Josiah Bartlett
1729–1795 · New Hampshire physician and signer who later served as the state's chief justice and governor.
Josiah Bartlett was born in 1729 in Amesbury, Massachusetts, studied medicine as an apprentice, and set up a practice in Kingston, New Hampshire. He was an early advocate of inoculation against smallpox and became a leader in the provincial congress as the quarrel with Britain deepened. In the Continental Congress he signed the Declaration of Independence for New Hampshire and later signed the Articles of Confederation. After the war he served as chief justice of New Hampshire and then as governor, helping to put the new state government on a firm footing. Bartlett kept up his medical work even while in office and was respected as a plain, careful public man. He died in Kingston in 1795.
See also: Signers of the Declaration · William Whipple · Matthew Thornton
Key dates
- 1729 Born in Amesbury, Massachusetts
- 1774 Serves in the New Hampshire Provincial Congress
- 1776 Signs the Declaration of Independence
- 1790 Becomes president, then governor, of New Hampshire
- 1795 Dies in Kingston, New Hampshire
Read about them
Grades 6–8
- The Founding Documents · In the library
More lives
John Adams · Samuel Adams · Carter Braxton · Edmund Burke · Charles Carroll of Carrollton · Samuel Chase