Title

Bohemia

Description

Located in the northern part of the Eastern Shore at the Little Bohemia River in Cecil County, Bohemia Manor came into Jesuit hands in part through a bequest and in part through an outright purchase. Originally claimed by Mary Ann and Margaret O'Daniel in 1680, the survey and deed process for the land was not completed before the two sisters died. They bequeathed their 300 acres to Thomas Mansell, SJ, and William Douglass, SJ. Mansell completed the survey and claim process for the land and contiguous vacant areas in 1706, and then purchased a number of adjourning tracts, increasing the size of the estate to roughly 2,000 acres. The plantation and its facilities served as the first Catholic outpost outside of the Jesuit farms in Southern Maryland. The Manor originally had a log house where Mansell lived until his death in 1723. The following year Thomas Hogdson, SJ, erected a brick house and church on the estate. Bohemia hosted a Catholic school started by Thomas Pulton, SJ, in 1745 or 1746. Though it only functioned for a decade at most, it proved to be a precursor to Georgetown College. Intended to provide an affordable education to Catholic boys who would go on to St. Olmers, the Academy at Bohemia included future Jesuit John Archbishop Carroll among its alumni.

(Thomas Hughes, History of the Society of Jesus in North America : Colonial and Federal (Documents), vol. Volume 1, Part 1 (London: Longmans, Green, and Co., 1908), 207-209. Edward Devitt, "History of the Maryland-New York Province, IX," Woodstock Letters LXIII, no. 1 (1934): 1-12.

Date

1706