Francis Green an American loyalist and philanthropist.
Background
Francis Green was the second son of Benjamin and Margaret (Peirce) Green and a descendant of Percival Green who came to Boston in 1635 and settled in Cambridge, Massachusets, in 1636.
Benjamin Green was secretary to the British forces at the siege of Louisbourg and was later president of the Council of Nova Scotia.
Francis was born on August 21, 1742, in Boston.
Education
After attending private school, Francis entered Harvard. Soon after his entrance, on July 2, 1755, his father secured for him a commission, as an ensign in the 40th Regiment, with the understanding that he might have leave of absence to complete his college work.
Career
The French War intervened and Francis had to join his regiment at Halifax in 1757.
The next year, he was at the siege of Louisbourg, and after its capture remained in garrison there until 1760 when he was transferred to Quebec.
In this year, despite the interruption to his studies, he was granted his degree by Harvard. The 40th Regiment marched to Crown Point in June 1761 and proceeded thence to New York where they were embarked for the West Indies, arriving in time to participate in the siege of Havana.
Green was commissioned lieutenant on September 30. Within a few years, however, he decided to give up his military career and while in England in 1766, sold his commission. Returning to Boston, he established himself as a merchant.
In the dispute with England preceding the Revolution, he was an opponent of the unlimited power of taxation by the British Parliament but remained loyal to the Crown.
His opinions were well known and on a business trip through Connecticut he was twice threatened as a Tory and driven out with violence from Windham and Norwich (1774). He was one of the Addressers of General Gage and became thoroughly obnoxious to the Patriot party.
On November 1, 1775, during the siege of Boston, he was appointed a captain of the third company of Loyal Associated Volunteers. Ten days later his wife died, and in March of the following year, when the town was evacuated by the British, he took his three surviving children to Halifax.
He was made a magistrate there, but in 1777 went to New York. The next year he was among those prescribed and banished by Massachusetts.
In 1779, with Philip Dumaresq who had also been a merchant in Boston, he fitted out the war vessel Tryon, 16 guns, and in 1780, at his own expense, equipped the sloop Carleton as part of the refugee fleet under George Leonard. He also cooperated with Leonard in equipping the Restoration.
Going to England in 1780, he resided there until June 1784, when he emigrated to Nova Scotia. He served as sheriff of Halifax County for three years, as senior judge of the court of common pleas, and as first joint treasurer of the province.
He died at Medford.
Achievements
Personality
Green’s son Charles, a child by his first wife, was a deaf-mute. He was sent by his father to Thomas Braidwood’s school in Edinburgh, and there, with great success, was taught to speak.
Green visited the institution a number of times and became much interested in methods of instruction for the deaf and dumb. In London, in 1783, he published anonymously a dissertation on the subject entitled Vox Oculis Sub je eta, a Dissertation on the Most Curious and Important Art of Imparting Speech and the Knowledge of Language, to the Naturally Deaf and (Consequently) Dumb.
In 1801, he published, also anonymously, an English translation of Abbé de l’Epée’s work on the subject, Institutions des Sourds et Muets, and from 1803 to 1805 published articles and translations in the New England Palladium and other Boston newspapers under the pseudonym “Philocophos. ”
Connections
On October 18, 1769, Green was married to his double cousin, Susannah, daughter of Joseph and Anna (Peirce) Green. She died in 1775.
In 1785, Green married Harriet, daughter of David Mathews, president of the Council of Cape Breton and formerly mayor of New York. They had six children, four born in Nova Scotia and two in Medford, Massachusets, where Green settled after his return to the United States in 1797.