Mary Surratt - Married Life

Married Life

Mary Jenkins met John Harrison Surratt in 1839, when she was 16 or 19 and he was 26. His family had settled in Maryland in the late 1600s. An orphan, he was adopted by Richard and Sarah Neale of Washington, D.C., a wealthy couple who owned a farm. The Neales divided their farm among their children, and Surratt inherited a portion of it. His background was questionable at best, and he had fathered at least one child out of wedlock. They wed in August 1840. John Surratt converted to Roman Catholicism prior to the marriage, and the couple may have wed at a Catholic church in Washington, D.C. John Surratt purchased a mill in Oxon Hill, Maryland, and the couple moved there. The Surratts had three children over the next few years: Isaac (born June 2, 1841), Elizabeth Susanna (nicknamed "Anna", born January 1, 1843), and John, Jr. (born April 1844).

In 1843, John Surratt purchased from his adoptive father 236 acres (96 ha) of land straddling the D.C./Maryland border, a parcel named "Foxhall" (approximately the area between Wheeler Road and Owens Road today). Richard Neale died in September 1843, and a month later John purchased 119 acres (48 ha) of land adjoining Foxhall. John and Mary Surratt and their children moved back to John's childhood home in the District of Columbia in 1845 to help John's mother run the Neale farm. But Sarah Neale fell ill and died in August 1845, having shortly before her death deeded the remainder of the Neale farm to John. Mary Surratt became involved in raising funds to build St. Ignatius Church in Oxon Hill (it was constructed in 1850), but John Surratt was increasingly unhappy with his wife's religious activities. His behavior deteriorated over the next few years. John Surratt drank heavily, often failed to pay his debts, and his temper was increasingly volatile and violent.

In 1851, the Neale farmhouse burned to the ground (an escaped family slave was suspected of setting the blaze). John found work on the Orange and Alexandria Railroad. Mary moved with her children into the home of her cousin, Thomas Jenkins, in nearby Clinton. Within a year, John Surratt purchased 200 acres (81 ha) of farmland near what is now Clinton, and by 1853 he constructed a tavern and an inn there. Mary initially refused to move herself and the children into the new residence. She took up residence on the old Neale farm, but John sold both the Neale farm and Foxhall in May 1853 to pay debts and she was forced to move back in with him in December.

With the money he earned from the tavern and sale of his other property, on December 6, 1853, John Surratt bought a townhouse at 541 H Street in Washington, D.C., and began renting it out to tenants. In 1854, John built a hotel as an addition to his tavern, and called it Surratt's Hotel.

The area round the tavern was officially named Surrattsville that same year. Travelers could take Branch Road (now Branch Avenue) north into Washington, D.C.; Piscataway Road southwest to Piscataway; or Woodyard Road northwest to Upper Marlboro. Although Surrattsville was a well-known crossroads, the community did not amount to much—just the tavern, a post office (inside the tavern), a forge, and a dozen or so houses (some of them log cabins). John Surratt was the hamlet's first postmaster.

John Surratt expanded his family's holdings by selling off land, paying down debt, and starting new businesses. Over the next few years, Surratt acquired or built a carriage house, corn crib, general store, forge, granary, gristmill, stable, tobacco curing house, and wheelwright's shop. The family had enough money to send all three children to nearby Roman Catholic boarding schools. Isaac and John Jr. attended the school at St. Thomas Manor, while Anna enrolled at the Academy for Young Ladies (Mary's alma mater). The family's debts continued to mount, however, and John Sr.'s drinking worsened. John sold another 120 acres (49 ha) of land in 1856 to pay debts. By 1857, Surratt had sold all but 600 acres (240 ha) of the family's formerly extensive holdings (which represented about half the 1,200 acres (490 ha) he had originally owned). Most of the family's slaves (never many in number) were also sold to pay debts. Still John Surratt's alcoholism worsened. In 1858, Mary wrote a letter to her local priest, telling him that Surratt was drunk every single day. In 1860, St. Thomas Manor school closed, and Isaac found work in Baltimore, Maryland. The Surratts sold off another 100 acres (40 ha) of land, which enabled Anna to remain at the Academy for Young Ladies and for John Jr. to enroll at St. Charles College, Maryland (a Catholic seminary and boarding school in Ellicott's Mills). The couple also borrowed money that same year against their townhouse in Washington, D.C., and at some point used the property as collateral for a $1,000 loan.