Downsville, MD

Downsville is an unincorporated census-designated place in southwestern Washington County, Maryland. The 2020 census counted 341 people. Maryland Route 63 and Downsville Pike meet here southeast of Williamsport and southwest of Hagerstown, with farms and scattered homes filling the road grid. The Potomac River lies about two miles south, so the community's orientation is split between a crossroads inland and the river valley just beyond it. That distance is short enough for the river landscape to shape local bearings without turning Downsville into a waterfront settlement.

That short trip south reaches the Chesapeake and Ohio Canal National Historical Park, the Big Slackwater viewpoint, Dam 4, and the old McMahon's Mill area. The canal once used dams and feeder structures to carry water and freight along the Potomac, and the towpath now provides the area's walking and cycling line. Downsville's own gathering place is the Ruritan park, with a picnic shelter and baseball diamond. It is a small farm-and-road community, but the river, canal, and highway give the name a much larger local map.