CHAPTER XXXVII.

WILLIAM HOOPER-JOSEPH HEWES-JOHN PENN.

WILLIAM HOOPER was born in Boston, Massachusetts, on the seventeenth day of June, 1742. His father was a Scotchman, and a graduate of the University of Edinburgh. Soon after leaving that institution, he emigrated to America, and fixed his residence at Boston, where he was married. William was his first born, and he paid particular attention to his preparation for a collegiate course. He was placed under the charge of Mr. Lovell, then one of the most eminent instructors in the colony of Massachusetts Bay. Having completed his preparatory studies, William was entered a pupil at Harvard University, where he remained a close and industrious student for three years, and in 1760 he graduated with distinguished honors. His father designed him for the clerical profession, but as he evinced a decided preference for the bar, he was placed as a student in the office of the celebrated James Otis. On the completion of his studies, perceiving that the profession was quite full of practitioners in Massachusetts, he went to North Carolina, where many of his Scotch relations resided, and began business in that province in 1767. Mr. Hooper formed a circle of very polished acquaintances there, and he soon became highly esteemed among the literary men of the prov

ince. He rose rapidly in his profession, and in a very short time he stood at the head of the bar in that region. He was greatly esteemed by the officers of the government; and his success in the management of several causes, in which the government was his client, gave him much influence.

When, in 1770-71, an insurrectionary movement was set on foot by a party of people termed the "Regulators," Mr. Hooper took sides with the government, and advised and assisted Governor Tryon in all his measures to suppress the rebellion. For this, he was branded as a royalist; and even when he openly advo

* This movement of the "Regulators," has been viewed in quite opposing lights; one party regarding them as only a knot of low-minded malcontents, who had every thing to gain and nothing to lose, and who hoped, by getting up an excitement, to secure something for themselves in the general scramble. This was the phase in which they appeared to Mr. Hooper, and thus regarding them, he felt it his duty to oppose them and maintain good order in the State. Others viewed them as patriots, impelled to action by a strong sense of wrong and injustice, the author of which was Governor Tryon, whose oppressive and cruel acts, even his partisans could not deny. From all the lights we have upon the subject, we cannot but view the movement as a truly patriotic one, and kindred to those which subsequently took place in Massachusetts and Virginia, when Boston harbor was made a tea-pot, and Patrick Henry drove the royal governor Dunmore from the province of Virginia. Governor Tryon was a tyrant of the darkest hue, for he commingled, with his oppression, acts of the grossest immorality and wanton cruelty. Although the "Regulators "" were men moving in the common walks of life, (and doubtless many vagabonds enrolled themselves among them), yet the rules of government they adopted, the professions they made, and the practices they exhibited, all bear the impress of genuine patriotism; and we cannot but regard the blood shed on the occasion by the infamous Tryon, as the blood of the early martyrs of our Revolution.

cated the cause of the patriots, he was for a time viewed with some suspicions lest his professions were unreal. But those who knew him best, knew well how strongly and purely burned that flame of patriotism which his zealous instructor, Mr. Otis, had lighted in his bosom; and his consistent course in public life, attested his sincerity. Mr. Hooper began his legislative labors in 1773, when he was elected a member of the Provincial Assembly of North Carolina, for the town of Wilmington. The next year he was returned a member for the county of Hanover; and from his first entrance into public life, he sympathized with the oppressed. This sympathy lead him early to oppose the court party in the State; and so vigorous was his opposition, that he was soon designated by the royalists as the leader of their enemies, and became very obnoxious to them. The proposition of Massachusetts for a General Congress was hailed with joy in North Carolina, and a convention of the people was called in the summer of 1774, to take the matter into consideration. The convention met in Newbern, and after passing resolutions approving of the call, they appointed William Hooper their first delegate to the Continental Congress. Although younger than a large majority of the members, he was placed upon two of the most important committees in that body, whose business it was to arrange and propose measures for action-a duty which required talents and judgment of the highest order. Mr. Hooper was again elected to Congress in 1775, and was chairman of the committee which drew up an address to the Assembly of the island of Jamaica. This address was from his pen, and was a clear and able exposition of the existing difficulties between Great Britain

and her American Colonies. He was again returned a member in 1776,* and was in his seat in time to vote for the Declaration of Independence. He affixed his signature to it, on the second of August following. He was actively engaged in Congress until March, 1777, when the derangement of his private affairs, and the safety of his family, caused him to ask for and obtain leave of absence, and he returned home. Like all the others who signed the Declaration of Independence, Mr. Hooper was peculiarly obnoxious to the British; and on all occasions they used every means in their power to possess his person, harass his family, and destroy his estate. When the storm of the Revolution subsided, and the sun-light of peace beamed forth, he resumed the practice of his profession, and did not again appear in public life until 1786, when he was appointed by Congress, one of the judges of the federal court established to adjudicate in the matter of a dispute about territorial jurisdiction, between Massachusetts and New York. The cause was finally settled by commissioners, and not brought before that court at all. Mr. Hooper now withdrew from public life, for he felt that

He was at home for some time during the spring of that year, attending two different Conventions that met at North Carolina, one at Hillsborough, the seat of the Provincial Congress, the other at Halifax. The Convention at the former place put forth an address to the people of Great Britain. This address was written by Mr. Hooper; and we take occasion here to remark, that as early as the twentieth of May, 1775, a convention of the Committees of Safety of North Carolina met at Charlotte Court House, in Mecklenburg County, and by a series of resolutions, declared themselves free and independent of the British Crown; to the support of which, they pledged their lives, their fortunes, and their sacred honor.

a fatal disease was upon him. He died at Hillsborough in October, 1790, aged forty-eight years.

JOSEPH HEWES.-The parents of JOSEPH HEWES were natives of Connecticut, and belonged to the Society of Friends, or Quakers. Immediately after their marriage they moved to New Jersey, and purchased a small farm at Kingston, within a short distance of Princeton. It was there that Joseph was born, in the year 1730. He was educated at the college in Princeton, and at the close of his studies he was apprenticed to a merchant in Philadelphia, to qualify him for a commercial life. On the termination of his apprenticeship, his father furnished him with a little money capital, to which he added the less fleeting capital of a good reputation, and he commenced mercantile business on his own account. His business education had been thorough, and he pursued the labors of commerce with such skill and success, that in a few years he amassed an ample fortune. At the age of thirty years, Mr. Hewes moved to North Carolina, and settled in Edenton, which became his home for life. He entered into business there, and his uprightness and honorable dealings soon won for him the profound esteem of the people. While yet a comparative stranger among them, they evinced their appreciation of his character, by electing him a member of the Legislature of North Carolina, in 1763, and so faithfully did he discharge his duties, that they re-elected him several consecutive years. Mr. Hewes was among the earliest of the decided patriots of North Carolina, and used his influence in bringing about a Convention of the people of the State, to second the call of Massachusetts for a General Congress. The convention that met in the