Andrew Gregg was an American politician. A Democratic-Republican, he served as a United States Senator for Pennsylvania from 1807 until 1813. Prior to that, he served as a U. S. Representative from 1791 until 1807.
Background
Andrew Gregg was born on June 10, 1755 of Scotch-Irish ancestry near Carlisle, Pennsylvania. His father, a native of Londonderry, Ireland, emigrated to Massachusetts early in the eighteenth century. About 1722 he moved to Londonderry, New Hampshire, whence he went to Delaware, and in 1732 he settled on a farm in southern Lancaster County, Pennsylvania, where his first wife died.
Less than two years later he married Jane, daughter of William Scott, an emigrant from Armagh, Ireland, and in 1750 he removed to a farm near Carlisle, where Andrew the younger was born.
Education
Andrew received an excellent classical education in Rev. John Steel’s Latin School, Carlisle, and at the Academy in Newark, Del. While a student at Newark in the early years of the Revolution he frequently turned out with the militia, but apparently saw no active service.
When the British invaded Delaware in 1777 the academy broke up, and young Gregg returned to the Carlisle farm to help his father.
Career
In 1779 he set out for Philadelphia on his way to France for his health. His acceptance of an appointment as tutor in the University of Philadelphia altered his plans, however, and for the next four years he remained at that institution. Lured by the West, in 1783 he moved to Middletown, Pennsylvania, where he opened a country store.
Shortly after his marriage he pushed farther into the interior, first to Lewistown, and in 1789 into the fertile Penn’s Valley, Center County, to take up farming. On October 11, 1791, Gregg was elected to the United States House of Representatives. His record of sixteen years in that body reveals him to have been a well-informed man of practical common sense who jealously guarded the interests of his backcountry constituents.
Aroused by British outrages committed against American commerce, on January 29, 1806, he introduced a sweeping resolution in the House forbidding the importation of all British goods whatsoever, but it was never adopted by the House.
The schism of the Pennsylvania Republicans found Gregg following the more conservative Constitutionalists, who, on January 13, 1807, with Federalist assistance, elected him for a single term to the Senate. Conforming to his Jeffersonian affiliations, here he supported the Embargo and Non-Intercourse Acts, and later, the declaration of war against England.
From June Gregg 26, 1809, to Feburary 28, 1810, he was president pro tempore of the Senate.
In 1814, desiring better educational facilities for his family, he became a resident of Bellefonte, where he was president of the Centre Bank. On December 19, 1820, he returned to public life as secretary of the commonwealth of Pennsylvania, having been appointed by the Independent Republican governor, Joseph Hiester. In 1823 the Independent Republicans nominated him for governor and the Federalists supported him, but he was overwhelmingly defeated by John Shulze, candidate of the more radical Republicans. The last twelve years of his life were spent in retirement at Bellefonte.
Achievements
Politics
A man of strong party predilections, he was identified with the Jeffersonians with whom he generally voted, and invariably he manifested a strong sense of national pride.
Personality
A contemporary has described him as being “remarkable for a sound and discriminating mind, agreeable and dignified manners, strict regard for truth, and unbending and unyielding honesty”.
He styled himself “a practical farmer” who would never sacrifice “the interests of agriculture to commerce, ” because they were “so ultimately connected as to be inseparable”.
Connections
On January 29, 1787, he married Martha, daughter of Major - General James and Mary (Patterson) Potter of Buffalo Valley, now Union County.