Originally published in the Cecil Whig
As the old Cecil County Jail undergoes another metamorphosis, I discovered information in the Cecil County Commissioners’ minutes books about construction of the jail: all of the bidders for all of the materials and the cost for everything. Jackpot! After taking some notes, I located some background material in the Historical Society of Cecil County’s vertical files. My heart sank. Included in one of the green hanging files about the jail was a magazine titled Maryland Sherriff from February, 1988. In it was a lengthy article by then Sheriff John DeWitt. Apparently Sheriff DeWitt had discovered the same material I had then added information from county historian Mike Dixon, and an earlier Cecil Whig article. “Now what?” I thought. Well, the material is still good, so I combined my research with Sheriff DeWitt’s insight and plowed forward, so here goes!
Sheriff DeWitt notes in his article that in 1871 the County Commissioners hired a general contractor to handle all of the work. But, at the last minute, the contract pulled out and the county decided it would be its own contractor, well, sort of. According to their minutes, the commissioners first hired an architect, named Samuel Sloan. Then they hired a project supervisor named Eli Sentman of Perryville because they wrote, he will “see that each and every contract…is done according to plan.” As payment for services, Sentman’s received 6% of the total cost of the project plus free Rail Road passage from Perryville to Elkton “while traveling on business pertaining to the said building.”
Then the bids started rolling in. The Commissioners awarded Davis May of Wholesale Lumber in Port Deposit to supply the lumber using hemlock, oak, and white pine. Prices varied from $20 to $50 per foot. R.C. Hicks of Philadelphia furnished the supplies and work for the plumbing in both structures including, in the Sherriff’s house: 2 water closets, 1 wash stand, a 40 gallon boiler, and various piping. For the jail: “all the iron pipes and water closets….” Total cost, $1475.
James Touchstone of Elkton supplied the iron works required for $7500. John Ruth and Brothers of Wilmington, Delaware, supplied “all the labor and lay the bricks” for the house and jail for $3.95 per thousand bricks. Timothy Rose bid “for laying stone …for painting…” for $2.10 per perch. Howland Company of Port Deposit, provided the doors, sashes, frames, shutters, and other wood work to be installed by the Anderson Company which did the carpentry. “The whole work to be made of good material, well seasoned … and to have a good coat of priming.” Delivered for $1890. James Little plastered the interior of the jail and house for 15 cents per square yard, “to be finished with three coats.” Finally, for $1600, Perry Lutzenburg painted the jail and sheriff house “all the work to have three good coats of paint the same to be properly mixed and to be applied in a workmanlike manner.”
These were not all of the bids, but the total cost for both jail and sheriff house was $42,000.
Sheriff DeWitt wrote that there were 10 cells on the first floor of the new jail with 6 on the second. The structure worked without major renovation until 1938. However, forty years later it was clear that Cecil County needed a new facility and work began on the current corrections facilities. That unit cost a bit more than the 1871 edition at $7.2 million.
For more information about the old Cecil County jail and all things history, contact the Historical Society of Cecil County at www.cecilhistory.org