Editing Christiana, Pennsylvania (section)

==History==
[[File:Christiana PA Station.JPG|right|thumb|upright=1.1|The Christiana railroad depot constructed by the [[Pennsylvania Railroad]]]] Present-day Christiana was once known as Nobleville.<ref name=upenn>{{cite news |title=Penn Biographies: D. Hayes (David Hayes) Agnew (1818-1892) |url=http://www.archives.upenn.edu/people/1800s/agnew_d_hayes.html |author=<!--Staff writers, not stated--> |work=[[University of Pennsylvania]] |access-date=2015-08-07 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20151220171326/http://www.archives.upenn.edu/people/1800s/agnew_d_hayes.html |archive-date=2015-12-20 |url-status=dead }}</ref> The present name is after Christiana Noble, the wife of a first settler.<ref>{{cite book|last=Espenshade|first=Abraham Howry|title=Pennsylvania Place Names|url=https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=mdp.39015012934249&view=1up&seq=311|year=1925|publisher=Evangelical Press|isbn=978-0-8063-0416-8|page=307}}</ref>

On September 11, 1851, Christiana was the site of the Battle of Christiana (also called the [[Christiana Riot]]), in which the local residents defended with firearms a fugitive slave, killing the slaveowner. Southerners demanded the hanging of those responsible, who were accused of [[treason]] and making war on the United States, but after the first defendant was acquitted, the government dropped the case. The trial was the first nationally covered challenge to the [[Fugitive Slave Act of 1850]].<ref>[[James M. McPherson]], ''[[Battle Cry of Freedom: The Civil War Era]]'' (New York: Bantam Books, 1989), pp. 84-85.</ref>