William Bingham
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
William Bingham (1752–1804) was an American statesman from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. He was a delegate for Pennsylvania to the Continental Congress from 1786 to 1788 and served in the United States Senate from 1795 to 1801. He helped to found the Bank of North America, the first bank of the new nation, in 1781.[1]
William was born on March 8, 1752 in Philadelphia. He graduated from the Philadelphia College (now the University of Pennsylvania) in 1768. He married Anne Willing, daughter of Thomas Willing, and they had two daughters. In 1798 his daughter Anne Louisa married English financier Alexander Baring, later 1st Baron Ashburton. His elder daughter, Maria Matilda married firstly a french aristocrat, Alexandre, comte de Tilly, and then with Henry Baring.
By the beginning of the American Revolution, Bingham was regarded as one of the richest men in Pennsylvania, having made his fortune through joint ownership of privateers and trading.[1] He was sent on diplomatic missions by the American Congress to Martinique and St. Pierre. Returning to America, he represented Pennsylvania as a delegate to the Continental Congress from 1786 to 1788. In 1790 and 1791 he was elected to the Pennsylvania House of Representatives, serving as its speaker in 1791. About this time he became a major land developer, purchasing lands in upstate New York and 2 million acres (8,000 km²) in Maine,later known as the Bingham Purchase.[2]
William Bingham was known as the richest man in America. Bingham was only twenty-eight years old when he achieved richest-man status. He made his fortune in three different ventures. First, running a privateer operation in the Caribbean during the American revolution for Robert Morris. After the revolution, he bought up any worthless Continental currency he could accumulate, and then persuaded Alexander Hamilton to redeem the currency at par. Next he invested enough gold bars to finance the Louisiana Purchase for Thomas Jefferson, as Napoleon had insisted on gold for payment. He also invested in the area in upstate New York now called Binghamton, and 2 million acres in the future State of Maine. Westward migration turned toward Ohio rather than north once the British prohibition on colonizing past the Allegheny mountains was lifted. Bingham died in 1804, but his estate was not settled until 1960.
Bingham was elected to Pennsylvania’s State Senate in 1794, and then named to the United States Senate where he served as a Federalist from 1795 to 1801. He was an active supporter of John Adams and when Adams was elected President, Bingham served as the Senate's President pro tem in the Fourth Congress. He was criticized by Jeffersonian politicians for "extravagance, ostentation and dissipation".[1] In 1813, nearly ten years after his death, John Quincy Adams said that the Presidency, the Capital and the Country had been governed by Bingham and his family connections.[1]
He was also a land surveyor, and looked to develop areas currently a part of Southern New York, and Northern Pennsylvania. One of his prime prospects was at the confluence of the Chenango River and Susquehanna River. Today that area is a city named in his honor, Binghamton, New York. Further more, Binghamton's resident university, Binghamton University recognized Bingham through the naming of Bingham Hall.
Bingham died on February 7, 1804 in Bath, England and is interred in Bath Abbey.
[edit] Further reading
- Robert C. Alberts, The Golden Voyage: The Life and Times of William Bingham, 1969, Houghton Mifflin.
[edit] External links
- William Bingham at the Biographical Directory of the United States Congress
- Biography at Virtualology.com
- Biography and portrait at the University of Pennsylvania
- The Political Graveyard
[edit] References
| Preceded by Robert Morris |
United States Senator (Class 3) from Pennsylvania 1795–1801 Served alongside: James Ross |
Succeeded by John Peter G. Muhlenberg |
| Preceded by Samuel Livermore |
President pro tempore of the United States Senate February 16, 1797–March 3, 1797 |
Succeeded by William Bradford |
|
|||||||
|
|||||||
