We Marylanders are used to the winter storm drill. As soon as forecasters warn of an approaching snowmageddon, we rush out to stock up on all the essentials: toilet paper, bread, milk, chips and salsa, Old Bay, beer, etc. Sometimes the experts are caught off guard by a major storm that crops up out of nowhere, but usually they can give us a few days’ notice before we get walloped. That wasn’t the case 250 years ago.
The Annapolis report in the January 30, 1772 Maryland Gazette was all about the suddenly severe weather then disrupting local life. The winter season had, so far, “been in general very mild, until Sunday Evening last, when it began to snow, which continued without Intermission until Tuesday Night.” The storm packed a one-two punch, as “Yesterday Morning we had again the appearance of fine moderate Weather, but in the Evening it began again to snow very fast, which continued all the Night; ’tis supposed the Depth where it has not drifted, is upwards of Three Feet, and it is with utmost Difficulty People pass from one House to another.” So much snow fell on the region’s waterways “that though the Frost has not been severe for these few Day past, yet our Navigation is entirely stopt up by the Ice.”
According to the Homony Club’s records, only six of the elite social group’s fourteen members made it to the Coffee-House on Church (now Main) Street for their weekly gathering on January 30. Printer Anne Catharine Green’s son-in-law, John Clapham, was then serving as the club’s President, and he congratulated the other hardy souls who braved the city streets that night for not being put off by “the inclemency of the season nor the late dreary Tempest.”
A week later, conditions weren’t much improved. The February 6 Maryland Gazette reported that “The Weather still continues so extremely severe that no Post has arrived for near a Fortnight past, and all Intercourse by Water is stopt by the Ice.” But ten Homony Club members and one visitor made it to the Coffee-House that night, so the streets must have been more passable.
The first Gazette issue of February 1772 also reported other local news of a frosty nature that had nothing to do with the weather. Governor Robert Eden had just “arrived in Town, and, by the advice of his Lordship’s Council, issued a Proclamation, further proroguing the General Assembly of this Province” from February 18 to March 24. Eden already had a well-established track record for putting off the start of legislative sessions that he didn’t think would go well for him, but there was more at work here than his own political discomfort.
Frederick Calvert, the sixth Lord Baltimore and colonial Maryland’s proprietor, had died in Naples the previous September, with the first report of his demise arriving in Annapolis in late December 1771. Until Eden was confirmed in his post by Calvert’s successor (whomever that might prove to be; his Lordship had died with no legitimate heir), the governor didn’t see any sense in holding a session that might be invalidated. News of this latest delay received a chilly reception from Lower House legislators eager to resume their fight against Eden’s unpopular tobacco tax and fee policies.
Just below the February 6 weather update, the Gazette’s publishers laid out some cold, hard facts concerning their “very expensive Business.” The newspaper’s subscription year had just ended, yet some customers were well behind on their payments. Anne Catharine Green and her son Frederick disclosed that “they can truly say they have not received more from their Subscribers than barely to enable them to pay for the Materials; and, though the Collection of a Number of small Debts is very troublesome and disagreeable, yet, if those indebted for more than One Year do not immediately discharge their Balances, they may depend every legal Step will be pursued to compel them thereto.” The Greens hoped that delinquent subscribers who couldn’t pay what they owed “will at least have Honesty enough to signify the same by a Line, that their Papers may be stopt without further Expense to The PRINTERS.”
You can read the January 30, 1772 issue of the Maryland Gazette starting here: https://msa.maryland.gov/megafile/msa/speccol/sc4800/sc4872/001282/html/m1282-0032.html
The February 6, 1772 issue begins here: https://msa.maryland.gov/megafile/msa/speccol/sc4800/sc4872/001282/html/m1282-0038.html
Glenn E. Campbell
HA Senior Historian
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