RETURN JOHNATHAN
MEIGS, SR.
colonel Revolutionary War; born Middletown Connecticut December 1740.
Died Cherokee Agency Tennessee January 28, 1823. Immediately after the battle of Lexington, he marched
a company of light infantry to Cambridge; with the rank of major accompanied Arnold to Quebec, and upon
it attack by Montgomery, December 31, 1775, was made a prisoner; exchanged in 1776; and in 1777, having
raised a regiment was promoted to colonel; May 23 1777, he performed a brilliant exploit at Sag Harbor,
for which Congress (August 7) voted him thanks and a sword; he commanded a regiment at the storming of
Stony Point, July 16 1779; and served to the end of the war. In 1788 he was appointed commissioner of
clothing under General Wayne, 1795; and in 1801 was appointed by President Thomas Jefferson agent for
Indian Affairs; from the Indians he received the sobriquet of “The White Path.” His Journal
of the Expedition to Quebec (September 9 1775-Janaury 1 1776) is in the American Remembrancer for
1776 and was printed, with an Introduction and Notes by C. I. Bushnell, NY 1864.
Bibliography
Dictionary of American Biography, Boston; James R. Osgood and Company, 1876, p. 614
RETURN JOHNATHAN
MEIGS, JR.
, a Senator from Ohio; born in Middletown Connecticut,
November 17, 1764; graduated from Yale College in 1785; studied law; was admitted to the bar
and commenced practice in Marietta, Washington County, Ohio (then known as the Northwest
Territory), in 1788; participated in the Indian fighting of that period; appointed territorial judge
1798; member, territorial legislature 1799; chief justice of the Ohio supreme court 1803-1804;
brevetted colonel in the United States Army and commanded in the St. Charles district in
Louisiana 1804-1806; judge of the supreme court of Louisiana 1805-1806; judge of the United
States District Court for the Territory of Michigan 1807-1808; returned to Ohio and was elected
Governor in 1808 but declared ineligible because of his prolonged absence from the State;
elected as a Republican to the United States Senate to fill the vacancy caused by the resignation
of John Smith; reelected in 1809 and served from December 12, 1808 until he resigned, having
been elected Governor, on or before December 8, 1810; Governor of Ohio 1810-1814;
Postmaster General in the administrations of Presidents James Madison and James Monroe 1814-1823; died
in Marietta, Ohio, March 29, 1825; interment in Mound Cemetery.
Bibliography
American National Biography; Dictionary of American Biography.
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