mentioned, the nineteenth century saw “gunning clubs” developed and refined by gentlemen whose own bloodlines ran to Maryland’s most prominent families. In Maryland history, Charles Carrolls are beyond number, but in 1783 Charles “The Barrister” expanded his island holdings at the mouth of the Gunpowder River with a tract he named the Shooting Ground. So, obviously, wildfowling was popular on Carroll’s Island decades before Sailor and Canton landed in Maryland. About the time of their rescue, a sportsmen’s club developed on the island that is credited with honing the retrieving skills of the pair’s progeny. The Carroll’s Island Wild Fowl
Shooting Club, which had hunting rights on the island pre-1833, became especially noted for developing the breed that became recognized as Chesapeake Bay Retrievers. In the introduction to C. John Sullivan’s Chesapeake Retrievers, Decoys and Long Guns, J. Fife Symington, Jr. speaks of these “noble animals” and the “reverence that early sportsmen held for these dogs.” Reverence is hardly an overstatement. Meticulous records survive of dog breeding on Carroll’s Island and in similar clubs ringing the upper Bay, records reminiscent of the Biblical Begats. Opinions differ as to whether Sailor and Canton were the same breed as Newfoundlands known
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