Brandywine Village
Brandywine Village was one of the most important 18th century milling
centers in the Mid-Atlantic colonies. Today there remains a block
of Brandywine blue rock 18th-century houses and brick and stone buildings.
For walking tour information contact Greater Brandywine Village at
(302)-571-9050
Dr. James Thatcher, a prominent local physician, wrote that
Brandywine Village had "8 very large and valuable stone mills where
an immense quantity of wheat is ground & bolted. The wheat is brought
in vessels to the very door, and the flour taken off in return."
Members of prominent 18th-century families in Brandywine Village
and the surrounding area -- the Marshalls, the Tatnalls and the Leas
-- built the beautiful stone houses on Market Street. They came into
their greatest period of prosperity during the Revolutionary War when,
after the Battle of Brandywine (September 11, 1777), Quaker miller
Joseph Tatnall became the chief supplier of flour for the Continental Army.
Joseph Tatnall has been called Delaware’s first great industrialist.
As early as 1774 a thriving trade was being carried on between Brandywine Village
and the West Indies. Tatnall’s support of the Continental forces
led to his lifelong friendship with Generals George Washington, Lafayette
and Anthony Wayne.
On August 24, 1781, French supply officers, who were preparing for the march
to Yorktown, Virginia, began to enter Delaware. On this date French guineas
(seven of them) show up for the first time in James Lea’s account book
in Brandywine Village, paying for corn meal supplied by a William Brown.
The entry adds, "44 bushels left. I am to sell to French Army.
The cash to be paid to Samuel Baker in Second Street."
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