History of Frederick

The Monocacy National Battlefield of 1864 lies just southeast of the city limits, along the Monocacy River at the B. & O. Railroad junction known as "Frederick Junction" or "Monocacy Junction" where two bridges cross the stream - an iron-truss bridge for the railroad and a covered wooden bridge for the Frederick-Urbana-Georgetown Pike, which was the site of the main battle of July 1864. Some skirmishing occurred further north across the Monocacy at the stone-arched "Jug Bridge" for the crossing of the National Road east of Frederick (built 1806) and an artillery bombardment occurred west of town along the National Road near Red Man's Hill where Prospect Hall mansion was sited as the Union troops retreated eastward. Antietam National Battlefield and South Mountain State Battlefield Park of 1862 and Gettysburg National Battlefield of 1863 lie approximately 35 miles (56 km) to the west and northeast, respectively.

The reconstructed home of Barbara Fritchie on West Patrick Street, just past Carroll Creek linear park, who according to legend waved the Stars and Stripes in defiance of Confederate commander Stonewall Jackson and his troops as they marched through downtown Frederick in 1862, stands as another historical site. Though the legend has been generally discredited, it was widely believed during the Civil War and was the subject of an 1864 poem by John Greenleaf Whittier, a poem that remained popular for decades. Barbara Fritchie, a significant figure in Maryland history in her own right, is buried in Frederick's Mount Olivet Cemetery. British Prime Minister Winston Churchill quoted the famous poem to President Franklin D. Roosevelt when they stopped here in 1941 on a car trip to the presidential retreat, then called "Shangra-La" (now "Camp David") on