Horatio Sharpe was the 22nd governor of colonial Maryland.
Background
He was born on November 15, 1718 near Hull, Yorkshire, England, United Kingdom, one of a numerous and celebrated family. His parents were William Sharpe and Margaret Beake. He was one of 16 children, of whom nine brothers and four sisters survived their father, William Sharpe, Sr.
Career
He had, before his appointment as governor, held a commission as captain of marines and as lieutenant-colonel of foot in the West Indies. His appointment was probably due in part to family influence and partly to the obvious expediency of placing a military man in office on the eve of a threatened attack by the French.
Upon his arrival in Maryland on August 10, 1753, he was immediately confronted by problems both numerous and serious. As a crown officer he had to provide men and supplies for the approaching war; as the representative of the proprietary he must resist every encroachment on his rights; but as the governor of the province he was equally bound to protect the citizens against injustice. The most immediately pressing of his problems was the French and Indian War.
Commissioned royal commander-in-chief, he exerted himself with the greatest energy, consulting his colleague, Governor Dinwiddie, gathering supplies, and descending the Potomac in a canoe to inspect the military posts. When Braddock arrived to displace him in the midst of these preparations, he cooperated loyally. He attended military councils in New York and Philadelphia in 1755 and 1757.
Especially charged to determine the boundaries of his province, he set men at work surveying the line in dispute with Virginia and by 1760 arrived at an agreement that eventuated in the Mason and Dixon's line. In 1769, in spite of the tact he had exercised toward Lord Baltimore, he was replaced by a brother-in-law of the proprietor. So wedded had he become to his province that he settled at "Whitehall, " the country home he had created near Annapolis, to manage his estate.
Though obliged to renounce the management of his estate to his friend and secretary, John Ridout, he watched the Revolution with interest and sorrow from his home in London.
He died in 1790.
Personality
He was a capable civil and military administrator.