Ever drive past a place a hundred times and think, "I wonder what the story is?" That's the case with St. Martin's Church. I've looked at this simple little church so many times and knew nothing about it... except that once my Aunt Ellen said it was haunted when I was a little girl.
I'm a sucker for architecture and history. After years of passing this building, I finally pulled a U-turn and stopped yesterday to check out the place and do some research! The church building is located off of Route 113 in Showell, MD.
The church was built around 1692 and the congregation prime was between 1750 and 1799. Currently, St. Martin's Church is closed for the season (they do tours in the Summer months - I'll have to check out the inside of the building then) but open for weddings, baptisms, vow renewals, and christenings. Sounds enchanting to me! How neat would it be to get married in a 1-room church built in the 1600's?
The original Flemish bond brick structure is original (to a renovation in 1764). The interior is preserved to accurately imitate the original. The windows were huge! Wavy, pressed glass that caught the beautiful rays of the afternoon sunset.
Oh, and no signs of the place being haunted. I was there for about a half-hour and nothing spooky happened. There are only 2 gravestones on the site and I'm sure that they have to be peaceful spirits if they were laid to rest at such a beautiful, rich site.
Glad that I finally stopped to check things out and do some investigating. I'm going to make myself some kind of local historian or something soon!
