephen Videto
88. William Wright
89. William Holmes (since been revised/fixed up by current researcher Natalie Miller)
90. Samuel Jones
91. Robert Harvey

The Society of John Gaither Descendants praised my work on the Henry Chew Gaither biography, writing

“It is timely during our celebration of our nation’s independence, that SJGD member Sue Gaither Vanzant alerted us to an updated and expanded biography of Revolutionary War Captain, Colonel Henry Chew Gaither. The biography and an excellent account of Colonel Gaither’s life written by Burkely Herman[n] is located on the Maryland State Archives site dedicated to the Maryland 400. Mr. Herman[n] is a 2016 Maryland Society of the Sons of American Revolution Research Fellow. The blog and biography provide valuable insight into the times in which Colonel Gaither lived and his service to our country…Society member, Sue Vanzant, through her own research, played an important role in expanding the biography of Colonel Gaither [which I wrote].

I used the information of varied Marylanders to write two following blogposts:

• Meloan and Slocum: Two Young Marylanders go off to war
• The post-war lives of Maryland’s revolutionary soldiers

My series on the Extra Regiment, which are listed below, also sprung from my work at the Maryland State Archives:

• “Ready to march Southward”: The story of the Maryland Extra Regiment
• “…the new Regiment now raising”: Continuing the story of the Extra Regiment
• The post-war life of Alexander Lawson Smith, a “Harford Man”
• A “person of trust”: the story of Archibald Golder
• “An officer of the Revolution”: The story of Mountjoy Bayly
• “A Gentleman of Maryland”: the short life of Edward Giles
• “A character for probity and honor”: the story of Theodore Middleton
• “A young man with some property”: the story of a former Maryland captain
• Benjamin Murdoch’s life after the war
• The story of the Extra Regiment’s ordinary soldiers: From McCay to Patton 

I also wrote “From Alexander McMunn to Hezekiah Foard: Maryland soldiers in Cecil County after the revolutionary war” which I put up on academia.edu, which was based on the bios of Alexander McMunn and Hezekiah Foard.

My other posts on this blog were somewhat inspired by the work I did at the Maryland State Archives but not directly connected to the work I did there:

• Favoring the British Crown: enslaved Blacks, Annapolis, and the run to freedom
• The story of “Black Confederates”
• Milton Township and the story of the Saratoga County Almshouse in 1900
• “Just a rifleman”: Fusiliers and “fusees” in the Continental Army
• “I never forgot that I was an American”: the story of the Maryland Loyalist Regiment
• 51 years later: Anna Marie Tilghman’s widows pension
• From one Tilghman to the next: Tench and his descendants

Then the most recent two posts are basically about genealogy, inspired by what I wrote on Packed With Packards:

• A history of the word (and practice of) genealogy
• The “rules of genealogical research”: Responding to Tanner’s “Genealogy Star” blog

That’s all of what I have wrote and put together.

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