We rowed around Keyser's Point, and up
Turval's Creek, a couple of miles to the plantation
landing.
There, upon the old estate in the little
family burial-ground, slept, "each in his narrow
cell," the children of four generations. Our
conversation before the blazing wood-fire that night
related to the ground travelled over during the day,
a course of about thirty-five miles. Mr. Taylor's
father mentioned that a friend, during one week
in the previous September, had taken upon his
hook, while fishing from the marshes of
Rehoboth Bay, five hundred rock-fish, some of which
weighed twenty pounds. The oysters in
Rehoboth and Indian River bays had died out,
probably from the decrease in the amount of
salt water now entering them. A delightful
week was spent with my friends at Winchester
Plantation, when the falling of the mercury
warned me to hurry southward.
On Wednesday, November 25, I descended
the plantation creek and rowed out of St.
Martin's River into the Bay. My course southward
led me past "the Hommack," an Indian mound
of oyster-shells, which rises about seven feet
above the marsh on the west side of the entrance
to Sinepuxent bay, and where the mainland
approaches to within eight hundred feet of the
beach. This point, which divides the Isle of
Wight Bay from Sinepuxent, is the terminus of
the Wicomico and Pocomoke Railroad, which
has been extended from Berlin eastwardly seven
miles. A short ferry conveys the passengers
across the water to a narrow island beach, which
is considered by Bayard Taylor, the author, the
finest beach he has ever visited. This new
watering-place is called Ocean City; and my
friend, B. Jones Taylor, was treasurer of the
company which was engaged in making the
much-desired improvements. The shallow bays
in the vicinity of Ocean City offer safe and
pleasant sailing-grounds. The summer fishing
consists chiefly of white perch, striped bass, sheep's-head,
weak-fish, and drum. In the fall, bluefish
are caught. All of these, with oysters, soft
crabs, and diamond-backed terrapin, offer
tempting dishes to the epicure. This recently isolated
shore is now within direct railroad
communication with Philadelphia and New York, and can
be reached in nine hours from the former, and
in twelve hours from the latter city.
From the Hommack to South Point is included
the length of Sinepuxent Bay, according to Coast
Survey authority. From South Point to below
the middle of Chincoteague Island the bay is
put down as "Assateague," though the oystermen
do not call it by that name. The celebrated
oyster-beds of the people of Chincoteague
commence about twenty miles south of the
Hornmack. There are two kinds of oysters shipped
from Chincoteague Inlet to New York and
other markets. One is the long native plant
the other, that transplanted from Chesapeake
Bay: this bivalve is rounded in form, and the
most prized of the two. The average width of
Sinepuxent was only a mile. When I turned
westwardly around South Point, and entered
Assateague Bay, the watery expanse widened,
between the marshes on the west and the
sandy-beach island on the east, to over four miles.
The debouchure of Newport Creek is to the
west of South Point. The marshes here are
very wide. I ascended it in the afternoon to
visit Dr. F. J. Purnell, whose attempts to
introduce the pinnated grouse and California
partridges on his plantation had attracted the
attention of Mr. Charles Hallock, editor of "Forest
and Stream"; and I had promised him, if
possible, to investigate the matter. This South Point
of Sinepuxent Neck is a place of historical
interest, it being now asserted that it is the
burial place of Edward Whalley, the regicide.
Early in 1875, Mr. Robert P. Robins found in a
bundle of old family documents a paper containing
interesting statements written by his great-great-grandfather,
Thomas Robins, 3d, of South Point,
Worcester County, Maryland, and dated July 8,
1769. We gather from this reliable source that
Edward Whalley left Connecticut and arrived in
Virginia in 1618, and was there met by a portion
of his family. From Virginia he travelled to
the "province of Maryland, and settled first at
ye mouth of ye Pokemoke River; and finding
yt too publick a place he came to Sinepuxent, a
neck of land open to ye Atlantic Ocean, where
Colonel Stephen was surveying and bought a
tract of land from him and called it Genezar; it
contained two thousand two hundred acres, south
end of Sinepuxent; and made a settlement on ye
southern extremity, and called it South Point; to
ye which place he brought his family about 1687,
in ye name of Edward Middleton. His own name
he made not publick until after this date, after ye
revolution in England, (in ye year of our Lord
1688,) when he let his name be seen in publick
papers, and had ye lands patented in his own
name."
The writer of the above quotation was the
great-grandson of Edward Whalley (alias Edward
Middleton), the celebrated regicide.
Four miles from South Point I struck the
marshes which skirted Dr. Purnell's large
plantation, and pushing the canoe up a narrow branch
of the creek, I waded through the partially
submerged herbage to the firm ground, where the
doctor was awaiting me. His house was close
at hand, within the hospitable walls of which I
passed the night. Dr. Purnell has an estate of
one thousand five hundred acres, lying along the
banks of Newport Creek. Since the civil war it
has been worked by tenants. Much of it is
woodland and salt-marshes. Five years before
my visit, a Philadelphian sent the doctor a few
pairs of prairie-chickens, and a covey of both the
valley and the mountain partridge. I am now
using popular terms. The grouse were from a
western state; the partridges had been obtained
from California. The partridges were kept caged
for several weeks and were then set at liberty.
They soon disappeared in the woods, with the
exception of a single pair, which returned daily
to the kitchen-door of a farm tenant to obtain
food.
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