Prince George's County Sheriff's Office (Maryland) - History

History

The Sheriff's Office for Prince George's County was founded April 22, 1696. The governor of Maryland, Sir Francis Nicholson, appointed Thomas Greenfield as the first Sheriff. The St. Paul's Church in Charlestown held the headquarters for the Sheriff's Office until the 1720s when it was relocated to the town of Upper Marlboro. At the time of the 18th Century, there was no set salary for the county sheriff, but he was often paid in hogsheads (huge wooden barrels) of tobacco.

During the War of 1812, (1812-1815), an interesting incident occurred involving the Prince George's County Jail, when local prominent resident Dr. William Beanes, (1775-1824) captured several marauding British Army deserters from the passing army of Gen. Robert Ross (British Army officer)|General Robert Ross (1766-1814) and Vice Admiral, Sir George Cockburn, (1772-1853), and held them in the County Jail, after he had treated several wounded "Redcoat" soldiers in their march on to Washington and the disasterous Battle of Bladensburg on the Eastern Branch stream of the Anacostia River in August 1814. Later he was arrested along with several others including Robert Bowie, former 11th Governor of Maryland (1803-1806, 1811-1812) by retreating British Cavalry on orders from Ross who had stayed in his home as headquarters. Later ] and the Chesapeake Bay to find the British Royal Navy fleet after leaving the Patuxent River, beating up the Bay from their base on Tangier Island, Virginia heading for their attack on the hated "nest of pirates" - Baltimore. After being received and negotiating with General Ross, Admiral Cockburn and their superior, Admiral Sir Alexander Cochrane, (1758-1832), and showing him some letters written by captured British wounded soldiers testifying to the fair treatment Beanes had given them and tended to them, they agreed to free him but that would be held up until they could celebrate after the Burning of Baltimore following their attack on Fort McHenry and landing troops to the east at North Point. Well, the famous story has been told, how the General was killed prior to the skirmishing at the Battle of North Point on September 12th, how the advancing British under successor, Col. Arthur Brooke led the British regiments to face the 20,000 drafted and volunteer citizens and militia under the determined overall command of Maj. Gen. Samuel Smith, (1752-1839), of the Maryland Militia on the eastern heights of "Loudenschlager's Hill" (later known as "Hampstead Hill" in modern Patterson Park, between Highlandtown and Canton neighborhoods) whose dug-in fortifications and dragged cannon were so numerous that the "Redcoats" halted in their tracks and decided to await the shelling of the Fort which guarded the entrances to the Harbor to pass into the inner port and the waterfront of famous Fells Point. Following the failure of the fort to fall to two days of "the rockets' red glare and the bombs bursting in air" and their flanking troop-loaded barge attack around the west end but driven back by alert artillery seamen at Forts Covington and Babcock in a driving night rainstorm, the British fleet turned about and set sail. Key and his companions Beanes and Skinner who were startled, amazed and emotionally overcome to see a huge 30 by 42 foot banner being raised in the light of the early morning with the distant booming of the morning's gun salute, knew that the fort and the city had held. When they landed at "The Basin" (modern "Inner Harbor") and Key finished up his draft of a new poem "The Defence of Fort McHenry" at the Indian Queen Hotel at West Baltimore and Hanover Streets, (later to be set to music in a few days) and sung lustily through the city, performed on the stage at the famed Holliday Street Theatre, and then soon throughout the state and soon the nation as "The Star Spangled Banner". Beanes, drunken Britishers and the PG County Jail had started all that.

The headquarters for the Sheriff's Office was held in the county seat of Upper Marlboro until 2000, when the sitting Sheriff, Al Black, moved it to the nearby town of Largo where it resided until August 2008. His successor, Sheriff Michael A. Jackson returned the office headquarters back to Upper Marlboro where it is currently located. He was succeeded by Sheriff Melvin High in 2010.