Benjamin Latrobe

Benjamin Henry Boneval Latrobe was a British neoclassical subject and trained architect there in England who emigrated to the new United States and is best known for his design of the United States Capitol, on "Capitol Hill" in Washington, D.C., along with his additional later work on the Old Baltimore Cathedral/The Baltimore Basilica,. The first Roman Catholic Cathedral constructed in the United States, was built on "Cathedral Hill" along Cathedral Street, between West Franklin and West Mulberry Streets in the future Mount Vernon-Belvedere neighborhood, then known as "Howard's Woods", a part of the country estate of "Belvidere" of American Revolutionary War hero and commander of the famed "Maryland Line" regiments of the Continental Army, Col. John Eager Howard, who owned and donated much of the land north of Baltimore Town. The new Catholic Cathedral site was north of and overlooking the city's downtown business district and the "harbor basin" of the Patapsco River.