Matthew Thornton
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Matthew Thornton
Matthew Thornton (March 3, 1714 – June 24, 1803) was an Irish-born Founding Father of the United States who signed the United States Declaration of Independence as a representative of New Hampshire. Background and early life Thornton was born in Ireland in 1714 to James and Elizabeth (''née'' Jenkins) Thornton, who were Scots-Irish. At the time of the Siege of Derry in 1689, James Thornton lived on a farm within a mile of Derry, and this is where Matthew was probably born, although Lisburn and Limerick have also been suggested as birthplaces. In 1716, Thornton's family immigrated to North America when he was three years old, settling first in Wiscasset, Maine.Reynolds, Alistair"Matthew Thornton" Maine Ulsterscots Project, retrieved October 8, 2014 On July 11, 1722, the community was attacked by Native Americans. James and Elizabeth Thornton fled from their burning home with Matthew, moving shortly thereafter to Worcester, Massachusetts.Ferris, Robert, and Morris, Richa ...
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Kingdom Of Ireland
The Kingdom of Ireland ( ga, label=Classical Irish, an Ríoghacht Éireann; ga, label=Modern Irish, an Ríocht Éireann, ) was a monarchy on the island of Ireland that was a client state of England and then of Great Britain. It existed from 1542 until 1801. It was ruled by the monarchs of England and then of Great Britain, and administered from Dublin Castle by a viceroy appointed by the English king: the Lord Deputy of Ireland. It had a parliament, composed of Anglo-Irish and native nobles. From 1661 until 1801, the administration controlled an army. A Protestant state church, the Church of Ireland, was established. Although styled a kingdom, for most of its history it was, ''de facto'', an English dependency.MacInnes, Allan. ''Union and Empire: The Making of the United Kingdom in 1707''. Cambridge University Press, 2007. p.109 This status was enshrined in Poynings' Law and in the Declaratory Act of 1719. The territory of the kingdom comprised that of the former Lords ...
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Worcester, Massachusetts
Worcester ( , ) is a city and county seat of Worcester County, Massachusetts, United States. Named after Worcester, England, the city's population was 206,518 at the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, making it the second-List of cities in New England by population, most populous city in New England after Boston. Worcester is approximately west of Boston, east of Springfield, Massachusetts, Springfield and north-northwest of Providence, Rhode Island, Providence. Due to its location near the geographic center of Massachusetts, Worcester is known as the "Heart of the Commonwealth"; a heart is the official symbol of the city. Worcester developed as an industrial city in the 19th century due to the Blackstone Canal and rail transport, producing machinery, textiles and wire. Large numbers of European immigrants made up the city's growing population. However, the city's manufacturing base waned following World War II. Long-term economic and population decline was not reversed ...
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Bedford, New Hampshire
Bedford is a town in Hillsborough County, New Hampshire, United States. At the 2020 census, the population was 23,322, reflecting a growth of 10% from 2010. Bedford is a suburb of Manchester, New Hampshire's largest city. History In 1733, the Province of Massachusetts Bay established Bedford as "Narragansett, No. 5" for the benefit of soldiers who fought against the Narragansett people in Rhode Island. The area was also known as "Souhegan East". The settlement was incorporated as "Bedford" in 1750, and was named for John Russell, 4th Duke of Bedford. Lord Russell, a close friend of Governor Benning Wentworth, was the Secretary of State for the Southern Department from 1748 to 1751, and his first wife, Diana Spencer, was cousin to the influential Duke of Marlborough. The first English settlers in Bedford were Robert and James Walker III. /upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/7e/SettlementMarker.JPG A monumentdated 1737 stands on what is now known as Station Road (adjacent to ...
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New Hampshire Supreme Court
The New Hampshire Supreme Court is the supreme court of the U. S. state of New Hampshire and sole appellate court of the state. The Supreme Court is seated in the state capital, Concord. The Court is composed of a Chief Justice and four Associate Justices appointed by the Governor and Executive Council to serve during "good behavior" until retirement or the age of seventy. The senior member of the Court is able to specially assign lower-court judges, as well as retired justices, to fill vacancies on the Court. The Supreme Court is the administrative authority over the state's judicial system. The Court has both mandatory and discretionary appellate jurisdiction. In 2000, the Court created a "Three Judges Expedited" or 3JX panel to issue decisions in cases of less precedential value, with its decision only binding on the present case. In 2004, the court began accepting all appeals from the trial courts for the first time in 25 years. From 1776 to 1876, the then four-member court ...
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Merrimack, New Hampshire
Merrimack is a New England town, town in Hillsborough County, New Hampshire, Hillsborough County, New Hampshire, United States. The population was 26,632 as of the 2020 census. There are four villages in the town: Merrimack Village (formerly known as Souhegan Village), Thorntons Ferry, Reeds Ferry, New Hampshire, Reeds Ferry, and South Merrimack. History Indigenous peoples of the Americas, The first known settlers of the area appeared sometime after the Last Glacial Period, last ice age. ''Merrimack'' is a Native American term meaning sturgeon, a type of fish. The Pennacook people named the Merrimack River after this fish because of the vast population that once existed there. The Pennacooks spelled it ''Monnomoke'' or ''Merramake''. "When the town was incorporated, it took the name of the river and spelled it Merrymac," according to the Merrimack Historical Society. The first mention of the territory containing the current town of Merrimack among written records was the peti ...
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Continental Congress
The Continental Congress was a series of legislative bodies, with some executive function, for thirteen of Britain's colonies in North America, and the newly declared United States just before, during, and after the American Revolutionary War. The term "Continental Congress" most specifically refers to the First and Second Congresses of 1774–1781 and, at the time, was also used to refer to the Congress of the Confederation of 1781–1789, which operated as the first national government of the United States until being replaced under the Constitution of the United States. Thus, the term covers the three congressional bodies of the Thirteen Colonies and the new United States that met between 1774 and 1789. The First Continental Congress was called in 1774 in response to growing tensions between the colonies culminating in the passage of the Intolerable Acts by the British Parliament. It met for about six weeks and sought to repair the fraying relationship between Britain and t ...
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Provincial Congress
The Provincial Congresses were extra-legal legislative bodies established in ten of the Thirteen Colonies early in the American Revolution. Some were referred to as congresses while others used different terms for a similar type body. These bodies were generally renamed or replaced with other bodies when the provinces declared themselves states. Overview Colonial government in America was a system of governance modeled after the British government of the time, with the king corresponding to the governor, the House of Commons to the colonial assembly, and the House of Lords to the governor's council. Colonial assemblies did not believe that the British Parliament had authority over them to impose taxes (or certain other laws), that it was the colonial assembly’s duty to decide what should be imposed on their fellow colonists (the Massachusetts Circular Letter was an example of that argument). Legally, the crown governor's authority was unassailable, but assemblies began to resi ...
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Committee Of Safety (American Revolution)
In the American Revolution, committees of correspondence, committees of inspection (also known as committees of observation), and committees of safety were different local committees of Patriots that became a shadow government; they took control of the Thirteen Colonies away from royal officials, who became increasingly helpless.T. H. Breen, ''American Insurgents, American Patriots: The Revolution of the People'' (Macmillan, 2010), pp. 162, 186–89. In Massachusetts, as affairs drew toward a crisis, it became usual for towns to appoint three committees: of correspondence, of inspection, and of safety. The first was to keep the community informed of dangers either legislative or executive, and concert measures of public good; the second to watch for violations of , or attempts of loyalists to evade them; the third to act as general executive while the legal authority was in abeyance. In February 1776 these were regularly legalized by the Massachusetts General Court but consolidate ...
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Justice Of The Peace
A justice of the peace (JP) is a judicial officer of a lower or ''puisne'' court, elected or appointed by means of a commission ( letters patent) to keep the peace. In past centuries the term commissioner of the peace was often used with the same meaning. Depending on the jurisdiction, such justices dispense summary justice or merely deal with local administrative applications in common law jurisdictions. Justices of the peace are appointed or elected from the citizens of the jurisdiction in which they serve, and are (or were) usually not required to have any formal legal education in order to qualify for the office. Some jurisdictions have varying forms of training for JPs. History In 1195, Richard I ("the Lionheart") of England and his Minister Hubert Walter commissioned certain knights to preserve the peace in unruly areas. They were responsible to the King in ensuring that the law was upheld and preserving the " King's peace". Therefore, they were known as "keepers of th ...
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New Hampshire House Of Representatives
The New Hampshire House of Representatives is the lower house in the New Hampshire General Court, the bicameral legislature of the state of New Hampshire. The House of Representatives consists of 400 members coming from 204 legislative districts across the state, created from divisions of the state's counties. On average, each legislator represents about 3,300 residents, which is the smallest lower house representative-to-population ratio in the country. New Hampshire has by far the largest lower house of any American state; the second-largest, the Pennsylvania House of Representatives, has 203 members. The House is the fourth-largest lower house in the English-speaking world (behind the 435-member United States House of Representatives, 543-member Lok Sabha of India, and 650-member House of Commons of the United Kingdom). Districts vary in number of seats based on their populations, with the least-populous districts electing only one member and the most populous electing 11. ...
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Fortress Of Louisbourg
The Fortress of Louisbourg (french: Forteresse de Louisbourg) is a National Historic Site and the location of a one-quarter partial reconstruction of an 18th-century French fortress at Louisbourg on Cape Breton Island, Nova Scotia. Its two sieges, especially that of 1758, were turning points in the Anglo-French struggle for what today is Canada. The original settlement was made in 1713, and initially called Havre à l'Anglois. Subsequently, the fishing port grew to become a major commercial port and a strongly defended fortress. The fortifications eventually surrounded the town. The walls were constructed mainly between 1720 and 1740. By the mid-1740s Louisbourg, named for Louis XIV of France, was one of the most extensive (and expensive) European fortifications constructed in North America. It was supported by two smaller garrisons on Île Royale located at present-day St. Peter's and Englishtown. The Fortress of Louisbourg suffered key weaknesses, since it was erected on ...
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