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CROGHAN, WILLIAM, was a native of Ireland, and emigrated in early life to America. He was one of those patriots, who raised this country to honour and to empire. During the whole of that memorable conflict, which resulted in the dismemberment of one, and the creation of another empire, he discharged the duties of an ardent and gallant officer. In the dangers, as well as in the glories of that eventful period, he largely participated.

At the commencement of those troubles which preceded and indicated the approaching conflict, his principles and his feelings forbade him from being a disinterested spectator; he promptly decided not only on the cause which he should espouse, but determined to support that cause at the hazard of his fortune and his life. He entered the American army in the year 1776, as a captain of infantry in the Virginia line; 300n afterwards the regiment of which his company formed a part, was marched to the seat of war in the north. He remained there during the whole of that period, which has ever been considered the most critical, as well as the most glorious of the war. Brandywine, Germantown, and Monmouth, presented successively a part of the scenes in which he was engaged. Indeed, to no officer of his rank, was a larger portion of that honour due, which history and this country give to the exertions of the army during that appalling period.

In the winter of 1779, a portion of the army embracing the whole Virginia line, was ordered to the southward.

Here he suffered the fate, to which the whole southern army was devoted in South Carolina. He was among the captured at the unfortunate surrender of general Lincoln, at Charleston. This event was not more calamitous to the public cause, than it was personally afflicting to many of the officers and soldiers who were embraced in it; none, however, bore the privations and hardships incident to that capture, with more fortitude, than the subject of this notice. In the siege of York Town, he could participate only by his presence: being yet on his parole of honour, he could give no aid by his sword, His feelings, however, did not permit him to be absent. He watched with anxious solicitude the progress of the siege, and had the high satisfaction of witnessing the surrender of the British army, commanded by a general to whom he was himself a prisoner. At the close of the war, he was the senior major of the Virginia line.

All those with whom in military life he was associated, as well those from whom it was his fortune to receive, as those to whom he gave command, bear willing evidence that he discharged every duty of a faithful and excellent officer.

In the spring of 1784, he went to Kentucky, and soon af

terwards married the lady who survives him, one of the sisters of the late general George Rogers Clarke. He fixed his residence at his seat in Jefferson county, where for thirty years he fulfilled every duty of an independent country gentleman, dispensing with a most liberal and hospitable hand, the bounties with which Providence had abundantly blessed him. His house was the seat of hospitality and plenty.

Major Croghan died in September, 1822, at Locust Grove, Jefferson county, Kentucky, in the seventieth year of his age.

In his manners he was eminently bland and polite; no one excelled him in those courtesies which sweeten and polish life. He was, indeed, the model of a gentleman. His reputation for integrity was unimpeached and unimpeachable. His family and his friends, while they rejoice in such a life, most deeply mourn his death.

CROPPER, JOHN, embarked early in the cause of his country, and was chosen a captain in the ninth Virginia regiment on continental establishment, when only nineteen or twenty years of age, and marched in December, 1776, to the north to join the army under the command of general Washington. He was promoted from a captaincy in the ninth Virginia regiment, to a major in the fifth Virginia regiment, and was at the battle of Brandywine, when the fifth Virginia regiment was nearly cut to pieces. Major Cropper then retreated with the remainder of the regiment, and lay concealed in some bushes on the battle ground, until near day-break of the same night of the engagement; between mid-night and day-break he stole off, and marched to Chester, with a red handkerchief lashed to a ramrod for colors. On Chester bridge, major Cropper was met by general Washington and general Woodford. The latter alighted from his horse, embraced major Cropper, and pressed him to his bosom, and said, "He whom we thought was lost, is found." He was then promoted to a lieutenant colonel in the seventh Virginia regiment, and was at the battles of Germantown and Monmouth courthouse. From the seventh Virginia regiment, he was promoted to the command of the eleventh Virginia regiment, by the Marquis De La Fayette, which regiment he commanded until his return to Virginia, on the Soth of November, 1782. The day on which the preliminary articles of peace were signed at Paris, colonel Cropper was engaged with commodore Whaley, in the barge Victory, in the Chesapeake Bay, against five British barges, under the command of commodore Perry. At the commencement of this engagement, there were attached to commodore Whaley's squadron three other American barges, all of which ran off as soon as the engagement commenced, and left commodore

Whaley alone to contend with five British barges, full manned. Commodore Whaley had on board his barge sixty-nine men, principally citizens of the counties of Accomack and Northampton. About the middle of the engagement, commodore Whaley's magazine took fire, at which time several of his men were overboard, hanging by the rigging; twentynine men out of sixty-nine were killed on board commodore Whaley's barge, together with the commodore himself. In this engagement, colonel Cropper had to contend with two white men and one negro, all armed with cutlasses and boarding pikes, and defended himself with a musket and bayonet. One of the colonel's antagonists struck him with a cutlass on the head, which nearly brought him down. In the middle of this individual contest, the negro discovering his young master to be the person with whom he and the two whitemen were engaged, cried out, "Save him; he is my young master!" General Cropper afterwards set this faithful man free, and settled him in the city of Baltimore. He was in the service of his country about forty-five years. Those who were acquainted with him, know how he discharged his duty in every station in which he was placed. He retained to the last hour of his life the veneration and love he bore for general Washington, the saviour of his country. He tried to imitate him in his conduct as a soldier and citizen. The deeds of this great, good, and illustrious American, was the theme of general Cropper at all times. He could not bear to hear the least whisper derogatory to the character of the best of men, and more than once has general Cropper been personally engaged to defend his fame. He had the honour to die possessed with a written document from the pen of this illustrious personage, which evidenced the high opinion he entertained of the worth of the deceased as an officer. This document was treasured up as a miser would treasure his gold, and but few persons were permitted to read it, or hear it read.

General Cropper died at his seat on Bowman's Folly, on the 15th of January, in the sixty-sixth year of his age.

CUSHING, THOMAS, lieutenant governor of the commonwealth of Massachusetts, was born in the year 1725, and completed his academical education, at the university of Cambridge, in his native state.

While he was very young, the town of Boston called him to fill some of its most respectable offices, and delegated him as its representative to the general court. In this situation his patriotism, his abilities, and his faculty in dispatching business, led the house of Assembly to chose him their speaker, a place which had for many years been filled by his father

with great reputation. While he was in the chair, the contest with Great Britain ripened to a conclusion, and the station he held not only called out his exertions in the service of his country, but rendered him known, wherever the cause of America was patronised, and indeed throughout the European world. Of the two first continental congresses, which laid a foundation for the independence and happiness of this country, he was a judicious and an active member. On his return to his own state, he was chosen a member of the council, which then constituted its supreme executive. He was also appointed judge of the courts of common pleas, and of probate in the county of Suffolk, which stations he held until the adoption of the present constitution, when he was called to the office of lieutenant-governor, in which he continued until his death.

Under arbitrary, or monarchial governments, a man's being appointed to, or continued in an office, is no certain evidence of his being qualified for it ; but in governments, free like ours, the appointment of a person for a long course of years together, to guard the interests of the people, and to transact their important affairs, is the most incontestible proof of his abilities and integrity. This observation was verified in Mr. Cushing. He thoroughly understood the interests of his country, and meant invariably to pursue them. Very few men knew better than he, how to predict the consequences of the public conduct; to balance contending parties; to remove difficulties; and to unite separate and divided interests. His life was a state of constant exertion in the service of his country; its happiness was dear to him in health; it lay near his heart in his last moments; and, while he expressed a satisfaction in having honestly and uprightly, in every department he had filled, aimed at doing good, he manifested the most tender solicitude, for the peace and prosperity of America.

There was a time when Mr. Cushing was considered in Great Britain as the leader of the whigs in this country. He was not esteemed so in Boston. He had less political zeal than Otis, or Adams, or Hancock; but by his pleasant temper, his moderation, his conversing with men of different parties, though he sometimes was lashed by their strokes for want of firmness, he obtained more influence than either, except Mr. Hancock. The reason of his being known so much in the mother country was, that his name was signed to all the public papers, as speaker of the house. Hence he was sometimes exposed to the sarcasms of the ministerial writers. In the pamphlet of Dr. Johnson, called, "Taxation no Tyranny," one object of the Americans is said to be, "to adorn the brows of Mr. C -g with a diadem." He had a rank among the patriots, as a sincerc friend to the public good, and

He was also a friend to religion, which he manifested by a constant attendance upon all pious institutions.

Mr. Cushing had a firm constitution, but was subject to the gout. It was this disorder, which deprived his country of his abilities, at a time, when an important change was agitating in her political fabric. On the 19th of February, 1788, he was attacked by the gout in his breast, and, on the 28th of the same month, he died in the sixty-third year of his age, having had the satisfaction to see the new federal constitution ratified by the convention of Massachusetts, a few days before his death."

DARKE, WILLIAM, a brave officer during the revolutionary war, was born in Philadelphia county, in 1736, and when a boy accompanied his parents to Virginia. In the nineteenth year of his age, he joined the army under general Braddock, and shared in the dangers of his defeat, in 1755. In the beginning of the war with Great Britain, he accepted a captain's commission, and served with great reputation till the close of the war, at which time he held the rank of major. In 1791, he received from congress the command of a regiment in the army under general Št. Clair, and bore a distinguished part in the unfortunate battle with the Indians on the 4th of November, in the same year. In this battle he lost a favorite son, and narrowly escaped with his own life. In his retirement during his remaining years, he enjoyed the confidence of the state, which had adopted him, and was honoured with the rank of major general in the militia. He died at his seat in Jefferson county, November 26, 1801, in the sixty-sixth year of his age.

DAVIE, RICHARDSON, WILLIAM, of North Carolina, was born in the village of Egremont, near White Haven, in England, on the 20th June, 1756.

His father, visiting South Carolina soon after the peace of 1763, brought with him this son; and, returning to England, confided him to the care of the reverend William Richardson, his maternal uncle; who, becoming much attached to his nephew, not only took charge of his education, but adopted him as his son and heir. At the proper age, William was sent to an academy in North Carolina, from whence he was, after a few years, removed to the college of Nassau-hall in Princeton, New Jersey, then becoming the resort of most of the southern youth, under the auspices of the learned and respectable doctor Witherspoon. Here he finished his education, graduating in the autumn of 1776, a year memorable in our military as well as civil annals.

Returning home, young Davie found himself shut out for a time from the army, as the commissions for the troops just le

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