Subject: Re: Hancok, MD
Date: Jun 10, 2003 @ 00:17
Author: acroorca2002 ("acroorca2002" <orc@...>)
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>be
>
> > ----------
> > From: acroorca2002[SMTP:orc@o...]
> > Reply To: BoundaryPoint@yahoogroups.com
> > Sent: Sunday, June 08, 2003 5:02 PM
> > To: BoundaryPoint@yahoogroups.com
> > Subject: [BoundaryPoint] Re: Hancok, MD
> >
> > --- In BoundaryPoint@yahoogroups.com, "Flynn, Kevin"
> > <flynnk@r...> wrote:
> > > A very interesting what-if regarding this narrow neck of MD:
> > >
> > > Before Mason and Dixon set out on their survey, Lord
> > Baltimore's
> > > representatives believed the PA-MD line of latitude would
> > farther north.Spruce
> > > Once it was established as a line 15 mi (IIRC) south of
> > Street inas Cedar
> > > Philadelphia
> >
> > you probably do recall correctly
> > as it was to be 15 miles south of the southernmost point of
> > philadelphia at that time
> > but how did you arrive at spruce street for it
> > & what part of spruce street if you can say
> >
> >
> My error, it wasn't Spruce bur rather South Street, then known
> Street (and I used to live in Philly, no lessl shoulda knownbetter).
> Anyway, prior to Mason and Dixon's arrival in Philly, the jointcommission
> of PA and MD reps had stipulated with input from city officialsthat the
> "southernmost point in the city" would be the north wall of ahouse on the
> south side of Cedar (now South) Street near the corner ofSecond Street. The
> constant latitude would be an E-W line 15 miles south of thispoint. Of
> course, because the Delaware River flows SWerly here, Masonand Dixon had to
> survey a course due west from the southernmost point, farenough to be west
> of the presumed place where the New Castle Arc would dropbelow the West
> Line (the point that should've become PADEMD but did notbecause of the
> problem of The Wedge) and then drop 15 miles due south tomark the latitude
> of the West Line. (This became the "Post Mark'd West," whichwas actually
> within the 12-mile New Castle Arc; Mason and Dixon had toproceed west from
> there tp begin the actual PAMD West Line at the Arc limit.course),
>
>
> > > (minus the land enclosed by the New Castle arc, of
> > > there was a real concern that the MD-VA line (the right bankof
> > the Potomac)of
> > > might actually swing so far north that it would extend north
> > the MD-PAmight
> > > boundary. Now *that* would have been interesting.
> > >
> > > So what is the speculation here as to how that situation
> > have beenwas
> > > equitably resolved among VA-MD-PA?
> >
> > it might have been equitably resolved the same way kymotn
> > resolvedlatitude,
> > which was for the surveyors to just follow the agreed specs
> > whatever happened
> > thus producing in that case the kentucky bend exclave
> > & in our speculation a similarly detached western md exclave
> > as you anticipate below
> >
> > > VA was supposed to have the lands south
> > > of the Potomac; but if the river flowed north of 44 deg
> >agreed in
> > actually if the river flowed anywhere north of the latitude
> > 1760 as you describe it aboveMD,
> > or in other words mason & dixons 39d43m17s6
> > aka mdn of today
> > for example 39d43m15s521 nad27 at mdne
> > then it would have done as you say here below
> >
> > > it would
> > > have punctured PA and cut off eastern MD from western
> > creating a largegiven
> > > enclave. How else could this have been resolved?
> >
> > i suppose a particularly generous & whimsical pa mightve
> > to md the part of itself that wouldve fallen south of thepotomac
> > & thus produce a sausage chain of 3 mary landsactually
> > connected only by 2 mdmdpava tristate quadripoints
> >
> However, I wonder whether Virginia would have interceded and
> claimed the land south of the Potomac that under thesecircumstances would
> have been north of the Mason Dixon Line and thereforearguably in PA? Just
> think, if the commissioners had said 17 miles instead of 15miles south of
> the southernmost point in Philadelphia, we would have hadthis very problem.
> One pre-Mason Dixon survey in the 1730s, I believe, actuallymeasured out a
> 17 1/2-mile southern march from Philly.when
> >
> > > As noted here, Mason and Dixon breathed a sigh of relief
> > the river'sSurveyed the
> > > course again turned to the south before reaching their line.
> >
> > interesting
> > can you give the source of this sigh
> >
> >
> Yes. Page 133, "Drawing the Line: How Mason and Dixon
> Most Famous Border in America," by Edwin Danson, (c)2001John WIley & Sons.
> "Mason was concerned about the westerly direction they mayhave to take the
> next season and was worried they may be forced to cross thePotomac River.
> If this were so, then they would have two problems. Measuringacross the
> wide river at an oblique angle would be difficult; but moreimportantly, the
> Potomac formed the border between Maryland and Virginia. If ittranspired
> that the true latitude they were following crossed south of thePotomac,
> Penn's legal boundary of constant latitude would beimpossible and Maryland
> would become divided. The political and legal ramificationswould be
> dire..."great river,
>
> "The next morning, they all set off for North Mountain to spy out
> the land... From the summit, they saw the northern loop of the
> about ten miles distant. Much to Mason's relief, they estimatedthat the
> West Line would pass some two miles north of the Potomac,near Hancock,
> Maryland....Shelby's
>
> (Then page 146:) "Near Hancock, Maryland, Mason and
> estimated course for the West Line, seen from North Mountainthe previous
> October, was substantiated when the survey team passed ascant 1 1/2 miles
> north of the Potomac River."