Frederick Frelinghuysen was a lawyer, Revolutionary patriot and politician. He was a United States Senator from New Jersey from 1793 until 1796, and served as the United States Attorney for the District of New Jersey in 1801.
Background
Frederick Theodore Frelinghuysen was born on April 13, 1753, near Somerville, Somerset County, New Jersey. He was the only son of the Rev. John and Dinah (Van Berg) Frelinghuysen and the grandson of the Rev. Theodorus Jacobus Frelinghuysen who emigrated from Holland in 1720.
His father died during the son’s second year, and his mother, the daughter of a wealthy East India merchant, was about to return to her family in Amsterdam with her two small children when Jacob R. Hardenbergh a divinity student, who had been studying under her husband, persuaded her to become his wife.
Education
Brought up in a very religious household, Frederick yielded to his mother’s desire that he enter the Christian ministry to the extent of studying theology for six months. Possibly the rigidity and strictness of his stepfather in regard to Sabbath observance and other matters may have discouraged young Frelinghuysen, who did not feel himself fitted for this profession.
He then entered the College of New Jersey and was graduated in 1770. Taking up the study of the law he was admitted to the bar upon reaching his majority and began practice in Somerset County.
Career
Under the leadership of his college president, John Witherspoon, he was among the first in New Jersey to join the movement for independence from Great Britain. But twenty-two years of age, he was selected with John Witherspoon, Jonathan D. Sergeant, and William Paterson to represent his county in the Provincial Congress of 1775 and 1776.
His votes in that body show him to have been one of the most uncompromising of those seeking complete separation from England. Throughout the war, he varied his legislative duties with those of a very active military career.
First a major of the Minute Men of his county, next to a captain of the artillery, major, and finally colonel and aide-de-camp to Gen. Philemon Dickinson, Frelinghuysen took part in the battles of Trenton, Princeton, and Monmouth.
At Princeton, his intimate knowledge of the local terrain was said to have been of great help to his superior officers. Elected November 6, 1778, by his state legislature a member of the Continental Congress, he resigned his military command and position on the New Jersey Committee of Safety to serve in that body.
Eight months of Congress was enough for an energetic young man whose heart was in the military struggle rather than the intrigues of politics. He resigned, giving as his reason his youth, but also his “situation peculiarly disagreeable” to him, and which he refused to explain for fear of causing more evil than good.
He then served his state as clerk of court of Somerset County and as a member of the legislative council until 1782, when he consented to return to the Continental Congress for another year. Again in the state legislature, he served in the Assembly (1784, 1800, 1804), and in the Council (1790 - 92), and was a member of the New Jersey convention which ratified the Constitution.
In 1790, he was appointed by President Washington a brigadier-general in the campaign against the western Indians, and in 1794, while a United States senator, he was commissioned a major-general of militia in the Whiskey Insurrection. His term in the Senate, extending from December 5, 1793, until his resignation in May 1796, was uneventful.
Achievements
Membership
Frelinghuysen was a member of the New Jersey convention that ratified the United States Constitution in 1787. He was a member of the New Jersey Legislative Council (now the New Jersey Senate) representing Somerset County from 1790 to 1792.
Connections
Frelinghuysen was twice married. His first wife was Gertrude Schenck, who died in 1794. After her death, he married Ann Yard. R. E. , Jr.