Place:Harpers Ferry, Jefferson, West Virginia, United States

NameHarpers Ferry
Alt namesHarper's Ferrysource: Wikipedia
Shenandoah Fallssource: USGS, GNIS Digital Gazetteer (1994) GNIS54007794
TypeTown
Coordinates39.325°N 77.744°W
Located inJefferson, West Virginia, United States     (1801 - )
Also located inFrederick, Virginia, United States     (1738 - 1772)
Berkeley, West Virginia, United States     (1772 - 1801)
source: Getty Thesaurus of Geographic Names
source: Family History Library Catalog


the text in this section is copied from an article in Wikipedia

Harpers Ferry is a historic town in Jefferson County, West Virginia, United States, in the lower Shenandoah Valley. The population was 285 at the 2020 census. Situated at the confluence of the Potomac and Shenandoah rivers, where the U.S. states of Maryland, Virginia, and West Virginia meet, it is the easternmost town in West Virginia and during the Civil War was the northernmost point of Confederate-controlled territory. It has been called "the best strategic point in the whole South."

The town was formerly spelled Harper's Ferry with an apostrophe, so named because in the 18th century it was the site of a ferry service owned and operated by Robert Harper. The United States Board on Geographic Names, whose Domestic Name Committee is reluctant to include apostrophes in official place names, established the standard spelling of "Harpers Ferry" by 1891.

By far, the most important event in the town's history was John Brown's raid on the Harpers Ferry Armory in 1859.

Prior to the Civil War, Harpers Ferry was a manufacturing town as well as a major transportation hub. (See Virginius Island and Harpers Ferry Armory.)

The main economic activity in the town in the 20th and 21st centuries is tourism. John Brown's Fort is the most visited tourist site in the state of West Virginia. The headquarters of the Appalachian Trail are there—not the midpoint, but close to it, and easily accessible—and the buildings of the former Storer College are used by the National Park Service for one of its four national training centers. The National Park Service is Harpers Ferry's largest employer in the 21st century.

The lower town has been reconstructed by the National Park Service. It was in ruins at the end of the Civil War, not helped by later river flooding.[1] "The fact that Harpers Ferry was first and foremost an industrial village during the 19th century is not apparent in the sights, sounds, or smells of the town today."

Contents

History

the text in this section is copied from an article in Wikipedia

18th century

In 1733, Peter Stephens, a squatter, settled on land near "The Point" (the area where the Potomac and Shenandoah Rivers meet) and established a ferry from Virginia (now West Virginia) to Maryland, across the Potomac.

Robert Harper

Robert Harper, from whom the town takes its name, was born in 1718 in Oxford Township, near Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Since he was a builder, Harper was asked by a group of Quakers in 1747 to build a meeting house in the Shenandoah Valley near the present site of Winchester, Virginia. Traveling through Maryland on his way to the Shenandoah Valley, Harper—who was also a millwright—realized the potential of the latent waterpower from the Shenandoah and Potomac Rivers at an easily accessible location. He paid Stephens 30 guineas for his squatting rights to the ferry, since the land actually belonged to Lord Fairfax.

Harper then purchased of land from Lord Fairfax in 1751. In 1761, the Virginia General Assembly granted him the right to establish and maintain a ferry across the Potomac, even though a ferry had already been functioning since before Harper arrived. In 1763, the Virginia General Assembly established the town of "Shenandoah Falls at Mr. Harpers Ferry." Harper died in October 1782 and is buried in the Harper Cemetery.

Thomas Jefferson

On October 25, 1783, Thomas Jefferson visited Harpers Ferry as he was traveling to Philadelphia and passed through Harpers Ferry with his daughter Patsy. Viewing "the passage of the Potomac through the Blue Ridge" from a rock that is now named for him as Jefferson's Rock, he called the site "perhaps one of the most stupendous scenes in nature" and stated, "This scene is worth a voyage across the Atlantic." The town was one of his favorite retreats, and tradition says that much of his Notes on the State of Virginia was written there. Jefferson County, in which Harpers Ferry is located was named for him on its creation in 1801.

George Washington

George Washington, as president of the Patowmack Company (which was formed to complete river improvements on the Potomac and its tributaries), traveled to Harpers Ferry during the summer of 1785 to determine the need for bypass canals. Following Washington's familiarity with the area led him to propose the site in 1794 for a new United States armory and arsenal, some of his family moved to the area: his brother Charles Washington, who founded the nearby Jefferson County town of Charles Town, and his great-great-nephew, Colonel Lewis Washington, who was held hostage during John Brown's raid in 1859.

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