James H. Birch

Industrialist and Arts Patron

James H. Birch established a carriage repair shop in Burlington in 1862. His business was so successful that in 1865, he purchased the High Street mansion which had previously been occupied by governor Joseph Bloomfield and his family. Behind the house, Birch built a factory to mass-produce carriages. A patron of the arts, he opened a 1200-seat opera house on High Street next to the mansion.

Birch's business continued to expand, and by 1900 his factory covered 15 acres, with a staff of hundreds making more than 200 models of carriages for export worldwide. Birch's techniques for the mass production of carriage bodies attracted the attention of Henry Ford, who asked Birch to manufacture bodies for his new automobiles. Although his son urged him to accept Ford's offer, Birch declined, believing that the automobile would never replace horse-drawn carriages.

The rest, as they say, is history. Birch's carriage factory went out of business in 1918, and the Birch Opera House closed in 1927. Even Birch's son, James Jr., met with sorrow, as the first husband of Marguerite V. Burton. Not all was lost, though - Birch's third son, Thomas, served as U.S. Minister to Portugal from 1913 to 1922. Today, rickshaws and carriages produced by the Birch carriage factory are preserved in the collections of the Burlington County Historical Society and the City of Burlington Historical Society.

William R. Allen

Civil War Mayor

After serving in the War with Mexico in 1847 and 1848, William R. Allen was mayor of Burlington for two terms. His time in office included the Civil War years, during which Allen strongly supported the union cause.

As president of a local bank, Allen was popular in Burlington's business community. He also served as director of the Library Company of Burlington for nearly thirty years, and resided in the former Smith House.

In 1900, the City named a school in honor of Allen.

Related Reading

Find books about the Mexican American War at Powell's Books.

James Healy

Black Priest and Bishop

James Augustine Healy was born April 6, 1830 on a cotton planation near the town Macon in Jones County, Georgia, to Michael and Mary Eliza Healy. Michael Healy was a former Irish soldier who emigrated to America by way of Canada after the war of 1812, and became a planter. In 1829, Michael fell in love with Mary Eliza, a mixed-race domestic slave, and purchased her from her former owner, Sam Griswold. Georgia's laws at the time prohibited interracial marriages, but the two are believed to have been married by a traveling preacher, and carried out their family life as husband and wife.

Considered both illegitimate and slaves at birth under the law, James and his siblings were forbidden from attending school in their home state. Wanting their children to be educated, the Healys sent James and his brothers Hugh and Patrick to Quaker schools in the north, first in Flushing, New York, then in Burlington, where they studied in the 1840's under the instruction of Adeline Glover. Despite the Quaker emphasis on equality, the boys met with some discrimination throughout their school years, based not only on their race, but also on their Irish heritage and the fact that their father owned slaves - something local Quakers found unconscionable.

In the mid-1840s, Michael Healy transferred the boys to the newly-founded Holy Cross College in Worcester, Massachusetts, where they excelled academically. James and Hugh were in the first graduating class of 1849, of which James was Valedictorian; Patrick graduated the next year. Their younger brothers, Sherwood and Michael, also attended Holy Cross. Continuing his religious education, James entered the Sulpican Seminary in Montreal to train for the the priesthood. In 1852, he transferred to the Sulpican Seminary in Paris, France, working toward a doctorate and a career as a seminary professor. During this period, he felt a calling to serve as a pastor, and in 1854 was ordained at the Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris, becoming the first African-American to be ordained a Roman Catholic priest.

Returning to the United States, Father James Healy served as an assistant priest in Boston for several years. At the time, tension existed between black and Irish Catholics, since both groups were forced to compete with each other for menial jobs. To make matters worse, New England residents unhappy with a flood of Irish Catholic immigrants were waging a hate campaign against Catholics, going so far as to tar and feather a priest in Maine! Healy managed to win respect, though, and lobbied to repeal anti-Catholic laws at the state level.

In 1866, he became pastor of Saint James' Church in South Boston, one of the largest churches in the diocese, and in 1875, he was named Bishop of Portland, Maine. At the time of his arrival, most Catholics in Maine were either Irish, French Canadian or Indian, and anti-Catholic sentiments were so strong that some churches were burned by Protestants. Even some Irish Catholics were shocked to have a black Bishop. Once again, Healy won over his doubters, traveling some 30,000 miles to visit parishoners throughout Maine in his first summer as Bishop.

In the twenty-five years he served as Bishop, Healy established 60 new churches, 68 missions, 18 convents and 18 schools throughout Maine, and lobbied for sovereignty for Indian tribes and an end to child labor. Known for his work among the poor, he refused to live in the Bishop's mansion, living instead at the Cathedral rectory, and declined to be buried in the Cathedral vault with the other Bishops, opting instead to be buried in South Portland's Calvary Cemetary under a Celtic cross headstone. Shortly before his death in 1900, he was appointed Assistant to the Royal Throne, a high honor within the Roman Catholic Church.

Having spent most of his formative years away from his mother's family and the slaves on his father's farm, he never became involved in discussions of racial issues. Asked to attend an African-American Catholic Conference, he declined, writing, "We are of that Church where there is neither Gentile nor Jew, circumcision nor uncircumcision, barbarian nor Scythian, slave nor freeman, but Christ is all and in all."

Patrick Healy

Patrick Healy was born February 27, 1830 on a cotton planation near Macon, Georgia, to Michael and Mary Eliza Healy. A former Irish soldier who emigrated to America by way of Canada after the war of 1812, Michael was a planter. In 1829, Michael fell in love with Mary Eliza, a mixed-race domestic slave, and purchased her from her former owner, Sam Griswold. Georgia's laws at the time prohibited interracial marriages, but the two are believed to have been married by a traveling preacher, and carried out their family life as husband and wife.

Considered both illegitimate and slaves at birth under the law, Patrick and his siblings were forbidden from attending school in their home state. Wanting their children to be educated, the Healys sent Patrick and his brothers Hugh and James to Quaker schools in the north, first in Flushing, New York, then in Burlington, where they studied in the 1840's under the instruction of Adeline Glover. Despite the Quaker emphasis on equality, the boys met with some discrimination throughout their school years, based not only on their race, but also on their Irish heritage and the fact that their father owned slaves - something local Quakers found unconscionable.

In the mid-1840s, Michael Healy transferred the boys to the newly-founded Holy Cross College in Worcester, Massachusetts, where they excelled academically. Patrick's brothers were in the first graduating class of 1849. Their younger brothers, Michael and Sherwood, followed them to Holy Cross. After his graduation a year later, Patrick continued his education at Universite Catholique de Louvain in Belgium, where in 1863 he may have been the second African-American to earn his Ph.D. - his brother Sherwood reportedly received a doctorate in Canon Law from the North American College in Rome in 1860.

Ordained as a Jesuit priest, Patrick served as Georgetown University's prefect of studies from 1868 to 1878, and its president from 1873 to 1881 - the first African-American president of a predominantly white university. Called the "second founder" of Georgetown by some, he reformed the curriculum, oversaw the construction of a multi-use building which now bears his name, expanded programs in medicine and law, and founded the alumni association.

Related reading:

Dream of an Outcaste : Patrick P. Healy

ISBN 091662031X - Amazon. Barnes & Noble. Borders.

William J. Allinson

Abolitionist Pharmacist

Druggist William J. Allinson opened his pharmacy on the corner of High and Union Streets in 1831, in the building which had previously been home to printer Isaac Collins.

A Quaker, Allinson was a close friend of the abolitionist poet John Greenleaf Whittier, who visited the pharmacy frequently, speaking against slavery from its doorstep. Allinson's opposition to slavery was not a surprise, as his grandfather had opposed it in the 1760's and 1770's. According to local legend, the pharmacy's basement served as one of Burlington's stations on the Underground Railroad.

Allinson was also interested in literature and history, and supported the Library Company of Burlington. His son became a prominent attorney in Philadelphia, and his descendants still possess a copy of John Woolman's Journal signed by Allinson's friend, Whittier.

Related Reading

Find books about Abolition, John Greenleaf Whittier, John Woolman and the Underground Railroad at Powell's Books.

James Walter Wall

Mayor and Senator

James Walter Wall, son of Garret Dorset Wall, was born in 1820, and, like his father, served in the military, attaining the rank of Colonel. He also shared his father's passion for the political arena. A year after his father's death, the startup Democratic party swept the local elections, and James, at 31, became the first mayor of Burlington under the new City charter. Well-respected in town, he was a very popular mayor.

Active in literature and journalism, the younger Wall corresponded with prominent citizens throughout the eastern states. In 1861, he became aware that some of his letters to friends in the southern states, opposing the Civil War, were being censored by the postmaster general, and wrote a letter protesting this censorship. He was accused of treason and arrested at his home, though not without a fight - he threw at least one constable across a room before being restrained.

The citizens of Burlington were incensed, and local anti-war sentiments were only galvanized by Wall's arrest. The mayor was returned to his home a short time later, and was elected to the U.S. Senate the very next year. He died in 1872, and is buried, like his father, at St. Mary's Church.

Samuel R. Gummere

Language Educator

Samuel R. Gummere was a Quaker educator and textbook author in the early 1800's. He authored texts on spelling, grammar and elocution, and in 1826, founded the Gummere Girls' School at York and Penn Streets in Burlington. Three years later, a building was erected on the Green Bank to house the school.

In 1833, along with his brother John Gummere, John's son Samuel J. Gummere, and Dr. John Griscom, formerly schoolmaster of the Burlington Friends' School, Samuel was instrumental in the founding of Haverford College.

In 1836, Samuel sold the school to a board of trustees. The next year, it was sold to Bishop George Washington Doane of Saint Mary's Church, and became Saint Mary's School for Girls.

Henry C. Carey

Writer and Muckracker

The son of an Irish immigrant, Henry Carey was a nineteenth-century economist, debater and political muckraker. He wrote on economics and tariffs, authoring such works as Harmony of Interest and Principles of Political Economy, and headed the American Philosophical Society.

Carey lived in Alcazar, just two buildings from the Camden & Amboy railroad through Burlington. He hated the concept of business monopolies, and wrote a series of letters against the monopoly of the Camden & Amboy beginning in the late 1840's.

When Burlington was the site of a devastating railroad accident in 1855, Carey authored essays and pamphlets revealing that the Camden and Amboy was not following ethical management and operation practices - for example, schedules.

James Fenimore Cooper

Frontier Novelist

Born in Burlington on September 15, 1789, James Fenimore Cooper was the eleventh of William and Elizabeth Cooper's twelve children. When James was one year old, his family moved to the frontier of Lake Otsego, New York, where his father established a settlement which became modern-day Cooperstown.

Drawing on his experiences in upstate New York, Cooper authored several books about the American wilderness, including The Deerslayer and Last of the Mohicans. Though he never again lived in his birthplace, Cooper returned to the Burlington area for nearly two decades later in life.

Related reading:

The Deerslayer

ISBN 0873957903 - Amazon. 

The Last of the Mohicans

ISBN 0899682545 - Amazon. 

Correspondence of James Fenimore Cooper

ISBN 0838312950 - Amazon. 

James Fenimore Cooper: Novelist of Manners

ISBN 0874134870 - Amazon. 

John Gummere

Science Educator

Born in 1784, John Gummere was a prominent Quaker educator and author of textbooks throughout the early nineteenth century. In 1814, he was elected a member of the American Philosophical Society, and published his Treatise on Surveying. 1814 also saw the founding of the Gummere Academy on East Union Street in Burlington, a boys' school offering classical education, with John as its president. In 1821, he published a textbook on astronomy.

In 1830, Gummere donated the original building used by Burlington's first African Methodist Episcopal church. In 1833, along with his brother Samuel R. Gummere, John's son Samuel J. Gummere, and Dr. John Griscom, formerly schoolmaster of the Burlington Friends' School, John was instrumental in the founding of Haverford College, where he served as president and taught mathematics from 1834 to 1843.

In 1843, Gummere returned to Burlington, and again served as president of the Gummere Academy until his death in 1845. His Treatise on Surveying outlived him, serving as the standard surveying text for students and professionals alike until the Civil War, and remaining in print until 1917.

Garret Dorset Wall

Attorney and Senator

Garret Dorset Wall was born in 1783, in Middletown, New Jersey. After earning his attorney's license at the age of 19, he served in the war of 1812, and also served as clerk of the State Supreme Court. In 1822, he was elected to the New Jersey Assembly as a Federalist, only to cause a stir in 1824 by supporting Andrew Jackson, Democratic candidate for the presidency.

In 1828, Wall bought the former home of Lydia Ritchie, on High Street in Burlington. A year later, he was elected Governor of New Jersey, but declined the position, stating that he was too busy with personal pursuits and did not wish to become further entangled in the State's politics. Later in the year, President Jackson appointed him U.S. District Attorney for the state. As District Attorney, Wall played a key role in breaking up a system of land piracy.

In 1834, Wall was elected to the U.S. Senate, where he represented New Jersey for six years. His final position as a public servant was that of a state court judge, from 1848 until his death in 1850. He is buried at St. Mary's Church in Burlington. During the decades he spent in the city, Wall played a central role in molding the local Democratic party, and was instrumental in establishing the short-lived Burlington College.

Garret Wall's son, James Walter Wall, followed in his father's political footsteps, and his daughter Matilda married Peter Dumont Vroom, governor of New Jersey between 1829 and 1836. Wall Street in Burlington was named in honor of the family's contributions to the City.

Captain James Lawrence

Naval War Hero

The youngest of eleven children, James Lawrence was born in Burlington on October 1, 1781. His parents were Tories who had entertained the Hessian commander as a dinner guest at their home during the Revolution, but when the war ended, they remained in America. James was sent to study law at the age of 13, but proved an uncooperative student. Eventually, he was permitted to join the Navy as a midshipman in 1798, and gained experience in action against the Barbary pirates.

Commissioned a Lieutenant in 1802, he was a member of Stephen Decatur's raiding party which destroyed the U.S.S. Philadelphia in Tripoli harbor after it was captured by the Tripolitans in 1804.

During the War of 1812, Lawrence commanded the U.S.S. Hornet, which captured the H.M.S. Peacock, and was promoted to Captain as a result. On June 1, 1813, commanding a new and untrained crew on the 49-gun frigate U.S.S. Chesapeake off Boston, Lawrence accepted a challenge from Philip Bowes Vere Broke, captain of the 38-gun H.M.S. Shannon. Four years Lawrence's senior, Broke had commanded the Shannon for six years, and had the best trained crew in the Royal Navy.

In less than 15 minutes, Lawrence's crew was overwhelmed. Mortally wounded, Lawrence shouted, "Tell the men to fire faster and not to give up the ship; fight her till she sinks!" True to his words, every officer in the Chesapeake's chain of command fought until he was either killed or wounded. Even so, the battle was lost in under an hour, the Chesapeake was captured, and Lawrence died four days later, leaving his wife and a daughter.

In honor of Captain Lawrence, a group of women stitched the words "Don't Give Up The Ship" into a flag. The flag was presented to Oliver Hazard Perry, commander of the U.S.S. Lawrence - named for Captain Lawrence - in the summer of 1813. Perry went on to capture an entire squadron of British ships in the battle of Lake Erie, on September 13, though not before every officer on the Lawrence - except for Perry and his 13-year-old brother - was either killed or wounded.

Lawrence's words became the motto of the U.S. Navy, which has named numerous ships in his honor, and Perry's flag now hangs in a place of honor at the United States Naval Academy. Copies may be seen at other Navy installations and, of course, in Burlington. Far less well known is Lawrence's last command to his crew - "Burn her!"

Stephen Grellet

Quaker Missionary

Born a French nobleman, Etienne de Grellet du Mabillier fled to New York to escape the French Revolution. Anglicizing and shortening his name to Stephen Grellet, he encountered the writings of George Fox, joined the Society of Friends, and eventually settled in a house in Burlington City.

A world traveler, he visited every European nation but Portugal, as well as Haiti, where he was called "Saint Stephen." Grellet discussed his Quaker beliefs with dignitaries including the Kings of Prussia and Spain, Pope Pius VII, and Czar Alexander I of Russia. Grellet's strangest distinction was his status as the last living person able to identify the true "Lost Dauphin" of France if the need arose - but it never did.

Grellet died in 1855, and is buried in the Quaker burial ground behind the Burlington Meeting House. Two of his chippendale chairs, donated by his daughter, are in the collection of the Library Company of Burlington.

Joseph Bloomfield

Soldier and Governor

Born in 1753, Joseph Bloomfield reached the rank of Captain in the Revolutionary War, then served as New Jersey state attorney general and chief justice of the New Jersey Vice-Admiralty Court. He moved to Burlington upon marrying Mary McIlvaine, and took up residence in a mansion on High Street which had been built about 1750.

Both Bloomfields supported social causes. Joseph served as president of the first Society for the Abolition of Slavery, organized in Burlington in 1783. In 1789, he donated a small plot of land near the family home to the Library Company of Burlington, which had formerly been housed in the living rooms and parlors of its members. This provided a place for the Library's first permanent home, and the small side street adjacent to the Bloomfield's house and the Library was renamed from Office Street to Library Street - a name that remains to this day. Mary Bloomfield became the first non-Quaker member of The Friendly Institution, a secretive local charity founded in 1796.

Bloomfield served as Mayor of Burlington from 1795 to 1800, the second mayor under the Act of Incorporation of 1784. He went on to serve as Governor of New Jersey from 1801 to 1802 and 1803 to 1812, then returned to military service as a Brigadier General in the War of 1812. After the war, he finished his political career as a U.S. Representative from 1817 to 1821. He died in 1823, and is buried in St. Mary's churchyard.

Oliver Cromwell

Black Revolutionary Soldier

Oliver Cromwell was born near Burlington in 1752. Raised a farmer, he served in several companies of the Second New Jersey Regiment between 1777 and 1783. After seeing action at the battles of Trenton and Princeton in 1776 and 1777, Brandywine in 1777, Monmouth in 1778 and Yorktown in 1781, he left the military at war's end. George Washington personally signed Cromwell's discharge papers, and also designed a medal which was awarded to Cromwell.

Some years after the war, Cromwell applied for a veteran's pension. He was well-liked in Burlington, and although he was unable to read or write, local lawyers, judges and politicians came to his aid, and he was granted a pension of $96 a year. He purchased a 100-acre farm outside Burlington, and fathered 14 children, then spent his later years at his home at 114 East Union Street in Burlington. He lived to be 100 years old, outliving 8 of his children, and is buried in the cemetary of the Broad Street Methodist Church. His descendants live in the city to this day.

In 1983, the Oliver Cromwell Black History Society was organized to research and preserve Black Heritage, in Burlington and elsewhere. The Society works to encourage young men to represent Cromwell and other African-American soldiers in Revolutionary War recreations at the Old Barracks Museum in Trenton, New Jersey.

Isaac Collins

Royal Printer

Isaac Collins was born in Delaware in 1746. He moved to Burlington in 1770, and was appointed Royal Printer. Taking up residence in the building now known as the Burlington Pharmacy, he printed six-shilling notes and almanacs in a print shop at 206 High Street. Historians are uncertain whether this was the same print shop where currency was printed in 1728 by Benjamin Franklin.

Collins was a Quaker, but in 1777, he began publishing The New Jersey Gazette, a newspaper which supported the revolutionary movement, and was expelled from the Friends Meeting for warlike behavior. The next year, he moved his printing press to Trenton.

In the early 1800s, Collins published a quarto Bible far more error-free than most of its contemporary editions. In 1808, he moved back to a house in Burlington, apologized to the Friends for his support of the war, and was welcomed back into the Meeting.

Elias Boudinot

Statesman and Abolitionist

Born in Philadelphia in 1740, Elias Boudinot served as a delegate from New Jersey to the Continental Congress from 1777 to 1778, and again from 1781 to 1784. In 1783, as president of the Continental Congress, he signed the Treaty of Paris, and was for a time President of the United States in Congress Assembled. After the Constitution was ratified, he served as a U.S. Representative from 1789 to 1795, then was appointed Director of the United States Mint.

Retiring from politics, Boudinot had a house built in 1803 on West Broad Street in Burlington. He took up residence in 1804, accompanied by his daughter, Susan Boudinot Bradford. As a private citizen, Boudinot was a trustee of what is now Princeton University, where he founded the natural history department in 1805. His views on religious tolerance and opposition to slavery led him to found the American Bible Society in 1816. That same year, he published Star in the West, suggesting that Native Americans were the lost tribes of Israel. Boudinot died in Burlington in 1821, and is buried in St. Mary's churchyard with his wife, Hannah Stockton Boudinot.

Boudinot supported the rights of Native Americans and is not to be confused with the other Elias Boudinot, who in 1835 helped arrange the signing of the Treaty of New Echota, in which a small minority group of Cherokee agreed to the emigration of the entire Cherokee Nation, resulting in most Cherokee eventually being rounded up by the Army and detained in concentration camps.

Cyrus Bustill

Black Revolutionary Baker

Cryus Bustill was born in Burlington in 1732, the son of an English attorney and an African slave. After learning the baker's trade from Thomas Prior, a local baker and member of the Friends Meeting, Bustill gained his freedom at age 36. During the Revolutionary War, he was commended for supplying American troops with baked goods at the Burlington docks, and reportedly given a silver piece by General Washington.

Bustill and his wife, the daughter of an Englishman and a Delaware Indian, later moved to Philadelphia where they and their eight children attended the Arch Street Friends Meeting. Bustill was an early member of Philadelphia's Free African Society, started in 1787. After retiring from baking, he started a school in Philadelphia. He died in 1806. You may have heard of his great-great-grandson, Rutgers University valedictorian, singer and actor Paul Robeson.

James Kinsey

State Court Chief Justice

Born in 1731 in Philadelphia, James Kinsey was instrumental in New Jersey's transition from colony to state. His father, John K. Kinsey, had served as Speaker of the New Jersey Assembly before moving to Philadelphia and holding the same post in the Pennsylvania Assembly. The elder Kinsey also served as Chief Justice of the Pennsylvania Supreme Court, led the Quaker Party, and was Clerk of the Philadelphia Yearly Meeting. Both were descended from John Kinsey, one of the founders of Burlington.

Like his father, James Kinsey studied law, was active in the Society of Friends, and a political leader. He studied law, passed the bar in 1753, and by the 1770's was well-known attorney. In 1772, he was elected to the New Jersey assembly. He opposed Royal Governor William Franklin, who lived across town, and in 1774, started the Burlington Committee of Correspondence, to turn public opinion against King George III.

James Kinsey married twice. His first wife was Phoebe Wood. After her death, he married Hannah Decow of Burlington. His children were John, James, Philip, Thomas, Charles, Ann, Mary, and Hannah.

Kinsey was elected in September of 1774 to the Continental Congress, but as a Quaker, chose to resign in November of 1775, rather than swear an oath of allegiance. He continued his legal practice, and was appointed Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of New Jersey in November 1789, serving in that office until his death in 1803. Kinsey is buried in St. Mary's churchyard in Burlington, and his portrait has hung in the New Jersey capitol building in Trenton.

Kinsey's house, built in 1770, was sold after his death by his wife Hannah. Located at 38 West Broad Street, the house now serves as Lodge 965 of the Loyal Order of Moose.

William Franklin

Our Last Royal Governor

The son of Benjamin Franklin, William Franklin spent much of his youth in England, where he earned a Master's degree by Oxford, was accepted to the bar, and married. Upon his return to America in 1763, he became royal governor of New Jersey at the age of thirty-two, and took up residence at Green Bank, a riverside Burlington mansion. There, he entertained dinner guests including George Washington.

Despite his youth, Franklin was a well-educated and talented administrator, but the office of Royal Governor was rapidly losing power. The first two years of his term were pleasant and uneventful, and he was instrumental in founding Queens College, now known as Rutgers University, but in 1765, he was unable to enforce the Stamp Act passed by Parliament. Three years later, 8,000 pounds disappeared from the East Jersey treasuries, and Franklin's refusal to remove treasurer Stephen Skinner from his post earned him more ill feelings.

Franklin's loyalty to the British crown bought him little in the way of military support, and when the spirit of revolution began to build, he was powerless to act against it. Locally, assemblyman James Kinsey began the Burlington Committee of Correspondence in 1774, to turn public opinion against the royal government. In January of 1776, Franklin was placed under house arrest at his second home in northern New Jersey. Five months later, he was seized and brought to Burlington for questioning by the independence-minded Provincial Congress. Refusing to relinquish his authority, he was transported to Connecticut and held as a prisoner of war for two and a half years. He then spent a few years as the leader of a Tory association in New York, before returning to England in 1782.

William Franklin's support of England severely strained his relationship with his father, as well as with his son, William Temple Franklin, who also supported independence. A few years before his death, Benjamin Franklin wrote in a letter to William, "Nothing has ever hurt me with such keen sensations, as to find myself deserted in my old age by my only son; and not only deserted, but to find him taking up arms against me in a cause wherein my good fame, fortune and life were all at stake." Upon his death, Ben left his son his books and papers and some lands in Canada, and forgave any debt his son owed him, but willed him no money, noting that if William's England had won the war, there would have been no inheritance to leave at all.

Related reading:

Benjamin & William Franklin: Father & Son, Patriot & Loyalist

ISBN 0312086172 - Amazon. 

William Franklin: Son of a Patriot, Servant of a King

ISBN 0195057457 - Amazon.