In December 1794 the General Assembly of Maryland created Washington Parish for the new Federal City and George-Town. Its first vestry was elected on May 25, 1795, and chose the Rev. George Ralph as its first rector that same day. Washington Parish tells how a colonial mission on the Eastern Branch became a parish whose first members included builders of the capital and craftsmen of the Navy Yard. They went to church with their lodges on the feasts of St. John, built Christ Church on lots given for it and founded the burial ground now known as the Congressional Cemetery. A new chapter follows the church on G Street from Robert Alexander's plan of 1806 to its listing in the National Register of Historic Places in 1969, using the drawings and photographs of the Historic American Buildings Survey. The history is followed by the documentary record, printed in full. This is the manuscript history of the parish by the Rev. Ethan Allen, D.D., its rector from 1823 to 1830. Tables of places, vestries, pews and clergy, a chronology, a biographical register and a guide to the records for genealogists complete the book.