Joseph Whipple

Joseph and William Whipple were brothers and partners in a mercantile business in Portsmouth, N.H. Joseph was the Collector of Customs as well as the Superintendent of the Lighthouse and the Agent for Fortifications in Portsmouth. William (1730-1785) was a member of the Continental Congress and later the New Hampshire legislature, signer of the Declaration of Independence, soldier in the Revolution, and Associate Justice of the New Hampshire Superior Court.

Citation:

• Joseph Whipple and William Whipple Papers, 1717-1904 (MS Am 1832). Houghton Library, Harvard University. From http://oasis.lib.harvard.edu/oasis/deliver/~hou01328

From http://genweb.whipple.org/d0533/I3454.html

Joseph [Whipple] was educated in the counting room of Nathaniel Carter, a merchant of Newburyport, and established himself in business in Portsmouth, in company with his brother: they continued their mercantile connection until a short time previous to the commencement of the revolutionary war. He was afterwards appointed collector of the port of Portsmouth, first by the state of New Hampshire, and after the adoption of the federal constitution, by the President of the United States: he held this office, with a short intermission, until a few months before his death. He died without issue, on the twenty-sixth of February, 1816, in the seventy-eighth year of his age.

[Joseph, born 14 February, 1737-8; married Hannah Billings of Boston, 9 October, 1672. He was collector of the customs in Portsmouth.--"Register," X, 48. Col. Joseph Whipple took part in the early settlement of Coos county, New Hampshire, and was living at Jefferson as early as 1773. He was captured there by the Indians during the Revolution, but escaped.--"McClintock's History of New Hampshire," Boston, 1889, pages 305-307. He afterwards returned to Portsmouth. When "Col. Joseph Whipple was Collector," he "transacted the business in the office adjoining his residence on State street." --"Rambles," I, 227. He "resided in the house then and now standing at the northeast corner of State and Chestnut streets, Portsmouth (No. 79 State St)." Hannah, wife of Col. Joseph Whipple, died 30 January, 1811, aged 75 years. --"Presentation of Flags," page 21.]"

--("Biographies of the Signers to the Declaration of Independence," Philadelphia, 1824, Vol. V., pp. 75-77.)

Two interesting letters on public matters from General William Whipple to Hon. Josiah Bartlett (who long served together in Congress), dated Portsmouth, July 12, and September 13, 1778, will be found in the "N.E.H.G. Register," Vol. XXX, pages 317-320.

Source: http://www.whipple.org/william/ancestors.html#InAmerica

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Great story about Joseph Whipple (protecting?) escaped slave Oney Judge:

PERSON OF HONOR THUNDERBEAR® #275
THE OLDEST ALTERNATIVE NEWSLETTER IN THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT January-March, 2008

"Moreover, according to Whipple "A thirst for complete Freedom" had been her only reason for absconding." Whipple stated this in a letter to Washington.

A thirst for complete freedom.

This was, after all, what the Whipple family was all about. His brother William was one of the signatories of the Declaration of Independence and had served at the Battle of Saratoga and suffered with Washington at Valley Forge (ironically, one of William's slaves, Prince Whipple, was a signatory of the 1779 Petition to the Government of New Hampshire, asking for Freedom) Joseph Whipple himself had served as Colonel of militia in the Revolutionary War.

In short, Joseph Whipple, like you, considered himself one of the Good Guys; a person of Honor. .... "