Representative Ebenezer Huntington

Ebenezer Huntington (December 26, 1754 – June 17, 1834) was an officer in the Continental Army during the American Revolutionary War and later a United States Representative from Connecticut. He was born in Norwich, in the Connecticut Colony, to Jabez Huntington and his second wife, Hannah (Williams) Huntington. He belonged to a prominent Connecticut family with deep military and civic traditions. His brothers included Joshua Huntington, who also served during the Revolution, and Zachariah Huntington. His half-brothers, Jedediah and Andrew Huntington, were sons of Jabez by his first wife, Elizabeth (Backus) Huntington, who died in 1746. The Backus family was well known in the region, and its heirs would later be associated with the founding of Backus Hospital in Norwich.

Huntington pursued higher education at Yale College, where he was enrolled at the outbreak of the American Revolution. On April 21, 1775, shortly after the battles of Lexington and Concord, he left Yale without permission to join the patriot cause. After subsequent communication with the college authorities, he was nevertheless granted his degree on August 8, 1775. His academic standing was further recognized when he later received an honorary Bachelor of Arts from Harvard College and, in 1785, the degree of Master of Arts from both Yale and Harvard. This combination of formal education and honorary recognition reflected both his scholarly promise and his growing public reputation as a military officer.

Immediately upon leaving Yale, Huntington went to Boston, where he received an appointment as a first lieutenant in Captain John Chester’s company of General Joseph Spencer’s 2nd Connecticut Regiment. He formally entered Continental service as 1st lieutenant in the 2nd Connecticut Regiment on September 8, 1775, and then as 1st lieutenant in the 22nd Continental Regiment on January 1, 1776. He participated in the Siege of Boston until its conclusion and then marched with General George Washington’s army to New York. In May 1776 he was promoted to captain in the 22nd Continental Regiment, and on August 27, 1776, he fought in the Battle of Long Island under Colonel Samuel Wyllys. During and after that hard-fought engagement, in which his regiment suffered significant casualties, he was promoted to brigade major to Brigadier General Samuel Holden Parsons in August 1776. On October 26, 1776, he received a temporary promotion to Deputy Adjutant General under Major General William Heath in the defense of the Hudson Highlands and also served as Deputy Paymaster, reflecting the confidence placed in his administrative abilities as well as his field service.

On January 1, 1777, Huntington was promoted to major of Webb’s Additional Continental Regiment, part of Major General Israel Putnam’s division. He took part in the campaigns of the middle years of the war and, during the summer of 1778, fought in the Battle of Rhode Island, where he assumed temporary command of his regiment. His performance led to further advancement: on October 10, 1778, he was promoted to lieutenant colonel of Webb’s Additional Continental Regiment. As the Continental Army was reorganized, he became lieutenant colonel of the 3rd Connecticut Regiment on January 1, 1781, and later lieutenant colonel of the 1st Connecticut Regiment on January 1, 1783. Under his command, his unit fought in the Battle of Springfield in New Jersey in 1780. By the closing phase of the war, now a seasoned lieutenant colonel, he was given command of a light infantry regiment and marched with Washington’s army to Yorktown, Virginia. There he witnessed the surrender of British General Charles Cornwallis in October 1781, an event in which he is represented among the American officers in John Trumbull’s famous painting of the surrender. In June 1783 he served as lieutenant colonel of Swift’s Connecticut Battalion, and he remained on duty with his troops until the unit was disbanded. He retired from the Continental Army on November 3, 1783, and shortly thereafter was admitted as an original member of the Society of the Cincinnati in the state of Connecticut, an organization of Revolutionary War officers.

After leaving active military service at the end of the Revolution, Huntington turned to mercantile pursuits, engaging in business as a merchant in Connecticut. His military experience, however, continued to shape his public career. Following the passage by Congress of the Militia Act of 1792, which authorized the states to maintain organized militias, Connecticut Governor Samuel Huntington appointed him adjutant general of the state militia. In this capacity, he was responsible for the organization, training, and administration of Connecticut’s militia forces. He held the post of adjutant general for approximately thirty years, serving under seven different governors and becoming a central figure in the state’s military establishment. During the Quasi-War with France, when the United States expanded its regular forces, he was commissioned a brigadier general in the United States Army on July 19, 1798. He served in that federal capacity until June 15, 1800, when he was discharged upon the reduction of the Army at the close of the crisis. His federal commission is sometimes recorded as a resignation on that date, marking the end of his brief service as a general officer in the regular army.

Concurrently with his long tenure as Connecticut’s adjutant general, Ebenezer Huntington entered national politics as a member of the Federalist Party. Representing Connecticut at large, he contributed to the legislative process during two terms in the United States House of Representatives. His first service in Congress was for less than five months, when he was elected to fill the vacancy created after Representative Samuel W. Dana was appointed to the United States Senate to complete the term of James Hillhouse, who had resigned. In this short tenure he participated in the deliberations of a Congress grappling with issues of early national policy and party conflict. He returned to Congress five years later, when he was elected as a Federalist to the Fifteenth Congress from Connecticut’s at-large congressional district in November 1816, beginning his term on March 4, 1817. He served one full term in that body, again representing the interests of his Connecticut constituents during a significant period in American history, as the nation adjusted to the aftermath of the War of 1812 and the evolving balance between Federalist and Republican political forces.

In his personal life, Huntington married twice and was the father of a large family. On December 10, 1791, he married Sarah Isham of Colchester, Connecticut. The couple had one son, Alfred Isham Huntington. Sarah died in 1793. On October 7, 1795, he married Lucretia Mary McClellan of Woodstock, Connecticut. Together they had nine children: Wolcott, born August 20, 1796; Louisa Mary, born February 20, 1798; George Washington, born November 22, 1799; Nancy, born April 6, 1803; Walter, born November 11, 1804; Sarah, born May 1, 1806; Elizabeth, born August 24, 1808; and Maria, born December 13, 1810. Lucretia died on November 5, 1819. Huntington’s family connections, both through the Huntington and Backus lines and through his marriages, reinforced his standing in Connecticut society and linked him to many of the region’s leading families.

General Ebenezer Huntington spent his later years in Connecticut, where he remained a respected figure for his Revolutionary War service, his long stewardship of the state militia, and his contributions in Congress as a Federalist representative. He died on June 17, 1834. His life and career have been documented in collections such as the letters published by Henry W. Sage in 1891 and in standard biographical references including the Biographical Directory of the United States Congress and works on Revolutionary War figures, as well as in studies of the Society of the Cincinnati and the American Revolution.