I am very interested in meeting or at least talking to you. I work for the National Park Service's National Underground Railroad Network to Freedom Program. I am anxious to identify sites associated with African Americans who sought freedom from enslavement (by going to the British) during the War of 1812. So far I only know of a site associated with Jefferson Patterson Park and Museum in Calvert Co. My phone number is 202-690-5166. I am based in National Capital Parks-East in Anacostia which manages Fort Washington and Piscataway Park among other sites in Prince George's County, MD. John Weiss <john.weiss@VIRGI To: [log in to unmask] N.NET> cc: (bcc: Jenny Masur/NACE/NPS) Sent by: Subject: Corps of Colonial Marines, War of 1812 Discussion of research and writing about Virginia history <[log in to unmask] LIB.VA.US> 09/02/2004 02:44 PM CET Please respond to Discussion of research and writing about Virginia history During the several years that I have been researching the Black refugees of the War of 1812 and the Corps of Colonial Marines, I have received welcome and generous help from various members of this list (and others, hence some cross-posting). I shall be in the US for a two-week visit in October, including a symposium in Baltimore, and I hope for some opportunity of meeting e-mail acquaintances during that time, between October 6 and 18. On Saturday 9 October my paper entitled 'Against Their Old Masters: Britain's Corps of Colonial Marines' opens the Eighth National War of 1812 Symposium, and I have posted information on the symposium, on behalf of the organizers, at www.mcnish-weiss.co.uk/symposium.html. Also while in Maryland, I plan further work at the National Archives at College Park with my wife Althea McNish (whose ancestor Polydore McNish was one of the Colonial Marines, recruited in Georgia) and we hope to visit sites of British landings (and Black escape) in the Patuxent river. I look forward to hearing from anyone on the list with whom we might make contact during our stay, 6-18 October, and I can then discuss details of our itinerary and contact points. John Weiss Independent scholar, London Black Freedom Fighters of the War of 1812 www.mcnish-weiss.co.uk/colonialmarines.html To subscribe, change options, or unsubscribe, please see the instructions at http://listlva.lib.va.us/archives/va-hist.html To subscribe, change options, or unsubscribe, please see the instructions at http://listlva.lib.va.us/archives/va-hist.html