Maryland Loyalists Battalion

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The Maryland Loyalists Battalion was a regiment loyal to Britain in the American Revolution. Composed primarily of colonists from the Eastern Shore of Maryland, it was commissioned in British-held Philadelphia in Mid-October, 1777 as "The First Battalion of Maryland Loyalists." The unit's commander, Lt. Col. James Chalmers of Chestertown, Maryland, was an active loyalist writer. His chief writing achievement was a political pamphlet from 1776 entitled Plain Truth a rebuttal of Thomas Paine's popularist pamphlet Common Sense.

The regiment saw limited action before being shipped off to Pensacola, Florida, to fight the Spanish in the fall of 1778. A number of soldiers of the regiment died of smallpox upon arrival. Their garrison was subsequently defeated by the Spanish. After a brief time as prisoners, the Maryland Loyalists were eventually sent back to New York City, the command center for British forces in the war.

After the war, the members of the regiment, along with many loyalists from various colonies were exiled to Nova Scotia. In the fall of 1783, a ship carrying members of the First Battalion of Maryland Loyalists was shipwrecked off the coast of Nova Scotia. Most survived and made up the first citizens of a new province: New Brunswick.

The Maryland Loyalist Battalion is also a Revolutionary War reenacting unit based in central Maryland.

[edit] Notable members

One of the more dramatic persons to serve with the unit was a young ensign named William Augustus Bowles who would become a leader of the Creek Indians in the 1790s.

One of the captains in the Maryland Loyalists was an attorney from Annapolis named Philip Barton Key. He was the uncle of Francis Scott Key who would later pen the words to The Star Spangled Banner.