478                           THE COUNTIES OF MARYLAND

Charles Calvert, requiring him to prepare for an election.²⁶ At the elec-
tion occurring in the following April Richard Preston is recorded as
a Delegate to the Assembly and Daniel Jenifer as a Burgess. Before
this time there are no records of representation of Dorchester County in
either House. It therefore seems probable that the County was erected
in the latter part of 1668 through proclamation of the proprietor, Cecil-
ius, Lord Baltimore. On the 6th of May, 1669, we have the record²⁷
of the appointment of commissioners to keep the peace in Dorchester
County and in the commission it is stated that " we will that the said
County extend ,to Great Choptank River, including the South Side
thereof to be accounted and taken to be within the said County of
Dorchester ......."

The next reference to Dorchester County is in the records of the
Council meeting at St. Mary's on the 22d of October following in a
minute of the order to the sheriffs of Somerset, Dorchester, Talbot, and
Baltimore counties regarding the seating of persons " on the Seaboard
Side of Deleware Bay from the Bounds of Virginia to the degree 40
Northerly Latitude." ²⁸ From this it may be inferred that the bounds of
the county at the time of its erection were the Choptank River on the
north and the Nanticoke River on the south, on the west Chesapeake
Bay, and on the east a disputed boundary. It should be remembered that
at or just before this time Lord Baltimore had received a confirmation
of his charter from Charles I, and that he was claiming with increasing
vigor his rights to the Delaware territory. On the other hand the
Dutch through their deputation of 1659 and subsequent correspondence
were asserting with equal vigor their rights to the territory of New
Sweden which they had recently subjugated. Four years before the
establishment of Dorchester County the captured possessions of the
Dutch, as far as the east bank of the Delaware, had been given to the
King's brother, James, Duke of York. The Duke's representative
thought it wise to claim both sides of the Delaware and by 1668 had com-
menced to give grants in the Delaware territory. Lord Baltimore was
evidently eager to establish his claims to the Delaware territory by the

²⁶ Md. Arch., 2: 185.              ²⁷ Md. Arch., 5: 52-54.            ²⁸Md. Arch., 5: 56.