Stateside celebrations

Dec 26 2008 by Iain Pollock, Dumfries Standard Friday

A DUMFRIES namesake is all set for a special celebration … to mark its 260th birthday.

For Dumfries is the oldest chartered town in the US state of Virginia – beating nearby Alexandria, on the outskirts of Washington DC by just a few hours.

And current mayor Fred Yohey says: “Although just a small town we feel we have something to shout about in our charter.”

And he stressed: “Anyone from Scotland’s Dumfries will be given a very warm welcome if they can manage across to our celebrations in May.”

The US Dumfries dates back to the late 1600s at a small inlet called Quantico Creek just off the Potomac River and with developments in the area, the town was formally established and named by John Graham after his Scottish birthplace and received its charter on May 11, 1749, making it the oldest continuously chartered town in Virginia.

The growth of the tobacco market saw it become a thriving community rivalling Boston, Philadelphia and New York in importance.

But Mayor Yohey pointed out that large scale cultivation in the area led to the town’s downfall.

He said: “There was no erosion control and sediment was washed down the rivers and the harbour became silted up and its importance began to wane.”

However it was at the centre of several battlefields in both the revolutionary war and the Civil War and although no fighting actually took place in the town it did have its importance adjacent to the Potomac River and the way upstream to Washington DC and came under fire.

And during the Civil War one of the houses in the town – the Henderson House – which is still standing and occupied today, was used as a hospital and the coping at one corner was torn away by cannon fire.

Today the town, with a population of around five and a half thousand, is mainly a bedroom community for Washington DC, though Mayor Yohey is optimistic that it could have a future tourist spin off following the building of the US Marines Museum just outside the town boundary next to the Quantico Marine base.

He said: “It was opened just under two years ago by President George Bush and is attracting a million visitors a year.

“It would certainly be wonderful to get some spin off from that.”