1812-1865: Rebuilding

1812-1865: Rebuilding. The Oxford Museum. , 1812-15 , War rages between the US and Britain, partly over the impacts of British restrictions on US maritime trade. British troops occupy Tilghman's, Poplar and Sharp's Islands., 1814 , British troops burn Washington and bomb Fort McHenry; Francis Scott Key writes the "Star-Spangled Banner.", 1818 , Frederick Douglass is born into slavery in Cordova, Talbot County., The first annual slave auction is held in Easton, MD., 1820 , Araminta Ross (Harriet Tubman) is born into slavery in Cambridge, Dorchester County., 1849 , General Tench Tilghman, grandson of Colonel Tilghman, opens the Maryland Military Academy in Oxford. The officers live in the Academy House on Morris Street while 33 cadets live in a wood-frame dormitory nearby., 1850 , The Oxford census lists 17 dwellings and 102 persons in the village, including children and free Blacks., Talbot County population: 7084 White, 2593 free Black, 4134 enslaved Blacks., 1855 , The Maryland Military Academy dormitory burns, and the school is forced to close down., 1860 , Eleven pro-slavery states secede from the Union, triggering civil war. Maryland does not secede, but Oxford's and the State's loyalties are deeply divided., August, the last public slave auction is held in Easton., 1861 , The first bloodshed of the Civil War occurs in Baltimore., 1863 , In September, over 200 enslaved Africans ship out from Oxford to Baltimore on the Steamer Champion to voluntarily join Union troops in the war effort., President Lincoln issues the Emancipation Proclamation, declaring slaves in Confederate states to be free., 1864 , Maryland abolishes slavery., 1865 , The Confederate States surrender., Slavery in America is abolished under the Thirteenth Amendment to the Constitution., President Abraham Lincoln is assassinated.