Central Figures

Two militia captains were among the 150 or so colonists who disembarked March 25, 1634, to form the first European settlement in what would become Maryland.

Although all able-bodied males were obligated to serve in the militia, the captains also called upon volunteers to establish a professional armed force known as the "trained bands."

As the colony grew, so did its militia. These militiamen not only guarded the colony against Indian raids, but also sometimes fought each other.

When civil war broke out in England in 1642, Maryland was deeply affected. Fighting between royalists and parliamentarians in Maryland dragged on intermittently for nearly 20 years.

Other European conflicts affected the colony. The Seven Years V&r was also fought in North America, where it was known as the French and Indian \\for. Maryland militiamen fought alongside the British during the struggle, which lasted from 1756 to 1763.

But relations between the colonies and mother country soon soured. The American Revolution found numerous Maryland militia units serving with George Washington's Continental Army.

At the Battle of Long Island in 1776, the "Maryland 400" gained immortality by making repeated bayonet charges against a vastly superior British force, thereby saving the Continental Army and probably the entire cause.

The Maryland Line, as the Maryland regiments later came to be collectively known, went on to fight in both the northern and southern campaigns of the Revolutionary War.

The Red Coats Again

The WJT of 1812 provided the setting for one of Maryland's greatest battlefield victories. Militiamen were routed at the Battle of Bladensburg on Aug. 24, 1814, only to redeem themselves three weeks later at the Battle of North Point near Baltimore.

The British commander, Gen. Robert Ross, had confidently declared, "I will take Baltimore if it rains militia." But by the time the smoke cleared, the British advance had been frustrated and Ross lay dead, shot down by two Maryland riflemen, Daniel Wells and Henry McComas.

Coupled with Fort McHenry's defense of the port the next evening, the victory successfully defended Baltimore, which bolstered the confidence of the American people and directly contributed to the ending of the War of 1812.

Over the next few decades, however, the militia suffered from serious neglect and many units dwindled in size.

In 1859, Maryland militiamen were among the troops that cornered abolitionist John Brown in Harpers Ferry, W Va. The incident would help spark a far bloodier conflict: the Civil War.

A border state with strong southern sympathies, Maryland nonetheless remained with the Union when war broke out in April 1861. But the sons of Maryland fought on both sides. Many Maryland militiamen went south to join the Confederates, while other units remained loyal to the Union.

The fratricidal nature of the war was illustrated May 23, 1862, when the Confederate 1st Maryland fought the Union 1st Maryland at Front Royal, Va.

Following the war, veterans from both sides took the lead in forming volunteer militia units. Although militia service was initially popular, a kck of government support frustrated many members of what was now known as the National Guard. Soon the force had shrunk to little more than two under-strength regiments.

It probably took an act of civil unrest to save the Maryland Guard from oblivion. In the summer of 1887, a railroad strike turned violent. The Guard was called in to restore order. For three days, the troops were besieged in Baltimore's Camden Station by 15,000 rioters. But in the riot's aftermath, the Guard's prestige soared and new recruits joined in droves.

By the end of the century, a number of new units had formed, including the Monumental City Guards, an all-black unit organized in Baltimore in 1879. Maryland also gained its first Naval Militia forces when a naval battalion was organized in 1896.

In 1904, Guardsmen were again called out to help maintain order after the Baltimore Fire gutted the city's downtown district. They also s*aw action in Texas in response to Pancho Villa's crossborder raids in 1916.

Over There

Maryland Guardsmen were early participants in World War I. Soon after the United States entered the war, officials mobilized the force to prevent sabotage on the home front and deployed the 117th Trench Mortar Battalion to France, where it participated in nearly every major campaign.

Much of the Guard was not long behind. The 1st, 4th and 5th Maryland regiments were combined to form the 115th Infantry, which served as part of the newly created 29th Division and fought in Alsace and the Meuse-Argonne.

The all-black Monumental City Guards, now known as the 1st Separate Company, served with great distinction as pan of the 372nd Infantry, earning the French Croix de Guerre with Palm for its valor in action. The Naval Militia was also mobilized, serving aboard the battleship USS Missouri during the war.

At the end of the "war to end all wars," the demobilized Guardsmen were discharged en masse and the Maryland force had to be reformed from scratch. As a result, the post-war Maryland Guard was substantially smaller than before.

One area where the Guard did expand was in the nascent field of aviation. In 1921, Maryland formed one the nation's first post-war flying units with the creation of the 104th Observation Squadron in Baltimore. But with economic troubles at home during the Great Depression, military preparedness received scant attention.

The outbreak of fighting in Europe in 1939 changed this outlook, and in February 1941, the entire Maryland Guard mobilized for a year of intense training. With the attack on Pearl Harbor that December, the call-up became "for the duration."

As part of the 29th Division, Marylanders took part in the D-Day landings of June 1944 and fought their way across France, Holland and Germany to link up with the Russians at the Elbe River.

During the war, the division suffered one of the highest casualty rates of any U.S. division. The running joke in France was that Maj. Gen. Charles H. Gerhardt, the division commander, had three divisions: one in the field, one in the hospital and one in the cemetery.

The still-segregated 1st Separate Company was again assigned to the 372nd Infantry and became the only Maryland Guard unit to serve in the Pacific, while the 104th Observation Squadron flew anti-submarine patrols along the East Coast. The Naval Militia was also mobilized, although it would not be re-established after the war.

Back Home

Following the allied victory in 1945, the U.S. military was nearly totally demobilized. From 1946 to 1948, dozens of Maryland Guard units were reorganized and gained federal recognition. Among these was the 104th Fighter Squadron, which became the Guard's first post-war flying unit. Another was the 1st Separate Company, now known as the 231st Transportation Truck Battalion.

When war broke out on the Korean Peninsula in 1950, the two companies of the 231st became the first Guard units to arrive in Korea.

While in Korea, the unit-along with the rest of the Army-was desegregated by order of President Truman. Ironically, the unit would become segregated again when it returned to Guard control. It would not be finally and permanently integrated until later in the 1950s.

Although no other Maryland Guard units saw action in Korea, or later in Vietnam, the Guard was far from inactive. During the late 1950s and early 1960s, the 104th Fighter Squadron became a fighter-interceptor squadron with a mission of defending the Baltimore-Washington region against a Soviet bomber attack.

The Maryland Army Guard's 70th Anti-Aircraft Artillery Regiment did the same from the ground. The unit initially had World War II-era anti-aircraft guns, but soon upgraded to Nike-Ajax surfaceto-air missiles.

By the time the unit ceased operation in the 1970s, it was armed with nucleartipped Nike-Hercules missiles at air defense sites across the state.

The Cold War brought other changes, including expansions in unconventional warfare units. Maryland became one of the first states to have a Guard Special Forces unit when Company B, 16th Special Forces Group stood up in 1963. This complemented the Maryland Air Guard's 135th Air Commando Group, which was created in 1955.

Meanwhile, the Maryland Guard became a frequent presence on the streets. Racial tensions in Cambridge, Md., kept the Guard on duty there for much of the 1960s. Likewise, repeated anti-war unrest at the University of Maryland resulted in multiple deployments to the campus outside of Washington, D.C., into the 1970s.

And when rioting erupted in Baltimore following Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s assassination in April 1968, officials called out nearly the entire force.

In response to Iraq's 1990 invasion of neighboring Kuwait, officials mobilized several Maryland Guard units, some of which deployed to the Middle East. Following the first Persian Gulf War, Maryland Air Guard units deployed repeatedly to enforce U.N. sanctions against Iraq. In addition, Maryland Army Guard units served on peacekeeping duty in Bosnia and Kosovo.

The Sept. 11 terror attacks had an almost immediate impact on the Maryland Guard. Within 24 hours, the 115th Military Police Battalion was helping to secure the Pentagon. Elements of the unit would later serve in Iraq and Afghanistan and at the detention facility on the Navy base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

The ongoing war on terror has brought the Maryland Guard's most sustained call-ups since World War II. Nearly every unit in the state has served overseas. From 2007 to 2008, elements of the 58th Brigade Combat Team deployed to Iraq in the state's largest single mobilization since 1968 and its largest combat deployment since World War II.

And for most of the war on terror, a Marylander has been the National Guard's senior officer, Lt. Gen. H Steven Blum, a former 29th commander who is now the National Guard Bureau chief.

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