St. Charles College Ruins - Printable Version

St. Charles College Ruins - Printable Version

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St. Charles College Ruins - Pamela - 10-06-2015 10:21 PM

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The "Ruins" as they are called are located in the middle of a tony neighborhood near Ellicott city and are owned by the community. I found them by putting St. Charles Place, Terra Maria Way, Marriotsville, MD in my GPS. The entire community sits on the former grounds of the school. There is no historical plaque, just a sign of rules which we broke by walking through them. Here is their history: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/St._Charles_College,_Maryland

John Harrison Surratt met Louis Weichmann at the school in 1859. They were both recommended by Father Waldron. The school was only for students studying for the priesthood.

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Here is a list of students and faculty. Louis was in year eleven, Surratt in year twelve. Note the names of Father Jenkins and Father Menu and the day and month the school opened.

http://www.stmarys.edu/wp-content/uploads/2014/01/scc_1848_1897.pdf

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This building was a later addition to the college and not built yet when Surratt and Weichmann attended. There is a flower laid in bricks in the stone floor. I guess it's a rosette. I forgot to mention there is a deck built onto the top in another picture which will be torn down. The ruins are amazing to see in the midst of the surrounding neighborhood.

Surratt was a student for the diocese of St. Augustine, Fla., under the Right Reverend Augustin Verot, D.D., and Weichmann was a student for the diocese of Richmond under Bishop McGill.

RE: St. Charles College Ruins - Susan Higginbotham - 10-06-2015 11:36 PM

Great pictures! Almost medieval-looking.

RE: St. Charles College Ruins - RJNorton - 10-07-2015 04:02 AM

I second Susan. Fascinating post. Possibly I missed this somewhere along the way, but how did Aloysius H. Wiechman become Louis J. Weichmann? Pamela, I think you asked this before - did you ever find the answer?

RE: St. Charles College Ruins - Eva Elisabeth - 10-07-2015 04:09 AM

(10-07-2015 04:02 AM)RJNorton Wrote: I second Susan. Fascinating post. Possibly I missed this somewhere along the way, but how did Aloys H. Wiechman become Louis J. Weichmann?

I "triple" Susan and Roger!
Roger, would post 344 help?
http://rogerjnorton.com/LincolnDiscussionSymposium/thread-525-post-51856.html?highlight=aloys#pid51856
(And it would make sense to me "Weichmann" came due to the misspellings in the course of the trial, to which he "gave up on" the original spelling as "Weichmann" is - I think - for English speakers easier to pronounce.)

RE: St. Charles College Ruins - RJNorton - 10-07-2015 04:24 AM

Thank you, Eva!! That explains it!

Now what does the J stand for in Louis J. Weichmann?

RE: St. Charles College Ruins - Eva Elisabeth - 10-07-2015 04:30 AM

Probably he had a further first name, many Germans have two or more, to honor grandparents or other ancestors or relatives (like I am "Elisabeth" for my father's sister), or just to make the name more special. There are typical combinations, too, like Hans Peter, Hans Georg, or Franz Josef (often nicknamed Hape, Hage, and Frajo). And many immigrants "Americanized" their names, like Henry Villard, who was born Ferdinand HEINRICH Gustav HILGARD.

"J" could almost only stand for either "Josef" or "Johann(es)"!

RE: St. Charles College Ruins - Eva Elisabeth - 10-07-2015 08:20 AM

Just curious - is more than one first name common in the US? It seems middle "letters" often stand for the maternal family name rather than for a first name? .

RE: St. Charles College Ruins - L Verge - 10-07-2015 08:41 AM

(10-07-2015 04:30 AM)Eva Elisabeth Wrote: Probably he had a further first name, many Germans have two or more, to honor grandparents or other ancestors or relatives (like I am "Elisabeth" for my father's sister), or just to make the name more special. There are typical combinations, too, like Hans Peter, Hans Georg, or Franz Josef (often nicknamed Hape, Hage, and Frajo). And many immigrants "Americanized" their names, like Henry Villard, who was born Ferdinand HEINRICH Gustav HILGARD.

"J" could almost only stand for either "Josef" or "Johann(es)"!

I'm not sure on this, but somewhere I remember seeing that Johann was his father's name.

Enjoyed seeing the photos of the college remains. I had seen only one previous photo many years ago. I'm trying to remember my history, but I think the land was originally part of a large Carroll family estate known as Doughregan Manor. The Carrolls are some of the "First Family" pillars of Maryland (as well as the Catholic establishment in our state). Believe it or not, we have a piece of charred wood at Surratt House that was retrieved from those ruins many long years ago.

RE: St. Charles College Ruins - Pamela - 10-27-2015 10:38 PM

Roger, about Louis's original name (I guess) Aloysius, I found this at namenerd.com:

Louis, Lewis, Aloysius

Lewis is the English form of Louis, a French name coming from the Germanic Ludwig, which comes from the words meaning "fame" and "warrior." Aloysius is a Latin form this name.

And from behindthename.com:

Meaning & History
Latinized form of Aloys, an old Occitan form of LOUIS. This was the name of a 16th-century Italian saint, Aloysius Gonzaga. The name has been in occasional use among Catholics since his time.

And there's the origin of the name of the school, Gonzaga, where so many characters in the assassination story attended, taught, or had a connection to. This book is interesting, In The Web of History, Gonzaga College and the Lincoln Assassination by Paul Warren.

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Halloween is coming - can anyone tell where this came from (art effect added)?

RE: St. Charles College Ruins - Eva Elisabeth - 10-28-2015 05:49 AM

That's neat, Pamela - V-E-R-Y spooky indeed!!! (Nice for a Halloween avatar!)
I guess this to be the origin:
http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=gr&GRid=7377

RE: St. Charles College Ruins - Pamela - 10-28-2015 06:57 AM

That didn't stay a mystery for long, Eva! I visited Greenmount cemetery for Halloween and noticed a lot of people like to put Washington monuments on their graves for some reason, lol.

Here are some more photos from Greenmount:

RE: St. Charles College Ruins - Pamela - 10-28-2015 09:45 AM

Thanks for posting those for me, Roger! The tradition at the Booth gravestone plot is to put pennies on Booth's unmarked stone and around the Booth name because they carry the image of Lincoln. It was moving to see that. As you can see, Arnold also had pennies. O'Laughlen had only a couple; I guess he's off the beaten path.

I spent over an hour trying to find Reverdy Johnson, to no avail. I had the photo from findagrave to use as reference and located the buildings in the background and it was kind of an interesting puzzle, but no luck. As a matter of interest, the Baltimorean who invented the ouigi board is buried there and his headstone is a ouigi board. Also there are a couple of beautiful sculptures by Hans Shuler at and near the chapel. We didn't get to go into the large mausoleum but were told that it is both creepy and amazing.