I, too, have been doing more thinking about the Potomac boundaries. I've also
been doing research.
The charter granted to Lord Baltimore made Maryland extend "unto the further
bank" of the Potomac River, that being the Virginia side. The MDVA boundary did
not become the low-water mark until 1879, long after the District of Columbia
and West Virginia had taken their form and being. This accounts for the
differences between the MDWV, MDVA, and DCVA boundaries.
The circumstances of the 1879 revision of MDVA are these: The two states
jointly agreed in 1874 to submit their boundary problems (mainly in the
Chesapeake Bay area and the wide tidal estuary of the Potomac) to arbitrators
and to be bound thereby. The arbitrators spoke in 1877, applying the doctrine
of prescription to move the boundary to the low-water mark, because Virginians
had always used the land exposed during low water as their own. The decision
was accepted by both states and ratified by the Congress in 1879. In doing so,
the Congress specifically disclaimed any application thereof to the District of
Columbia.
It was this same arbitration that determined that the low-water mark should be
measured "without considering arms, inlets, creeks, or affluents as parts of the
river, but measuring the shore from headland to headland." In 1927, the two
states agreed that their respective state geologists (Edward B. Mathews and
Wilbur A. Nelson) should designate the headlands from which straight lines
should be drawn. This was done in 1927 and shown as red lines on a series of
six maps, accepted by Virginia in 1928 and by Maryland in 1929. Thus, it is not
left of any of us moderns to shoot any headlands. (I find the Mathews-Nelson
report cataloged in several libraries in the region and one in Tulsa!)
Note that none of this low-water and headland business affects MDWV! That line
is governed by Lord Baltimore's charter. When the Supremes directed the
resurvey of the north-south MDWV line at the western end of Maryland in 1910,
they had the initial point established at the SOUTH BANK of one of the heads of
the Potomac.
Thus, the MDWV line follows the south bank of Lord Baltimore's river downstream
to the VAWV boundary. Meanwhile, the MDVA boundary is ascending the same river
along the low-water mark. Regardless of how one might construe the stitch to
connect the two, the tripoint has to be at the intersection of the newly refined
VAWV land boundary and the south bank of the Potomac.
Lowell G. McManus
Leesville, Louisiana, USA
----- Original Message -----
From: "m06079" <barbaria_longa@...>
To: <BoundaryPoint@yahoogroups.com>
Sent: Wednesday, November 12, 2003 11:31 AM
Subject: [BoundaryPoint] more thinking about mdvawv
> dickson tn
>
> played with the full deck on route 52 from elgin to orlinda
> & got a wave from a joker who was just sitting there at the end
>
> also
> devised a completely new approach to the mdvawv conundrum
>
> & will be kicked off this computer in a few minutes
>
> but here it is in brief
>
>
> of course there is still the purely technical loose end of recovering
> marker 29a on the south side of the highway
> just for maximum possible sighting accuracy
>
> not that i doubt the plat nor my ability to read it mind you
> since there is perfect agreement with the folkloric tripoint position
> on the flat rock
> as reported by brian
>
> but the only remaining hard question is
> how to determine the correct low water mark for the mdva & mdwv
> vectors
> which is the crosshair position on our vawv line of sight
>
>
> but first
> a breakthru discovery
> on bus&ss76 p91 under dc it says mdva does not follow the meanderings
> of the river but runs from headland to headland
> yikes
>
> & presumably this principle also applies equally to mdwv
>
> all in the absence of specific judicial comment of course
>
> but when the courts had to determine this same low water line on dcva
> do you know what they did
>
> they changed it to the freakin high water mark
> also p91
> i kid you not
>
> so tho this dcva decision is neither dispositive nor even necessarily
> suggestive of how mdva & mdwv might be resolved
> i think it does argue for not just any low water line but rather for
> at least as high a low water line as one could possibly construe
>
>
> & curiously too
> there is that mdva drinking straw case currently being decided by the
> supremes
> which may even force them to elucidate this state line more clearly
> just in the nick of time & as if just for us
>
> but in the meantime
> my considered guess is neither lowest nor mean but highest low water
>
> & we do have available for this very purpose that hydrographic
> webpage with the green light that turns red just at zero stage
> you may recall
>
> so i would pick that moment of zero stage to take the reading
> from headland to headland
>
>
> btw the day i tried mdvawv that gauge was 3 feet 7 inches
>
> & the flat rock was at or just below the surface at that stage
>
> which suggests it may not be the true tripoint position at all but
> just a point on vawv some distance shy of mdvawv
> even by my own conservative reckoning
>
>
> but i suppose the real trick will be shooting the headlands
> at whatever stage
> given all the scattered boulders
> yikes
>
> this isnt getting any easier
>
> but i do think it is at least getting clearer
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
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