Location Details
- 154 W. Patrick St.Frederick, MD 21710
This house is privately owned.This reconstructed house marks the residence of Barbara Fritchie, the heroine of John Greenleaf Whittier’s 1863 poem. In 1863, John Greenleaf Whittier wrote a poem about Frederick resident Barbara Fritchie and her courageous act of flying the Union flag from her attic window above of the heads of Confederate soldiers marching out of town during the first invasion of Lee’s troops into Maryland in September 1862. Fritchie was ninety-six years old at the time, and perhaps bedridden. The poem has been controversial ever since, and most people today think the incident never took place (at least not the version described in the poem). Barbara Fritchie’s strong Unionist views were never in doubt, however. She freely expressed her strong and unyielding support for the Union throughout the sectional conflict. It is known that Barbara Fritchie stood outside her home and cheered on McClellan’s forces as they marched through Frederick in September 1862, and an alleged member of Jackson’s Third Brigade relates that the elderly woman once mistakenly waved a Union flag at passing Confederates. True or not, Whittier’s poem became famous, and spawned books, plays, musicals, films, and memorabilia and souvenirs of all types. Fritchie died in December of 1862, and her house was torn down a few years later to widen nearby Carroll Creek. Much of the material from the house was saved, and later used in reconstructing the house in the 1920s.
For Additional information
- Maryland Inventory of Historic Properties (Select “Search by Property” tab, and enter FHD-0520 in search box to right of “Site No.”)
- Charles S. Adams, The Civil War in Frederick County, Maryland – A Guide to 49 Historic Points of Interest (Shepherdstown, WV: The Author, 1995), 12
- Civil War Trails Historical Marker
