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272 was born in the year 1739, at Trenton, New Jersey, during the temporary residence of his parents at that place. His father died in Philadelphia in 1744, and his mother, persuaded by the friendship and acting under the advice of Edward Shippen, removed with her five children to Lancaster, Pa., where the earlier years of his life were spent. From the Reverend McGraw, a man of note, who united the two congenial occupations of a Presbyterian divine and a pedagogue, he received as thorough an education as could well be obtained in those days, and afterwards commenced the study of law.

This pursuit, adopted in extreme youth, was abandoned at the breaking out of the French and Indian War, when an ardent temperament and a sense of duty induced him to enter another field, more brilliant and more active, in which he was destined to perform services of great benefit to the cause of his country, and well worthy the remembrance of posterity.