Transcriber’s Note
The punctuation and spelling from the original text have been faithfully preserved. Only obvioustypographical errors have been corrected.
A SKETCH
OF THE
LIFE AND SERVICES
OF
Gen. Otho Holland Williams,
READ BEFORE THE
Maryland Historical Society,
ON THURSDAY EVENING, MARCH 6, 1851.
By OSMOND TIFFANY.
BALTIMORE:
PRINTED BY JOHN MURPHY & CO.
No. 178 MARKET STREET.
1851.
Mr. President:
The events of the American Revolution are so nearly connected with ourown times, that the actors in that great struggle seem yet to be to usas living men. We open the portal of the past century, and are withthose who once like ourselves, breathed and thought, and who now, lienot silent or forgotten in the tomb.
Their deeds live in our memory; their examples are glorious as of old:their words of hope in dark hours, and of their joy in success, stillburn before us:—they have become the great historians of their age.Among this band of gallant men, who gave themselves with all their soulto liberty, I could name none of our native State, who displayed a morepatient, disinterested, and zealous spirit, than the pure and chivalrousOtho Holland Williams.
He was born in the county of Prince George's, in March, 1749. Hisparentage was highly respectable, his ancestors emigrating from Wales,and he being of the second generation after their settlement inMaryland.
Had his days been wholly passed in the enjoyment of peace, his influencewould not have been lost. He would still have left to his friends thesame invaluable legacy of a good name, but it was his fortune to deserveand gain a wider celebrity. He was his father's oldest son, and in theyear succeeding his birth, his home was changed to the mouth of theConococheague Creek, in Frederick, near Washington county. In thatbeautiful region of country, watered by the stream that lends its nameto the valley, were spent the few short years of his boyhood. There helearned to love the aspect of fields and groves,[Pg 4] the memory of whichwas his solace long after, in many dark and trying hours, for we find inthe midst of the toils of the camp, that his spirit yearns for ruralpeace and solitude. The love of nature is ever ennobling; it perhapscontributed to form the character of the future hero.
It is a favorite theme with biographers to dwell on parental precepts,especially on those of the mother. We have no anecdotes of this period,but we may yield to a happy idea, and imagine young Williams listeningto the accents of a mother's lip, with the true deference which healways paid to goodness. We may see him, among his little playmates onhis father's farm, already showing those traits of character, whichguided him in the path to honor: that love of truth, that physical andmoral courage, which won in time the confidence of his greatcommander-in-chief, who had himself early shone in the same qualities.We may picture him crossing the fields, at early morning hours, to therustic school, there to recite the simple lesson, and to be instructedin his mother tongue, which he afterwards used wi