The governor considered this an opportunity to fortify the borders of his territory on the Delmarva Peninsula against the pressing encroachment of the Virginians.

[3] The Royal Charter that Lord Baltimore had received from King Charles I in 1632 had granted Maryland the land north of the entire length of the Potomac River up to the 40th parallel.

Later surveys authorized by Baltimore on the Eastern Shore of the Chesapeake Bay indicated that the southern boundary would continue across the peninsula at the mouth of the Pocomoke River.

The Virginian Quakers settled just north of that point, on the southern bank of the Annemessex River in November 1662, A separate group of Anglican Virginian settlers were granted permission to make another settlement, further north along the Manokin River.

[4] In conjunction with the two new settlements, Lord Baltimore set up a three-man commission for the Eastern Shore territory, made up of two Marylanders and one Virginian.

Its purpose was ostensibly to oversee the territory, found new settlements, and maintain a detailed recording of all land and civic transactions in the area.

Lord Baltimore intended to use the commission to reinforce Maryland's claim to the area and to monitor any encroachments by Virginians.

The Assembly tried to secure the allegiance to Virginia of all settlers south of the Wicomico River – including the Annemessex and Manokin settlements.

[6] In early October 1663, a militia from Accomac County, Virginia led by a Colonel Edmund Scarborough arrived at the Annemessex settlement.

Scarborough was also on a personal mission to arrest Stephen Horsey (born on Isle of Wight, England and immigrated to Northampton, Virginia, 1643), the leader of the anti-tax movement and a vocal critic of the colonial government.

He along with fellow Northampton County residents William Coulborne, Randall Revell, and Ambrose Dixon signed the Tricesimo die Marty 1651.

Scarborough and his force of 40 mounted men reached Horsey's new residence on October 11, 1663, and presented the Commands of the Assembly of Virginia against him.

[10] Horsey sat as a regular member of the Somerset County Court through the winter and spring of 1666.

He traveled across the Chesapeake Bay in 1665 with Captain Thorne to meet with Charles Calvert, who swore them in as county commissioners.

Baltimore believed his Eastern Shore territory extended to the top of the peninsula, where the Delaware River meets the Bay.

Their compromise was to split the Delmarva Peninsula; however, they disagreed as to whether the boundary line should be drawn at the location of Cape Henlopen or at Fenwick Island.

The original settlers in the first two settlements were Quakers and Anglicans; and both groups continued to grow from ongoing immigration from the northern portions of the Virginia colony.

In the 1670s, Scottish and Irish Presbyterians began to immigrate to the county, some from Virginia, some from the British Isles.

In December 1680, a prominent member of the county and professed Anglican, William Stevens of Rehoboth settlement, sent a request to the Presbytery of Laggan in northern Ireland to consider sending a Presbyterian minister to Somerset county; and the first Presbyterian (Reformed) minister, Reverend Francis Makemie, arrived in early 1683, quickly followed by a growing list of additional Irish Presbyterian ministers and missionaries.

In 1689, the "Glorious Revolution" of 1688 in England resulted in the exile of the Roman Catholic King James II.

The "Protestant Revolution" of 1689 in Maryland overthrew the Roman Catholic government, resulting in the reversion of Lord Baltimore's proprietary charter.

The capital was moved from the Catholic stronghold at St. Mary's City in southern Maryland to the more central, newly renamed Annapolis on the western shore of the Chesapeake Bay, opposite Kent Island.

[13] For more than a century, the county and much of the colony were developed by planters, with the labor of enslaved Africans, for tobacco as a commodity crop.

After the defeat of the French Empire at the hands of the Seventh Coalition in July 1815, emperor Napoleon I sought to flee to the United States to escape imprisonment.

They intermarried with colonists, including white indentured servants, and African and African-American enslaved workers.

In the late 20th century, many groups of Native American began to reorganize, noting their community continuity.

In 2012, it was one of only a handful of Southern counties to switch from the Republican McCain to the Democratic Obama,[31] though in 2016 it swung strongly in favor of Donald Trump.

If Gerald Ford, who was never elected president, is not counted as an incumbent, this streak can be traced back to 1948 (Trump in 2020, Obama in 2012, Bush in 2004, Clinton in 1996, H.W.