“…Every praise was due to him; the city being threatened, it became the duty of the citizens to be foremost in its defense. He claims the honor, and its brave officers and men under his command hailed with delight the opportunity of meeting the enemy’s attack…” Division Orders, September 19, 1814.
He was the son Colonel George Stricker (1832-1810) a Revolutionary War officer born on February 15, 1759 in Frederick, Maryland. During the revolution he served in General William Smallwood’s’ First Maryland Regiment at the battles of Brandywine, Monmouth, and Princeton.
On August 28, 1807, he was commissioned a brigadier general of the Maryland Militia and commanded the Third Brigade of Baltimore City of the Third Division of the Maryland Militia. On September 11, 1814, Stricker led the Third Brigade and other militia from Pennsylvania and western Maryland to meet the British on what would be the Battle of North Point the following afternoon. He commanded 3,200 militia to confront the 4500 British veterans troops approaching Baltimore. In a two hour battle the Americans, under heavy fire and a flanking movement by the British withdrew steadily to Baltimore. On September 15th General Stricker wrote his official account of the battle.
General Stricker resigned his militia commission on November 10, 1814 and resumed his merchant career and became president of the Bank of Baltimore in 1824 until his death on June 23, 1825. He was buried in Westminister Burying Grounds in downtown Baltimore.
Source: Easton Republican Star, April 20, 1814 and January 25, 1825; “General John Stricker,” by John Stricker, Jr.” Maryland Historical Magazine, September 1914, vol. 9, No. 3), 209-218.
Maryland in the War of 1812 
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