Existing comment:
Silver Spring; Spring itself
Silver Spring gets its name because Francis Perkins Blair, the editor of the Washington Globe newspaper, came out with his daughter in 1842 and discovered a spring in the heavily-wooded area north of Washington DC. There were glints of silver color in the water and he purchased the land around the spring, built a home, and named the area Silver Spring.
The Blairs were an influential family in national politics. Francis' son Montgomery Blair moved to the area in 1853. He was a lawyer who's free-soil views moved him into the Republican party. He was Scott's counsel in the Dred Scott Case. He was Abraham Lincoln's Postmaaster General for four years, resigning at Lincoln's request to keep peace in the cabinet. After the war, Montgomery opposed the Radical Republicans in their persecution of President Andrew Jackson and he eventually rejoined the Democratic party.
Francis Blair Jr was another son. He founded the Free-Soil party in Missouri. He was instrumental in saving Missouri and Kentucky for the Union by directing, without authority, the capture of the St Louis arsenal. He was later involved in the John Fremont affair. (Fremont had run for President as the first Republican candidate. He was given control of Missouri and ran it in a haphazard manner with poorly conceived contracts. On August 30, 1861, he declared martial law and freed the slaves of anyone who oppsed him. Lincoln asked him to modify this and he refused, forcing Lincoln to revoke it. Lincoln sent Montgomery Blair, General Meigs, and David Hunter to advise Fremont. Fremont started losing battles and Lincoln told him to turn his command over to David Hunter. Fremont later lost battles in Jackson's Shenandoah Campaign and was relieved of command in June 1862.) By Chattanooga and the Atlanta campaign, Francis was a Corps commander. He spent much of his private fortune to support the Union and was financially ruined after the war. He fought the with Radical Republicans after the war and eventually ran for Vice President in 1868. He was a US Senator in 1871-1873.
When the Confederate troops under Early came through this area to attack Fort Stevens, they too stopped at this stream, which is now just a trickle, commemorated here by a little well and a marker:
COMPLEMENTS TO SILVER SPRING FOR THE QUARRIES OF ALFRED DAY HIGHLANDS ROCK CREEK 1872
They also destroyed Francis Blair's mansion. |