Share Bookmark
Richard Stockton

Richard Stockton

Male 1730 - 1781  (50 years)    Has 15 ancestors and 10 descendants in this family tree.

Personal Information    |    Notes    |    All

  • Name Richard Stockton 
    Birth 1 Oct 1730  Morven, Princeton, New Jersey, USA Find all individuals with events at this location 
    Gender Male 
    Prominent People Founding Father USA 
    Death 28 Feb 1781  Princeton Find all individuals with events at this location 
    Burial Quaker Meeting House Cemetery, Stony Brook Find all individuals with events at this location 
    Siblings 2 Siblings 
    Person ID I363605  Geneagraphie
    Links To This person is also Richard Stockton (Continental Congressman) at Wikipedia 
    Last Modified 23 Nov 2016 

    Father John Stockton,   b. 1701   d. 1758 (Age 57 years) 
    Mother Abigail Phillips   d. Yes, date unknown 
    Family ID F144069  Group Sheet  |  Family Chart

    Family Annis Boudinot,   b. 1 Jul 1736   d. 6 Feb 1801 (Age 64 years) 
    Children 
    +1. Julia Stockton   d. Yes, date unknown
     2. Mary Stockton
     3. Susan Stockton
    +4. Richard Stockton,   b. 17 Apr 1764   d. 7 Mar 1828 (Age 63 years)
     5. Lucius Horatio Stockton,   b. 1765   d. May 26, 1835 (Age 70 years)
     6. Abigail Stockton
    Family ID F144082  Group Sheet  |  Family Chart
    Last Modified 23 Nov 2016 

  • Notes 
    • After a preparatory education at West Nottingham Academy, in Rising Sun, Maryland, he graduated in 1748 from the College of New Jersey (later Princeton University), then in Newark but relocated eight years later at Princeton. In 1754 he completed an apprenticeship with a Newark lawyer and joined the bar. The next year, he wed poetess Annis Boudinot, by whom he had two sons and four daughters. By the mid-1760's he was recognized as one of the ablest lawyers in the Middle Colonies.
      Like his father a patron of the College of New Jersey, in 1766 Stockton sailed on its behalf to Scotland to recruit the Reverend John Witherspoon for the presidency. Aiding in this endeavor, complicated by the opposition to Witherspoon's wife, was Benjamin Rush, a fellow alumnus then enrolled at the University of Edinburgh. In 1768, the year after Stockton's departure, Witherspoon finally accepted.
      Stockton resumed his law practice, spending his spare hours at Morven breeding choice cattle and horses, collecting art objects, and expanding his library. Yet, though he had some time before expressed disinterest in public life, in 1768 he began a 6-year term on the Executive Council of New Jersey and then sat on the Provincial Supreme Court (1774-1776).
      Stockton became associated with the Revolutionary movement during its initial stages. In 1764 he advocated American representation in Parliament, but during the Stamp Act crisis the next year questioned its right to control the Colonies at all. By 1774, though dreading the possibility of war, he was espousing colonial self-rule under the Crown. Elected to Congress two years later, he voted for independence and signed the Declaration of Independence. That same year he met with defeat in a bid for the New Jersey Governorship, but rejected the chance to become first Chief Justice of the state Supreme Court to remain in Congress.
      Late in 1776 fate turned against Stockton. In November, while inspecting the northern Continental Army in upper New York State with fellow Congressman George Clymer, Stockton hurried home when he learned of the British invasion of New Jersey and removed his family to a friend's home in Monmouth County. While he was there, Loyalists informed the British who captured and imprisoned him under harsh conditions at Perth Amboy, New Jersey, and later in New York. A formal remonstrance from Congress and other efforts to obtain his exchange resulted in his release, in poor physical condition, sometime in 1777. To add to his woes, he found that the British had pillaged and partially burned Morven. Still and invalid, he died.

      Ferris, Robert G. Signers of the Declaration. Washington: U.S. Government Printing, 1973. 133-135.



Home Page |  What's New |  Most Wanted |  Surnames |  Photos |  Histories |  Documents |  Cemeteries |  Places |  Dates |  Reports |  Sources