The Frederick Town Barracks

Funded by the Maryland Legislature in 1777, Frederick Town Barracks entered service during the American Revolution as the first building erected for the new state. Built on land from the Locust Level tract owned by Daniel Dulany, the Elder, who remained loyal to the Crown and fled to England during the war, the barracks were erected in his absence and without his consent, and Maryland did not buy the deed from his heirs until 1799. For the duration of the Revolution, the barracks served as a prisoner-of-war camp, recruiting depot, and market center, and money spent here by about 1,500 German captives later helped Frederick County's postwar recovery. Between 1783 and 1861, the site stood at the crossroads of national events, housing captured French sailors in 1799, serving in 1802-1803 as an inspection depot for supplies gathered for the Lewis and Clark Expedition, holding U.S. troops, militia, and British prisoners during the War of 1812, and functioning repeatedly as a federal depot and state armory. The property also took on educational and agricultural uses: the Bingham Military Academy began operating here in 1827, a short-lived silk worm cocoonery was allowed on the site in 1838, and agricultural exhibitions were held on the grounds from the 1850s until the Civil War. During the Civil War, the barracks became the headquarters of U.S. Army General Hospital #1, where about 30,000 soldiers wounded at battles including South Mountain, Antietam, Gettysburg, and Monocacy recuperated, though the camp was under Confederate command for nine days in September 1862. In 1867, the property was taken over by the institution now known as the Maryland School for the Deaf, which opened the next September with 34 registrants; during its first years there, the barracks housed teachers and students, classrooms and workshops, before later supporting academic programs in a museum. Today Frederick Town Barracks survives as a rare North American architectural type from the Revolutionary era and reflects a long transition from military service to education.

Frederick, Maryland · United States