Worcester County, Maryland Genealogical Records Information

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Worcester County History and Information

Worcester County Facts

Worcester County was created in 1742 (Chapter 9, acts of 1742) and was formed from Somerset County . The County was named for the wife of Sir John Somerset, son of the 1st Marquess of Worcester, was Mary Arundel, sister of Anne Arundel, wife of Cæcilius Calvert, 2nd Baron Baltimore.. The County Seat is Snow Hill.

Worcester County, occupies the extreme southeastern corner of the state. Unlike the southern Maryland counties, this area was never tobacco country. The earliest settlers raised grain and livestock, and since the introduction of the refrigerated railroad car, this has been a vegetable and fruit growing area.

Snow Hill, the county seat since 1742, was a commercial center for the lower Eastern Shore even before the creation of the county. Destructive fires in 1834 and 1893 burned most of the old part of the town. It is a town of shingled frame houses, many built in the Victorian era. Houses that remain from earlier days can be identified by large outside chimneys and separate kitchen buildings connected to the main house by curtains, all characteristics of early nineteenth century houses of the lower peninsula. See also County History for more historical details.

Counties adjacent to Worcester County are Accomack County, Virginia (south), Somerset County (west), Sussex County, Delaware (north), Wicomico County (northwest).

Worcester County Cities Include Pocomoke City. Towns Include Berlin, Ocean City, Snow Hill. Communities Include Bishopville, Boxiron, Cedartown, Germantown, Goodwill, Klej Grange, Nassawango Hills, Poplartown, Showell. (Unincorporated areas are also considered as towns by many people and listed in many collections of towns, but they lack local government.)

Various organizations, such as the United States Census Bureau, the United States Postal Service, and local chambers of commerce, define the communities they wish to recognize differently, and since they are not incorporated, their boundaries have no official status outside the organizations in question. The Census Bureau recognizes the following census-designated places in the county: Girdletree, Newark, Ocean Pines, Stockton, West Ocean City, Whaleyville

The Worcester County Official Government Website
Worcester County, Maryland History Books at Amazon.com
Family History Library - The largest collection of free family history, family tree and genealogy records in the world.

There are free downloadable and printable forms to help with your research. These include U.S. Census Extraction Forms, U.K. Census Extraction Forms, Research Calendar, Ancestral Chart, Research Extract, Correspondence Record , Family Group Sheet , Source Summary Form.

Records at the Worcester County Courthouse

See Also Maryland Land Records, Marriage Records, Court & Probate Records

PLEASE READ!! Please call the clerk's department to confirm hours, mailing address, fees and other specifics before visiting or requesting information because of sometimes changing contact information.

Government records of Worcester County are available in Original , Microfilm and Digital formats from the Maryland State Archives The Official County website is located at http://www.co.worcester.md.us/. See also Courthouse History. NOTE: The record dates below are from the earliest date to present time.

Worcester County Register of Wills/ Clerk of Orphan's Court has Probate Records from 1742 and is located at One W. Market St. - Room 102, Snow Hill, MD 21863 - 1074; (410) 632-1529
The Register of Wills is responsible for appointing personal representatives to administer decedents estates and for overseeing the proper and timely administration of these proceedings. We also perform the following duties: assist and advise the public in the preparation of all required forms; maintain and preserve the permanent record of all proceedings; serve as the Clerk to the Orphans Court; track estates and refer delinquent matters to the Court; determine and collect inheritance taxes and probate fees/court costs; audit accounts of personal representatives and guardians; and, verify compliance with court orders.

Worcester County Circuit Court Clerk has Land Records from 1742 and Marriage Records from earliest to 1919 and is located at the courthouse, Room 104, One W. Market Street, P.O. Box 40, Snow Hill, Maryland 21863; 410-632-5500
The Clerk's responsibilities include supervising Clerk's office personnel in the civil, criminal, courtroom clerks, business license, marriage license, land records, and juvenile units.

There are a few online databases for Court, Land and Probate Records which include: Maryland Calendar of Wills, Maryland Marriages, 1655-1850 and Maryland Marriages, 1667-1899.

Click Here to Search Maryland Court, Land, Wills & Financial Records! - Researchers often overlook the importance of court records, probate records, and land records as a source of family history information.

Below is a list of online resources for Worcester County Court Records. Email us with websites containing Worcester County Court Records by clicking the link below:

Bureau of Land Management (BLM)
Worcester County, Maryland Court Books at Amazon.com
Maryland Immigration & Emigration Records - Immigration records help the family historian to understand the movements of their ancestry as they relocated to different parts of the world.

Worcester County Vital Records

See Also Research In Tax Records

Available at the Maryland State Archives with index is a Maryland tax assessment of 1783, which is “more complete” than the 1776 or 1778 “censuses”. Robert W. Barnes and Bettie Stirling Carothers abstracted the 1783 tax list of Baltimore County, Maryland but while it has some omissions, it serves as an index to photocopies of the originals published as Maryland Tax List 1783 Baltimore County from the collection of the Maryland Historical Society (Philadelphia: Historic Publications, 1970). The counties of Calvert, Cecil, Harford, and Talbot are covered by Bettie Carothers, comp., 1783 Tax List of Maryland (Part I: Cecil, Talbot, Harford, and Calvert Counties) (Lutherville, Md.: Pub. by compiler, 1977). Furthermore, there is a two part index to the 1783 list at the state archives, one by names of property owners, the other by names of the tracts.

The earliest tax records are to be found among the proprietary papers, dating from the 1630s. Some early tax records have been published, such as Raymond B. Clark, Jr., and Sara Seth Clark, comps., Baltimore County, Maryland, tax list, 1699-1706. At the Maryland State Archives is a tax list for St. Anne's Parish, Anne Arundel County, 1764-66. Also here are the surviving 1798 U.S. direct tax records, for Anne Arundel County (indexed), Baltimore County and City, and the counties of Caroline, Charles, Harford, Prince George's, Queen Anne's, Saint Mary's, Somerset, and Talbot. Richard J. Cox edited Name Index to the Baltimore City Tax Records: 1798-1808 Of the Baltimore City Archives, (Baltimore: Baltimore City Archives and Records Management Office, 1981).

Below is a list of online resources for Worcester County Tax Records. Email us with websites containing Worcester County Tax Records by clicking the link below:

Worcester County Genealogical Addresses

See Also Other Maryland Genealogical Addresses

The Repositories in this section are Archives, Libraries, Museums, Genealogical and Historical Societies. Many County Historical and Genealogical Societies publish magazines and/or news letters on a monthly, quarterly, bi-annual or annual basis. Contacting the local societies should not be over looked. State Archives and Societies are usually much larger and better organized with much larger archived materials than their smaller county cousins but they can be more generalized and over look the smaller details that local societies tend to have. Libraries can also be a good place to look for local information. Some libraries have a genealogy section and may have some resources that are not located at archives or societies. Also, take a special look at any museums in the area. They sometimes have photos and items from years gone by as well as information of a genealogical interest. All these places are vitally important to the family genealogist and must not be passed over.

Below is a list of online resources for Worcester County Genealogical Addresses. Email us with websites containing Worcester County Genealogical Addresses by clicking the link below:

Lower DelMarVa Genealogy Society, P.O. BOX 3602, Salisbury, MD 21802-3602; (410) 742-3501; (Membership/Surname Chairman); Maryland Room of the Wicomico County Library: Th 10:00-5:00
Worcester County Historical Society , 3 East Second Street, Pocomoke City, MD 21851
Local Maryland Researchers, Find a local researcher or become a local researcher.
Maryland State Archives, 350 Rowe Boulevard, Annapolis, MD 21401
Maryland Genealogical Society, 201 W. Monument Street, Baltimore, MD 21201-4674.
Publishes the Maryland Genealogical Society Bulletin Quarterly.
The Maryland Historical Society, 201 W. Monument Street, Baltimore MD 21201-4674
Has published a quarterly magazine Maryland Historical Magazinefor over 90 years
Maryland Newspapers & Periodicals Records - Newspapers and periodicals are the diaries of local communities. They are excellent sources of family history details - often recorded nowhere else. Look for obituaries, marriages, legal notices, and more found in our Historical Newspaper Archives.
Maryland Genealogical Society Books at Amazon.com

Worcester County Church & Cemeteries

Click Here to Search Maryland Obituary Records! - This database is a compilation of obituaries published in U.S. newspapers, collected from various online sources. Obituaries can vary in the amount of information they contain, but many of them are genealogical goldmines, including information such as names, dates, places of birth and death, marriage information, and family relationships.

There are many churches and cemeteries in Worcester County. Some transcriptions are online. A great site is the Worcester County Tombstone Transcription Project.

A search for church records should begin with Directory of Maryland church records (Westminster, Md.: Family Line Publications, 1987), arranged by county and giving a range of dates of available records for over 2,600 churches with mailing addresses. Also helpful are The First Parishes of the Province of Maryland (Baltimore: The Norman, Remington Co., 1923).

The largest collection of church records is at the Maryland State Archives, with a consolidated index, and many are at the Maryland State Archives, which has various original and microfilmed records, many with indexes. Some church records have been published in the Maryland Genealogical Society Bulletin or in individual books, such as those for St. Paul's in Baltimore and for many German churches in the western counties.

Although Catholicism is very important to the history of Maryland, the disenfranchisement of Catholics after the establishment of the Anglican church in 1692 largely contributed to the lack of record keeping prior to the Revolutionary War. One source for St. Marys County in the 1700s, however, is Catholic Families of Southern Maryland: Records of Catholic Residents of St. Mary's County in the Eighteenth Century (1980; reprint, Baltimore: Genealogical Publishing Co., 1985). Records of the German churches and the Society of Friends are very good. The latter were early settlers of Maryland, along with Anglicans and Catholics. Quaker records in Maryland, (Annapolis: Hall of Records Commission, 1966) is an excellent guide to the original and microfilmed Friends' records at the Maryland State Archives. Some Quaker records were published in Kenneth Carroll, Quakerism on the Eastern Shore (Baltimore: Maryland Historical Society, 1970) and other records are at the Maryland Historical Society, the state archives, and the Friends Historical Library in Swarthmore, Pennsylvania.

The Maryland State Archives has indexes to cemetery records for various time periods. Some have been published in the Maryland Genealogical Society Bulletin and other journals and in individual works covering large parts of Anne Arundel, Baltimore, Dorchester, Frederick, Garrett, St. Marys, Somerset, Wicomico, and Worcester counties. A great number of grave marker inscriptions have been transcribed by members of the Maryland DAR and will be found at the Maryland Historical Society and the DAR Library in Washington, D.C. See also Historic graves of Maryland and the District of Columbia (1908; reprint, Baltimore: Genealogical Publishing Co., 1967).

Below is a list of online resources for Worcester County Cemetery & Church Records. Email us with websites containing Worcester County Cemetery & Church Records by clicking the link below:

Family Trees & Genealogy Tidbits

Click Here to Search Maryland Family Tree Records! - The use of published genealogies, electronic files containing genealogical lineage, and other compiled sources can be of tremendous value to a researcher.

When view family trees online or not, be sure to only take the info at face value and always follow up with your own sources or verify the ones they provide. Below is a list of online resources for Worcester County Family Trees, web forums and other family type information. Email us with websites containing Worcester County Family Trees, web forums and other family type information by clicking the link below:

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Worcester County, Maryland Family Books at Amazon.com

County History

The only Maryland County that touches the Atlantic Ocean, Worcester County was part of Somerset County until 1742, when Somerset County was divided and the eastern portion became Worcester County. It was named for the Earl of Worcester. Historic Figures Originally populated by Native Americans, the County was explored by Giovanni de Verrazano in 1524. He described the log canoes, native dress and food of the local people as well as wild animals and the lack of stone in the area.

The land is like the previous one in situation, fertility, and beauty; the woods are sparse; the land is covered with different types of trees, but they are not so fragrant since it is more northern and cold. We saw there many vines growing wild, which climb up around the trees as they ado in Cisalpline Gaul: they would doubtless produce excellent wines if they were properly cultivated, for several times we found the dry fruit sweet and pleasant, not unlike our own. The people must value them, because wherever they grow, the bushes around them are removed so that the fruit can ripen better. We found wild roses, violets, and lilies, and many kinds of herbs and fragrant flowers different from ours. We did not find out about their houses, as they were in the interior of the country. We think from the many signs we saw that they were built of wood and grasses... After staying here for three days, anchored off the coast, we decided to leave because of the scarcity of ports, and we continued to follow the coast which we baptized "Arcadia" on account of the beauty of the trees."

Later, Captain John Smith and other explorers visited the Atlantic Coast of Maryland and made favorable descriptions and detailed maps which brought European settlers to the area. The Pocomoke River, which forms a boundary that separates Worcester County from Somerset and Wicomico Counties, provided access to the Chesapeake Bay which also encouraged settlement of the area.

Crops such as corn and wheat were grown in the fertile soil. But the most valuable crop was tobacco. Because gold and silver currency was scarce, tobacco was used to buy land, slaves, indentured servants and imported goods. Another crop which was valuable to the early economy was cypress wood. Cypress trees grow along the banks of the Pocomoke River. The wood is resistant to rot and was used for homes and other buildings. Cypress wood, along with oak, pin, poplar and gum contributed much to the local economy into the twentieth century.

The economy of Worcester County still relies heavily on agriculture. Crops such as corn, rye, soybeans, potatoes, tomatoes, beans and strawberries are raised here. Produce and poultry processing are also important industries.

Short History of Snow Hill

The Town of Snow Hill, located in Worcester County Maryland serves as the County Seat and traces its municipal history back 300+ years.

Snow Hill was founded by English settlers from a division of the City of London named "Snow Hill." The town received its first charter on the 26th of October 1686, and was made a port of entry in 1694.

Prior to 1742, when Worcester County was carved out of Somerset County and Snow Hill was made the county seat - Snow Hill had been a trading post and the head of navigation on the Pocomoke River.

Trade was the "engine" that drove commerce in the town and the Pocomoke River was the "highway". As the public came to trade, the residential population grew, businesses were established and churches and educational facilities were built. Prior to the turn of the twentieth century, Snow Hill resting on the banks of a navigable river, with its booming commerce became the business and cultural center of Worcester County.

Cherrystone - Federal Street - Snow Hill, MDIt became a town of gracious living, where merchants, bankers, farmers and sea captains built fine homes showing off their prosperity. Proof of this can be seen on Federal Street just one block from the downtown. The street is lined on both sides with historic homes, some dating back to the eighteenth century. These home are fine specimens of the Federal Style, Greek Revival, Victorian Second Empire, Italianate, Queen Anne and Gothic Revival style architecture - much of which has been immaculately restored. Snow Hill has the largest number of stately homes than any other community on the Lower Shore. The Maryland Historical Trust has referred to the Town of Snow Hill as "one of the most historically in-tact towns in the state of Maryland."

Metropolis of Old Somerset
It is doubtful that any town in Maryland is better planned and , for its size, possesses more outstanding early houses - one dating back to the pre-Revolution period and several subsequent thereto.

"With its long, straight shady streets laid out at right angles, Snow Hill is peaceful, gracious, and self-conscious. Thus it was that the town of Snow Hill, then in Old Somerset County, now in Worcester County (by subdivision in 1743) had its origin and founding in 1684 - 1686, and has had a consecutive history of life on the same site for two centuries and a half. The town of Snow Hill became in reality the "metropolis" of Old Somerset." - Clayton Torrence 1935

The development of Snow Hill differed from that of other towns on the Eastern Shore in three ways.

First there does not seem to have been any significant lot accumulation by any individual beyond three or four lots, and certainly not the same eight or ten lot "town estates" found elsewhere.

Second, the variety of craft specialists owning Snow Hill lots was unusual. Snow Hill lots were owned by merchants, innkeepers, and planters, as in other towns, but also at different times by shoemakers, barbers, surgeons, cabinet makers, joiners, blacksmiths and felt makers. Because the majority of records were destroyed in the Courthouse fire of 1893, there is a possibility that many additional type crafters were also lot owners.

Third, Snow Hill showed an unusual intensity of development - indicated through its lot subdivision, in which a single legally distinguished was broken into two or more parts. Fifteen of the thirty-eight identified lots for which conveyances exist were subdivided, comparatively high in relation to other Eastern Shore towns.

Snow Hill became an attractive place for craft specialists, who became markedly successful not only because of the local population, but also due to the town's proximity to a navigable river which allowed both import and export of goods. Successful craft specialists prospered and as a result were able to afford lots of their own and the ability to build remarkable dwellings on those lots.

The Great Fire of 1893

A fire destroyed most all the commercial area of Snow Hill including the Court House. All of the buildings were rebuilt within the next two years, so the downtown area contains primarily historic buildings with architectural design of the late nineteenth century.

Stately Homes

Snow Hill has the largest inventory of stately homes of anywhere on the Lower Shore. Beautifully maintained and remarkably restored, these homes with tree lined streets are worth the drive for any visitor who has an interest in historic architecture.

Snow Hill and its immediate surrounding area have nine properties listed on the National Register Listings in Maryland. They are: All Hallows Church, Chanceford, George Washington Purnell House, Governor John Walter Smith House, James Martin House, Mansion House, Nassawango Iron Furnace, Nun's Green,
Samuel Gunn House, Federal Street

Federal Street runs parallel to Market Street which was originally the start of the commercial district in Snow Hill. Federal Street contains remarkable historic homes, each with unique design that encompasses Colonial and Victorian styles.

Berlin
Berlin (accent on the first syllable), has all the special character of the Southern Eastern Shore. People are friendly and the pace of life is easy.

The village of Berlin began in the 1790s around the original 300 acre 1677 land grant that became Burley Plantation. The town's Main Street was originally part of the path connecting the Assateague Indians with the neighboring Pocomoke tribe. In colonial times the path became the Philadelphia Post Road, the main travel route up the shore to the centers of commerce to the north and west.

It is believed that the name Berlin was derived from a contraction of "Burleigh Inn," a tavern at the crossroads of the Philadelphia Post and Sinepuxent Roads. In the early 1900s Berlin's bustling commercial and tourist business supported more hotels than neighboring Ocean City.

Pocomoke City
Settled in the 1600s on the banks of the Pocomoke River, the town was originally known as Steven's Ferry. During the late 1800s and early 1900s shipbuilding was the largest enterprise and furs, whiskey and tobacco found their way from Pocomoke to ports in Baltimore, Philadelphia and New York.

Courthouse History
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