Mark Anthony DeWolf (also spelled D'Wolf and deWolfe; 8 November 1726 - 9 November 1793) was an American merchant and slave trader.
Biography
Mark Anthony DeWolf was born in 1726
Guadaloupe, French West Indies. He was second son of Charles DeWolf and Margaret (Potter) DeWolf.
His father was born in
Lyme, Connecticut, in 1695, but in 1717 immigrated to Guadaloupe, French West Indies, where he remained for the rest of his life.
DeWolf received formal education in a French school and spoke several languages.
[Perry, Calbraith B. (Calbraith Bourn), 1846-1914, "Charles DWolf of Guadaloupe, his ancestors and descendants. Being a complete genealogy of the "Rhode Island DWolfs," the descendants of Simon De Wolf, with their common descent from Balthasar de Wolf, of Lyme, Conn. (1668)." 1902] DeWolf, moved from Guadeloupe back to the U.S. at age 17, after being hired as a deckhand on a slave-trading vessel owned by Simeon Potter. Soon after the arrival in 1744 he married Potter's sister, Abigail. Their honeymoon did last long as DeWolf joined Captain Potter on the board of the
privateer ''Prince Charles'' of Lorraine to participate in
King George's War
King George's War (1744–1748) is the name given to the military operations in North America that formed part of the War of the Austrian Succession (1740–1748). It was the third of the four French and Indian Wars. It took place primarily in t ...
in West Indies.
DeWolf settled in
Bristol, Rhode Island, but after his house was burned by the British in 1778 he relocated his family to a farm in
Swansea, Massachusetts
Swansea is a town in Bristol County in southeastern Massachusetts.
It is located at the mouth of the Taunton River, just west of Fall River, south of Boston, and southeast of Providence, Rhode Island. The population was 17,144 at the 2020 cens ...
and didn't return to Bristol until shortly before his death on 17 September 1793.
The DeWolf family
DeWolf married Abigail Potter of
Bristol, Rhode Island, on 26 August 1744. They had eight sons and seven daughters.
Senator
James DeWolf
James DeWolf (March 18, 1764December 21, 1837) was a slave trader, a privateer during the War of 1812, and a state and national politician. He served as a state legislator for a total of nearly 25 years, and in the 1820s as a United States senat ...
was DeWolf's twelfth child. James DeWolf made most of his fortune in the slave trade. In total, the DeWolf family is believed to have transported more than 11,000 slaves to the United States before the African slave trade was banned in 1808.
General George DeWolf, the builder of
Linden Place
Linden Place mansion is a Federal-style mansion located in Bristol, Rhode Island. It was built in 1810 by slave trader, merchant, privateer and ship owner General George DeWolf and was designed by architect, Russell Warren. The mansion now opera ...
, was Mark Anthony DeWolf's grandson through his son Major Charles DeWolf.
The name D’Wolf was spelled with the French contraction due to his education in Guadaloupe, French West Indies.
DeWolf was the 4th generation from
Balthazar DeWolf of Lime, Connecticut.
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:DeWolf, Mark Anthony
1726 births
1793 deaths
People from Bristol County, Rhode Island
People from Bristol, Rhode Island
People from Swansea, Massachusetts
American slave traders
People of colonial Rhode Island
American privateers
DeWolf family