Background
Heath was born on Match 2, 1737 in Boston, Massachusetts. He was brought up as a farmer and had a passion for military exercises.
farmer military political leader Soldier
Heath was born on Match 2, 1737 in Boston, Massachusetts. He was brought up as a farmer and had a passion for military exercises.
In 1765 Heath entered the Ancient and Honourable Artillery Company of Boston, of which he became commander in 1770.
In 1770, Heath wrote to the Boston Gazette letters signed A Military Countryman, urging the necessity of military training. He was a member of the Massachusetts General Court from 1770 to 1774, of the provincial committee of safety, and in 1774-1775 of the provincial congress. He was commissioned a provincial brigadier-general in December 1774, directed the pursuit of the British from Concord (April 19, 1775), was promoted to be provincial major-general on the 20th of June 1775, and two days later was commissioned fourth brigadier-general in the Continental Army. He became major-general on the 9th of August 1776, and was in active service around New York until early the next year. In January 1777 he attempted to take Fort Independence, near Spuyten Duyvil, then garrisoned by about 2000 Hessians, but at the first sally of the garrison his troops became panic-stricken and a few days later he withdrew. Washington reprimanded him and never again entrusted to him any important operation in the field. Throughout the war, however, Heath was very efficient in muster service and in the barracks. From March 1777 to October 1778 he was in command of the Eastern Department with headquarters at Boston and had charge (November 1777 - October 1778) of the prisoners of war from Burgoyne's army held at Cambridge, Massachusetts. In May 1779 he was appointed a commissioner of the Board of War. He was placed in command of the troops on the East side of the Hudson in June 1779, and of other troops and posts on the Hudson in November of the same year. In July 1780 he met the French allies under Rochambeau on their arrival in Rhode Island, in October of the same year he succeeded Arnold in command of West Point and its dependencies and in August 1781, when Washington went south to meet Cornwallis, Heath was left in command of the Army of the Hudson to watch Clinton. After the war, he retired to his farm at Roxbury, was a member of the state House of Representatives in 1788, of the Massachusetts convention which ratified the Federal Constitution in the same year, and of the governor's council in 1789-1790, was a state senator (1791-1793), and in 1806 was elected lieutenant-governor of Massachusetts but declined to serve.
Heath was an American military commander in the Continental Army during the American Revolutionary War.
William Heath was married to Sarah Lockwood.
