Baltimore and flour 1831 ... and garlick flour

The port of Baltimore handled about 600,000 barrels of flour and 70,000 bushels of wheat mostly shipped to England - more than any US port except NYC.  Ellicott's mills supplied flour to Baltimore.  Wild garlic was probably a problem in the wheat from Howard County.  Oliver Evans' book (who visited Ellicotts mills, book was co-written by a brother of the Ellicott founders) contained an entire section on the wild garlic problem.

Nathan Tyson's patented flour drying process - 1831

Nathan Tyson (1787-1867) married George Ellicott's daughter Martha Ellicott (1795-1873) in 1815 at the Quaker Meeting house in EC.  They lived in Baltimore city and at 'Jericho' by his family mills on the Gunpowder.  He was on the Board of Directors of the B & O Railroad, and historian Scharf wrote after his death that he was "one of the ablest and most honorable merchants of Baltimore."

Revolutionary War rations - bread with water

Lea flour mills along the Brandywine near Wilmington, Del. provided flour for Washington's soldiers.  Thomas Lea married George Ellicott's daughter.  Soldiers received a pound of flour per day ration, but bakers could add more water to make a pound loaf of bread, and keep the excess flour.

Davy Crockett amid flour barrells near Ellicott's Mills

Before Davy Crockett (1786-1836) became a US Representative and then fought (and died) at the battle of the Alamo in 1836, he went through Ellicott’s mills in a wagon laden with flour barrels enroute to Baltimore.  He recounted his misadventure in his 1834 autobiography.  After running away from Kitchen’s school at a very young age, he went with a waggoneer to Gerardstown (Virginia, now WV) where he worked until he decided to accompany a man to Baltimore with the load. The horses bolted and he was in a "devlish flouncing about of flour barrels" in the back of the wagon.  He survived - "if he is born for a seat in Congress, even flour barrels can't make a mash of him."

Ellicott's Mills and Bonnie Branch mill 1907

Now all gone, one mill on the Bonnie Branch river was preserved in photos and described in this 1907 article.  Wooden gears are also described from the Ellicotts' Gwynn Falls mill, and the problems they had with Oliver Evans, 200 years ago.

Ellicott mills in 1805

"1805 8th Month, 3d. This evening I visited Ellicott's Mills, in company with J. T. and his wife. The overseer of these mills informed me they could grind and pack 300 barrels of flour per day. A barrel being 196lbs. or 14st. the annual returns, at 3s. per stone, would be nearly 200,000L. The stones were 7 feet in diameter."

Baltimore the "greatest flour market" with trains and wagons

Thousands of barrels of flour passed through Baltimore by large Conestoga wagons and railroad cars then onto ships to American and foreign ports.  The following excerpt is from an 1848 children's history book.