Brownsville, MD

Brownsville is an unincorporated community and census-designated place in Washington County, Maryland, United States, near Gapland in an area known as Pleasant Valley. The 2010 census counted 89 residents. Tobias Brown, son of Rudolph Brown, was one of the first settlers of Washington County, and owned a tract of farmland extending from Gapland, south to the future location of Brownsville. John Brown, son of Tobias, and his son Cornelius established a tannery in the swamp land at the head of a small tributary to Israel Creek, and built a home on the east side of the valley overlooking the tannery. A newcomer can read Brownsville through the overlap of its older landmarks, surrounding geography, and current places. For a newcomer, Brownsville comes into focus through those concrete links among its past, landscape, and current routines.