Whats in the name FREETOWN: The southern banks of Marley Creek was considered utopia to escaped and free slaves in the mid-19th century. Blacks could own property and build a homestead, even before slavery ended, and where runaway slaves were slaves no more, according to local lore. Mr. William Turner, helped found “Freetown between 1850 and 1880. James Spencer, a free-born black, bought the first tract near Marley Creek on Dec. 26, 1845. Thus the name Spencer Road. During the next two decades, William Howard, Nathan Owens, William Turner, William Hall and Abraham Franklin bought neighboring tracts, according to county records. Spencer and Howard enlisted in the Union Army, U.S. Colored Troops, and fought three years in the Civil War. By the 1880s, African-Americans owned nearly 1,000 acres between Marley and Stony creeks, including Brewers Island in Marley Creek. The property boundaries took in the area of Marley and Stony creeks, Baltimore-Annapolis Boulevard and Mountain Road. The Spencer property was in the western section along Marley Creek, the Hall property in the northern portion around Solley Road, and the other property owners clustered near Mountain Road, in the heart of Freetown. Slaves from neighboring farms escaped by crossing what they called Freedom Bridge over Marley Creek, according to oral tradition and a 1952 local history. The area is called Freetown because no slave owners occupied the property and nobody was owned as slaves. Free blacks established Freetown in the 1840s Freetown is now a cluster of old brick houses, and a group of families who remember life in a close-knit community of farmers. Everybody would help out, such as the time a grandmother would help the lady next door who didnt have no milk. She gave the baby milk from her breast. People in the community would go out in winter storms to make sure single mothers and widows had enough to eat. Residents were largely independent of the white communities that surrounded Freetown. Most families raised hogs or chickens for meat, along with fruit and vegetables. Land records show that the first school was built in 1870 on a half-acre along Marley Neck Road near Freeman Shores Road to be used for the education of freed men and children irrespective of race or color. They raised money and built two other schools before the county built Freetown Elementary. The community also built several churches. At least one Hall United Methodist Church was built on land donated by the Hall family. The Freetown Community Association, started in 1954, was responsible for bringing roads and public water, and alerted the county to the need for public and senior housing programs, according to Willie Johnson, who spearheaded the campaign. Whites wouldnt lend us money, and at the same time they wouldnt rent us apartments, Johnson explained. Freetown remained a farming community until after World War II, when suburban development began to encroach. Now the community is encircled by subdivisions, including Sun Valley, Timberglade and Shannon Square.
Posted on: Sat, 27 Dec 2014 19:38:12 +0000
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