Childhood In Tuckahoe

32559 Covey’s Landing Road, Cordova, Maryland 21625

Douglass’s birthplace is less than a mile north of here on Tuckahoe Creek. In his books, he describes his first six years in great detail. The Tuckahoe and its surroundings were his first classroom. He roamed from here north to the town of Hillsborough (now the towns of Queen Anne and Hillsboro) and may have gone to Denton with his grandmother, who raised him, and who sold her fish and produce there. For a water view of Douglass’s childhood neighborhood, launch canoes or kayaks here at the public landing and head north to the Hillsboro Landing.

She was a gardener as well as a fisherwoman, and remarkable for her success in keeping her seedling sweet potatoes through the months of winter, and easily got the reputation of being born to “good luck.” In planting-time Grandmother Betsey was sent for in all directions, simply to place the seedling potatoes in the hills or drills; for superstition had it that her touch was needed to make them grow. This reputation was full of advantage to her and her grandchildren, for a good crop, after her planting for the neighbors, brought her a share of the harvest. — Frederick Douglass, Life and Times of Frederick Douglass

Driving Note: Pull to the side of the road at the Tappers Corner intersection. Look southeast towards the treeline on your right.

Site of Aaron Anthony’s Farm, Birthplace of Frederick Douglass
Site Only – no buildings remain

In February 1818, Frederick Douglass was born in a cabin near here occupied by his grandmother, Betsy Bailey, and her free husband, Isaac Bailey, a sawyer. Betsy was enslaved by Aaron Anthony, who owned the farm. Slave status ran with the mother; Betsy’s children and grandchildren were therefore all owned by Anthony, who mostly rented his land and slaves to tenant farmers. The Bailey’s cabin was on a part of the farm known as Kentucky Ravine in the wooded area just southeast of Tappers Corner.

By the time Douglass returned here in 1878, the cabin was long gone.

He knew that the cabin stood near a large cedar tree, in a clearing a short way from the steep bank of the Tuckahoe near the “muddy shore” where he had played and fished. Near some large cedar trees, Douglass collected soil to take back to Cedar Hill, his new Washington, D.C., home. The place of his beginning, this is also where his mother, Harriett Bailey, died. His father was unknown to him.

To me it has ever been a grief that I knew my mother so little, and have so few of her words treasured in my remembrance. I have since learned that she was the only one of all the colored people of Tuckahoe who could read. How she acquired this knowledge I know not, for Tuckahoe was the last place in the world where she would have been likely to find facilities for learning. I can therefore fondly and proudly ascribe to her an earnest love of knowledge. That in any slave State a field-hand should learn to read is remarkable, but the achievement of my mother, considering the place and circumstances, was very extraordinary. — Frederick Douglass, Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave

13213 Lewistown Road, Queen Anne, Maryland 21657

Dedicated in 2018 to honor the bicentennial of Talbot County’s most famous native son, this park allows visitors to see the unspoiled natural landscape that Douglass likely knew. The park spans more than 107 acres and encompasses a high ridge overlooking a wide bend in Tuckahoe Creek.

Key to this park is its proximity to Douglass’s birthplace. Visitors are met by an interpretive panel, “The Beloved Tuckahoe Home of Frederick Douglass,” which presents details of the future abolitionist’s early life.

“Grandmother and grandfather were the greatest people in the world to me; and being with them so snugly in their own little cabin … for a time there was nothing to disturb me.” – Frederick Douglass, My Bondage and My Freedom, 1855

Across the park are three more signs — “Forging Freedom from Places of Bondage,” “A Champion for Equality,” and “Honoring an American Hero” — which trace the epic trajectory of his life and celebrate the power of his legacy in the present. Future plans for the park include a pollinator meadow, walking trails, and a visitor’s center.

“We have to do with the past only as we can make it useful to the present and to the future. To all inspiring motives, to noble deeds which can be gained from the past, we are welcome. But now is the time, the important time.” – Frederick Douglass, Speech in Rochester, New York, July 5, 1852

Main Street, Hillsboro, Maryland 21641

Our Douglass tour intersects here with the Civil War Trail. You are now two-plus miles north of Frederick Douglass’s birthplace as the crow flies and about four miles north as the river winds.

The view directly across the river is a 40-acre tract donated by the George C. and Naomi H. Moore family, which is now part of Frederick Douglass Park on the Tuckahoe. The circa 1790 Federal-style brick house behind you on the hill was there in Douglass’s childhood.

Note the interpretive sign depicting both Douglass and his wife Anna Murray Douglass, who was born free near Denton, Maryland. Though they were neighbors in youth, Douglass’s three narratives relate that he met Anna in Baltimore. They were married in New York after his escape, which she helped to fund, in 1838, and settled in New Bedford, Massachusetts.

Rev. J.W.C. Pennington, who was also born enslaved on the Eastern Shore in nearby Queen Anne’s County, performed the ceremony. By 1849, the couple had five children: Rosetta Douglass, Lewis Henry Douglass, Frederick Douglass, Jr., Charles Remond Douglass, and Annie Douglass.

Canoes and kayaks may be put in here for a river tour of Douglass’s childhood neighborhood. Navigate south to Covey’s Landing. 

“Upon receiving this [marriage] certificate … I shouldered one part of our baggage, and Anna took up the other, and we set out forthwith to take passage on board of the steamboat John W. Richmond for Newport, on our way to New Bedford.”— Frederick Douglass, Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave