Maryland in the American Civil War a majority of the legislature, wished to remain in the Union, but did not want to be involved in a war against their southern neighbors, and sought to prevent a military response by Lincoln to the South's secession. After John Brown's raid on Harpers Ferry in 1859, many citizens began forming local militias, determined to prevent a future slave uprising. The first bloodshed of the Civil War occurred in Maryland. Anxious about the risk of secessionists capturing Washington, D.C., given that the capital was bordered by Virginia, and preparing for war with the South, the federal government requested armed volunteers
Maryland Maryland, with large communities existing in the suburbs of Washington, D.C. (particularly Montgomery County and Prince George's County) and the city of Baltimore. The Greater Washington area has the largest population of Ethiopians outside of Africa. The Ethiopian community of Greater DC was historically based in Washington D.C.'s Adams Morgan and Shaw neighborhoods, but as the community has grown, many Ethiopians have settled in Silver Spring. The Washington, D.C. metropolitan area is also home to large Eritrean and Somali communities. The top reported ancestries by Maryland residents are: German (15%), Irish (11%), English (8%), American (7%), Italian (6%), and Polish