Williamsport: Canal Town on the Conococheague
Near Harpers Ferry, Maryland
Williamsport, Maryland sits at the spot where the Great Wagon Road, the ancient trading path linking Pennsylvania to the Shenandoah Valley, forded the Potomac River. That crossing made it important long before the canal arrived.
In eighteen thirty-five the Chesapeake and Ohio Canal reached town, and Williamsport transformed into one of the busiest ports on the entire waterway. Warehouses, sawmills, and shipping firms lined the Cushwa and Steffey wharves. Coal, timber, and grain floated downriver toward Georgetown; dry goods and hardware came back upstream.
The Civil War intruded in July eighteen sixty-three. After the Battle of Gettysburg, Robert E. Lee directed his battered army to recross the Potomac here, cavalry securing the ford while infantry filed through the town. Williamsport held the keys to Lee's escape. And he took them.
