Talk:Slaughter Beach, Delaware

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The town of Slaughter Beach located at 38°55'3" North, 75°18'29" West in Sussex County Delaware is a small beach front community consisting of 524 residents.

To the East is the Delaware Bay and to the west is the Primehook National Wildlife refuge. The town is located on one primary road, Bay Avenue. Homes are either bay front or have views of the protected wetlands. Many of the homes have views of both. Nature lovers will enjoy the yearly migration of shorebirds such as wood duck, black duck, and snow geese. Heron and Eagles are yearly residents. The marsh lands are also home to Deer, Raccoon, and the endangered Delmarva Fox Squirrel.

Slaughter beach is one of the most important breeding grounds for the horseshoe crab. In 2004 over 250,000 Horseshoe crabs spawned on slaughter beach. The town recently adopted the horseshoe crab as its official town symbol and can be seen on the towns “welcome” signs as you drive down the main street. Slaughter Beach is home to the only wooden frame lighthouse still standing in Delaware. The lighthouse is located at the mouth of the Mispillion River and Cedar Creek.

There are at least two stories of where the towns name came from:

The first is that it was named after William Slaughter, A local postmaster in the mid 1800's

The second story claims “the name came from the horseshoe crabs that wash up on shore and die each year. They come near shore to shallow water to lay their eggs and the low tide strands them leaving them to die, thus the "slaughter."

Slaughter Beach Real Estate Home prices range from the high 300's to well over a million.

Naming
I would be more inclined to believe the story that Slaughter Beach was named after William Slaughter than the Horseshoe crab idea. Slaughter is a not-unknown surname in Sussex, UK, (the surname is a lot more common in Sussex than anywhere else in the UK). Indeed, I myself have the surname Slaughter, and all my ancestors with the surname Slaughter as far back as I can trace have lived in Sussex.

Slaffter (talk) 10:37, 17 August 2012 (UTC)