The National Road, authorized by Congress in 1806, was one of the first paved roads to cross the Appalachian Mountains. Construction began in Cumberland MD and eventually the road extended to St. Louis MO. Barnesville, Belmont County OH had quite a contingent of Calvert County families in the 1830's who followed the National Road west.
Barnesville OH, which is near St. Clairsville on the map above, was founded by a Maryland Quaker, James Barnes, in 1806. (Many Quakers migrated to OH in order to live in a free state rather than a slave state, and they were often active in the Underground Railroad.)
By 1832, when Thomas Taneyhill and his wife Mary Scrivener (both distant cousins to me) emigrated to Barnesville with eight children, the town had 64 residences and about 400 inhabitants. (Thomas's son Richard Henry Taneyhill wrote a history of the town in 1899 which gives great detail of its growth and development. See https://archive.org/stream/historyofbarnesv00tane/historyofbarnesv00tane_djvu.txt. ) Family tradition says that Mary Scrivener's father, William Scrivener, was a body guard of George Washington during the Revolutionary War, but I have not been able to find evidence for this.
(Above: Cassellman River Bridge Constructed in 1813 as art of the National Road)
Thomas Taneyhill, the son of John Taneyhill and Lurana Smith, was a veteran of the War of 1812, having served in the 31st Regiment of the Maryland Militia under Captain Richard Ireland. He died in Barnesville in 1848. His widow, Mary Scrivener Taneyhill, died in Barnesville in November 1866 at the home of her son-in-law, John Dove, also a native of Calvert County MD. Thomas and Mary's son William Scrivener Taneyhill, was the first lawyer in Barnesville.
Several of Mary's nephews, the children of her sister Catherine Scrivener and Thomas Dew, also migrated to Barnesville from Calvert County: Thomas Henry Dew 1819-1897, Joseph Dew, and Jesse Dew 1822-1860. Elizabeth Dew married George Stamp in Calvert County and also moved to Barnesville with her three brothers and four daughters.
(Above: Mount Washington Tavern, Frederick MD, one of the busiest stage stops on the National Road in the early 19th century.)
James Scrivener, born in Calvert County in 1819 and probably the son of Francis and Ellen Scrivener, was a cousin of Mary and Catherine who also moved to Barnesville. He married in 1843 to Elizabeth Cox, the daughter of John Cox and Jane Eades, as her second husband. Their son John Francis Scrivener, a shoemaker with a business in Barnesville, died there in 1884.
Another Calvert Countian who shows up in Barnesville is Benjamin Hance Mackall (another distant cousin to me), born June 20, 1767 to John Mackall
and Margaret Reynolds in Calvert County, MD. Mackall married Mary
Wheeler Bond, daughter of Dr. John Bond and his wife Mary, on August 4,
1794 in Calvert County. The Mackall's had
five children, including Harriet,
Col. Benjamin Mackall, and John T. Mackall.
Benjamin Hance Mackall was a
member of the Maryland legislature and a deputy United States
Marshal. Mackall
owned land and enslaved people
in Calvert County. A few
years after the War of 1812, Benjamin H. Mackall disposed of his
property in Calvert County and moved his family to Warren, Ohio where
they lived for eleven years. The family then settled in Barnesville,
Ohio where Mackall was appointed post master. In 1824, Mackall mailed a
claim from Ohio to John Quincy Adams in Washington, DC in regards
to the property that was carried off by the British. Mackall had a claim
specifically for household items that were taken, and another claim
that dealt with the loss of enslaved people. His claim for the
household items was
rejected by the commission who granted award money for claims under the
Treaty of Ghent.
In
1828, Mackall purchased a drug store which housed medicine, paints, and
oils. Mackall ran his store and continued to hold his position as post master in Belmont until his death. Benjamin
Hance Mackall died May 16, 1835 in
Barnesville, Ohio at the age of 65. Mackall's widow Mary died July 13,
1871 at the age of 93.
Their son, Benjamin Hance Mackall Jr., served as state senator in Ohio.
Their son, Benjamin Hance Mackall Jr., served as state senator in Ohio.
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