INTRODUCTION

BIOGRAPHIES

The format of the biographies is designed so that the major public and private aspects of a
legislator's career are quickly discernible. In formulating research procedures, we adopted eleven
elements as an organizational framework for the collation of evidence as it accumulated (see figure
5). After an individual's name and dates of birth and death come concise statements of his
personal and family background, marriages, children, private and public career, values and
opinions, and wealth. Elements are set in boldface type in small capital letters, with categories of
data within each element set in regular type in small caps. The section dealing with a legislator's
familial connections, for example, begins with the element FAMILY BACKGROUND (boldface
type), followed by categories such as FATHER, MOTHER, UNCLE, and AUNTS (regular
small caps). Elements and categories do not appear where research elicited no information. If we
could not ascertain the name of a legislator's wife but did know the name of his offspring, only
CHILDREN will appear and not the element MARRIED. The names of all legislators in a man's
biography are in boldface italic type in order to highlight legislative connections. If a legislator's
father, two uncles, and four sons sat in the legislature, their names will be in boldface italics and
reference should be made to their biographies. The voluminous number of sources consulted
precluded using footnotes, but the documented files on each legislator are at the Hall of Records.
Upon completion of the three monographs, these files will be open to the public and the contents
placed on microform.

The first element of a biography consists of the legislator's name, with variant spellings
indicated parenthetically, followed by birth and death dates. For an explanation of date qualifiers
"by," "ca.," and slash dates (e.g., 1744/45), see Abbreviations and Notes.

If we know the precise date of a legislator's birth, it appears after the category BORN in the
element [PERSONAL BACKGROUND]. Where the term "of age by" precedes a year after BORN, it
means that the man was of legal age—twenty-one—by that date. Also included in this category,
where available, is the legislator's birthplace and rank within his family (that is, first son, younger
son, etc.). The category IMMIGRATED explains when a legislator came to Maryland. For the
purpose of numbering generations, an immigrant was considered first generation if he was of age
upon arrival in the colony. When a legislator immigrated to the colony as a minor with his parents,
he was counted as second generation. The final category under personal background is the legisla-
tor's residence. If a man lived in several locations, they are listed in chronological order. Only one
location and the absence of a date denotes a legislator who maintained a single residence
throughout his adult life.

One of the main concerns of the project was to document legislative connections within and
between family groupings. Thus, primary stress in the element FAMILY BACKGROUND was the
delineation of a legislator's relationships, through blood or marriage, to other legislators.
Marriages of brothers are not shown if the father sat in the Assembly, but those of sisters are given
if they married legislators. This rule applies to all male and female relatives. If a man's father did
not sit in the Assembly, however, available information on the legislator's immediate family is
included.

The research files contain much additional information on familial ties. For the sake of
brevity in publication, however, the relationships are limited to the immediately preceding and the
two succeeding generations. Specific relatives sought were: father, stepfather/guardians, mother,
stepmothers, uncles, aunts, brothers and sisters, first cousins, nephews, and nieces. We did not