Nathan Cooke Sr. (b. 1803 - d. circa 1869)
MSA SC 5496-035312
Property owner and slaveholder, Cracklin District, Montgomery County,
Maryland
Biography:
Nathan Cooke Sr. was born on June 21, 1803 on his family's farm, Cooke's Range. His father, also named Nathan, died from malignant bilious fever when Nathan was only two years old,1 so he grew up at the home of his step-father Henry Woodward Dorsey. Nathan's mother, Rachel Magruder Cooke, had married Doresey in 1807.2 In 1822, Nathan received 700 acres of land from his late father's estate, which had originally contained over 4,700 acres.3 He married nineteen-year-old Elizabeth Magruder on November 17, 1825,4 and they settled at his inherited farm, Gray Rock, north of Gaithersburg. Although two of the Cookes' children died in childhood, Rachel D. Cooke (b. 1839) and Nathan Pottinger Cooke (b. 1841) survived into adulthood.
Cooke enjoyed success as a farmer, landowner, and investor. In 1850, Cooke owned sixty sheep and sixty swine, selling over twice the average amount of meat produced in the area. While the surrounding forty farms sold an average of $124-worth of meat that year, Cook sold $275-worth.5 He also raised a large amounts of crops on land that he had both inherited and purchased. For instance, in 1849, Cooke attended a county auction in which he successfully bid on 502 acres of land that the county had confiscated from Jesse Leach two years earlier.6
Like many successful Montgomery County farmers, Cooke invested in stocks as well as in land. Assessment records for 1858 showed Cooke owning $6,750 in private securities, along with "Six & two third Shares in Rockville and Geo.Town Turnpike," valued at $167.7 Although banks funded some of these toll roads, others, like the Rockville and Georgetown Pike, "were entirely dependent on individual subscriptions."8 By 1826, the Washington Turnpike Company was providing investors like Cooke with dividends of about six percent.9 Unfortunately, the Rockville Pike became a disappointment through its inability to withstand the elements and through its recurring potholes.10
A large part of Cooke's wealth resulted from slave labor. In 1850, twenty-three slaves were working on Cooke's farm, with the number increasing to thirty-two by 1860.12 By the time Maryland enacted statewide emancipation on November 1, 1864, Cooke owned forty slaves.13 Following manumission, many of Cooke’s former slaves remained in the same district of Montgomery County, including Rezin Prather and Robert Tyler. Both Prather and Tyler purchased land in the area, with the extended Prather family establishing a closely-knit, African American community eventually known as Prathertown.
Nathan Cooke Sr. died intestate at Gray Rock on September 18, 1869,
with his large estate ultimately passing to his widow and children. He
was the brother-in-law of the slaveholder Dr.
William Bowie Magruder of the same district.
1. William Edward Muncaster. "Harriet Cooke Robertson." Year Book of the American Clan Gregor Society (American Clan Gregor Society. Charlottesville, VA: The Michie Company, Printers, 1916) 45.
2. MONTGOMERY COUNTY COURT, (Marriage Licenses), Film Reel: CR 8920, [MSA CM724-1]. Henry Woodward Dorsey and Rachel Cooke, June 16, 1807.
3. “Medicine in Maryland, 1752-1920.” Maryland State Archives. http://mdhistoryonline.net/
4. MONTGOMERY COUNTY COURT, (Marriage Licenses), 1798-1839, Film Reel: CR 8920, [MSA CM724-1]. Nathan Cook and Elizabeth Magruder, November 17, 1825.
5. U.S. CENSUS BUREAU,
(Census Record, MD), 1850, Agriculture, [MSA S1184-2]. Products of Agriculture
in the First or Cracklin District.
U.S. Census
Records (MD) for Harry D. Cooke, 1850, Montgomery County, Cracklin District,
Page 7, Line 25 [MSA SM61-142, M 1499-1].
6. MONTGOMERY COUNTY COURT (Land Records), Liber STS 4, Folio 210, 1849-1850, [MSA CE 148-42]. William O. Chappell, late sheriff, to Nathan Cooke, June 6, 1849.
8. MONTGOMERY COUNTY, BOARD OF COUNTY COMMISSIONERS, (Assessment Record), 1858-1863, [MSA C1111-3].
9. Wilhelmus Bogart Bryan. A History of the National Capital from Its Foundation Through the Period of the Adoption of the Organic Act. Vol. 2. (New York, NY: The Macmillan Company, 1916) 101-102.
10. Bryan 100.
11. Maude McGovern and Maizie Cummings. "Transportation in Rockville." Peerless Rockville. http://peerlessrockville.org/peerless_collection/transportation/transportation_1.htm.
12. U.S. Census Bureau (Census Record,
MD) Nathan Cooke, Slaves, 1850, Montgomery County, Cracklin District, Page
3, Line 10 [MSA SM61-168, M 1505-5].
U.S.
Census Bureau (Census Record, MD) for Nathan Cooke Sr., Slaves, 1860, Montgomery
County, District 1, Page 9, Line 33 [MSA SM61-239, M 7230-2].
13. MONTGOMERY COUNTY COMMISSIONER
OF SLAVE STATISTICS (Slave Statistics), [MSA CM750-1]. Nathan Cook, pages
19-21.
Researched and written by Rachel Frazier, 2010.
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