A Camping We Will Go Traditional Cache
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This is our Boy Scout Troop's home camp and is the best camp anywhere. Not you typical hide at the entrance to Henson Scout Reservation. No need to go in the field as it is not part of the camp and is private property. The cache was placed with the permission of the camp director.
The Richard A. Henson Scout Reservation lies on the land in the “vee” formed by the confluence of the Marshyhope
Creek and the Nanticoke River in northeastern Dorchester County, Maryland. The land, which was bought by Del-Mar-Va Council in the early l960’s, was originally named the Nanticoke Scout Reservation, but the name was changed in 1987 to commemorate the gift of a large amount of money. When the land was acquired, except for one house near the Reservation entrance, it was uninhabited land and, indeed, there were no buildings whatever. Most of the northern area had been ravaged by timber cutting, rendering most of it unsightly second growth, but dotted with carpets of blueberry and mountain laurel.
The area comprising the Reservation is rich in historical fact and legend. The first white to visit was Captain John
Smith during his 1608 exploration from his new settlement in Virginia. He sailed up the Nanticoke River and the Marshyhope Creek and may well have walked on the very site of the Reservation. As English settlement took hold, the Reservation land fell into white hands and over the years became a thriving community of small homesteads and farms. When the present trails were marked out in 1964-1965, there were many indications of this, including homestead sites near Ababco, Kuskarawa, Crazy Woman, Old Bucket, and Tomahawk Outposts and near the Nature Area (east of the pool, site of the Activities Building), and the Longhouse (staff area). A 1938 aerial survey photo shows many traces of small fields, several of which appear to still have been cleared. When the Reservation opened in 1965, the entire area south of the Maintenance Area was open field which, due to planting soon thereafter, is now a forest.
The name of Patty Cannon brings shame to three local counties. An outpost is named for her. She and her partner kept a tavern in Reliance from 1802 to 1829 which was located at the exact point where three counties converged, not far from the Reservation. She engaged in a reign of terror, taking in weary travelers then robbing and sometimes killing them for their money and property. She also captured blacks, principally ex-slaves who had been freed, and shipped them into the South where they were resold into slavery. The murderous woman evaded the law for years because of the unique location of her inn, with one part of the building in Dorchester County, another part in Caroline County and a third part in Sussex County. When the sheriff of either county arrived to arrest her, Cannon simply ran into a part of the tavern that was in another county! Legend has it that she was finally apprehended when the sheriffs of all three counties coordinated a raid, attacking the inn all at once. Since she died in the jail in Georgetown, it may be concluded that one of the Delaware sheriffs made the actual “collar.” At any rate, Cannon chained slaves to trees in the woods awaiting ships to carry them south and, according to legend, the Reservation area was so used, principally in the south end near Red Bank and where Patty Cannon Outpost is located. The outpost is named not to glorify this madwoman, but to honor her victims.
To read more about Henson Scout Reservation Click here (visit link)
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