right kevin
& oops i didnt mean to mislead you victor
for i shouldve explained all this too when presenting that map
but again much of it had previously been discussed
so i just took & left it all for granted as usual
but really should take care to give all necessary info each time
anyway from where we now stand
& to elucidate the questions both of you raise
right bank dc was not developed so much as left bank dc
& indeed was practically not developed at all by the federal govt
whose presence & influence became very much more
concentrated on the left bank of the potomac
& so i imagine the govt was finding it increasingly difficult to
justify the expense & activity of maintaining more territory than it
really thought it needed for itself
& all this at some considerable remove in those days from
where nearly all the federal action was really happening anyway
& there may even have been some prescience that the nation
might split apart along the potomac
as it did in fact do by 1861
& someone may have already realized
yikes
what an extra mess it would be to have the capital of the north
partly in the south &or even vice versa too
but this is speculation upon speculation
in any case
what actually happened in 1846 is that congress first passed an
act providing for the retrocession to virginia of all that part of dc
originally ceded to the usa by va
namely what was then called the county & town of alexandria
that act however
9 statutes at large 35 & 36
required the assent of the people of alexandria
& then prescribed as the means for that assent
an oral vote of its free white male citizens
to be taken before 5 commissioners appointed by the president
the vote went 763 in favor & 222 opposed
so the president proclaimed the act in full force & effect
on 7 sept 1846
9 statutes at large 1000
per bus&ss
& thats why only 26 of the original 40 milestones dated 1792
were planted along the boundary of what is now washington dc
& the other 14 positions are today found in va
most of them on the boundary of what has become arlington
county
whose territory lies entirely within the old dc
but some of them also upon & within the boundaries of
alexandria city
which is today only partly within the old dc
having sprawled a bit to the west & south as well since that time
also i believe arlington county doesnt actually surround
alexandria city
but merely abuts it
so anyway it might be more nearly true to say that arlington
county got dc than that dc got arlington county
--- In BoundaryPoint@y..., Kevin Meynell <kevin@m...> wrote:
>
> >how did dc get arlington county, va?
>
> I'm not sure whether this is an explanation, but the District of
Columbia
> originally included land on the western bank of the Potomac
donated by
> Virginia (as per the plans for a 10 x 10 mile federal territory).
This area
> was designated 'Alexandria County', whilst the land on the
eastern bank
> donated by Maryland, was designated 'Washington County'.
>
> In 1846, a citizen's referendum returned Alexandria County to
Virginia for
> reasons which I've never been clear about (maybe because,
rather bizarrely,
> DC citizens didn't get a presidential vote until 1961, and don't
have full
> Congressional representation to this day). At a later date, the
City of
> Alexandria established its own jurisdiction, and the
surrounding county
> became known as 'Arlington County' to avoid confusion.
>
> As an aside, I believe Washington DC does not exist as an
official entity.
> You either reside in the City of Washington or Washington
County, both of
> which are located in the District of Columbia!
>
> Regards,
>
> Kevin Meynell