, Rev. Andrew J. Sutton, came the Civil War, depriving the
college of its Southern constituency and distracting men's minds from
learning. After the Rebellion, an unfortunate selection of teachers and
laxness of discipline caused the college to lose still more ground, and
Wm. J. Rivers, Principal from 1873 to 1887, had much to do to build it
up again. He was a faithful and diligent teacher, and under him the
moral tone of the college was improved and the course of instruction
enlarged. The present head, C.W. Reid, Ph.D., is still further advancing
the cause of the institution and a new career of prosperity seems
opening before Maryland's oldest college and the only one on the Eastern
Shore of the Chesapeake Bay.

St. John's College, like its sister institution, founded on a
non-denominational basis, started out under even fairer auspices.[9] It
was granted, by the State, Governor Bladen's mansion and four acres of
land surrounding it, was made heir to the funds of King William's
School, and secured L9,000 from private beneficence in the first two
years of its history. The Bladen mansion, now known as McDowell Hall,
was repaired and enlarged and, on August 11, 1789, Bishop Carroll was
elected president of the Board of Visitors and Governors and Dr. John
McDowell accepted the Professorship of Mathematics. After unsuccessful
attempts to obtain a principal from England, Dr. McDowell was chosen to
that position in the following year and continued in office, until the
State withdrew its aid to the college in 1805. He was a man of great
learning and was very successful at St. John's and later at the
University of Pennsylvania as provost. Under him, St. John's flourished
greatly and many men of a national reputation were enrolled among its
students, from the time the first class graduated in 1793.

The same disaster fell on St. John's, as on Washington College. The
Legislature withdrew the annual grant given by the State. The same doubt
as to the constitutionality of this withdrawal existed here, and the
State confirmed its position in the same way, by increasing its
appropriation in 1832,[10] on condition of the college's accepting it in
full satisfaction of all claims against the State under the original
charter. Of late years Maryland has been quite generous to St. John's,
but it has never quite recovered the station and prestige it lost by the
taking away of the State's grant in 1805.

In the first despair over the Act of