JONATHAN

See also:

• TRUMBULL, JAMES HAMMOND (1821-1897)
• TRUMBULL, JOHN (1750-1831)
• TRUMBULL, JOHN (1756-1843)
• JONATHAN TRUMBULL (1710-1785)
• TRUMBULL, LYMAN (1813-1896)

TRUMBULL (1710-1785)  , American political leader, was born at Lebanon, Connecticut, on the 12th of October 1710 . He graduated at Harvard in 1727, and began the study of theology, but in 1731 engaged in business with his father . He next studied law, was elected to the Assembly in 1773, and held public office almost continuously afterward . He served for seven years in the Assembly, being Speaker for three years, for seventeen years as county judge of Windham county, for twenty-two years (after 1740) as governor's assistant, for two years as deputy-governor (1767-1769), and for three years (1766-1769) as chief justice of the colony . In 1769 he was elected governor and continued in office until his voluntary retirement in 1784 . During the War of Independence he was a valued counsellor of Washington . The story that the term " Brother Jonathan," a sobriquet for the United States, originated in Washington's familiar form of addressing him seems to be without any foundation . After the war Trumbull was a strong Federalist . He died in Lebanon on the 17th of August 1785 His public papers have been printed in the Massachusetts Historical Society's Collections, 5th series, vols. ix.-x . (Boston, 1885-1888), and 7th series, vols. ii.-iii . (1902) . See I.W .

Stuart, Life of Jonathan Trumbull, sen . (Boston, 1859) . His son JONATHAN (1740-1809) graduated at Harvard in 1759, served in the War of Independence as paymaster-general of the northern department in 1775-1778 and as a military secretary of Washington in 1778-1783, and was a member of the national House of Representatives in 1789-1795, serving as Speaker in 1791-1793, and of the United States Senate in 1795-1796; he was lieutenant-governor of Connecticut in 1796-1798, and governor in 1798-1809 . Another son, JosEPH (1737-1778), was a member of the first Continental Congress (1774-1775), became commissary-general of stores of the Continental army in July 1775 and commissary-general of purchases in June 1777, resigned in August 1777, and from November 1777 to April 1778 was commissioner for the board of war . A grandson of the first Jonathan, JOSEPH (1782-1861), was a Whig representative in Congress in 1834-1835 and in 1839-1843, and was governor of Connecticut in 1849-1850 .