Fell’s Point was founded in 1726 by William Fell, a shipbuilder from England. Baltimore’s original deep-water port for over a century, Fell’s Point shipbuilders developed the famed Baltimore Clippers, built two of the first ships in the US Navy, the USS Constellation and the USS Enterprise, and financed the “privateers” that helped win the War of 1812.
Privateers were privately owned warships, authorized by the US government, to raid and capture enemy ships.
The Chasseur (right) built by Thomas Kemp was one of the largest and most successful privateers in the War of 1812 under Captain Thomas Boyle. After the war, many other Baltimore schooners ended up as slavers or outright pirate ships, but the Chasseur became a successful Chinese Trader because of her speed and size. (Photo courtesy of its artist, Torsten Kruse)
In the 1960's, Baltimore planned to demolish the heart of Fell's Point to build an expressway. The Preservation society was founded to defeat the proposal and save Fell's Point and Federal Hill.
Baltimore's oldest surviving urban residence (~1765), the Robert Long House was restored in the 1970's by the Preservation Society.
In the 1980's and earlier, before Broadway Pier was rebuilt, it was home to a police station.
The Levering Coffee House, built in ~1806, was restored in 2003-2006 by the Living Classrooms Foundation as the Frederick Douglass - Isaac Meyers Maritime Park.
