ANTHONY WALTON WHITE, BRIGADIER IN THE CONTINENTAL ARMY
The subject of this memoir descended from an ancient and honorable West of England family, noted for six generations for its military predilections. The first Anthony of whom we have particulars was a zealous partisan of Charles I., and left England for Virginia after the establishment of the Commonwealth; but, stopping at Bermuda, decided to remain there, where he became a member of the Government. The second Anthony returned to England and under William III. became a lieutenant-colonel and served at the battle of the Boyne. In reward for services, he was appointed a member of the King’s council, and Chief Justice of the Bermudas; an office which descended to his eldest son, Leonard, who entered the British Navy and served with distinction. The third Anthony, Leonard’s eldest son, came to New York about 1715, married a Miss Staats, and died soon afterwards, on the voyage to Bermuda. His only son, Anthony (IV.), after holding various civil offices in the State of New Jersey, entered the army and was a lieutenant-colonel in 1751. He married Elizabeth, daughter of Lewis Morris, governor of New Jersey, by whom he had the subject of our sketch, Anthony, the fifth of the name—his middle name coming from his godfather, the celebrated William Walton, of the “Walton House,” in the present Franklin Square, New York City. Anthony was born July 7, 1750, at the family residence near New Brunswick, N. J.
The family aptitude for officeholding secured him, in due time, several posts of honor and profit under the Crown, and up to the outbreak of the Revolution he pursued the ordinary routine life of a country gentleman of large property; when the hereditary love of arms, and a sincere attachment to the cause of country, transformed him into the ardent patriot. In October, 1775, he was appointed an aide to Washington,[[8]] and in February, 1776, became Lieutenant-Colonel of the Third N. J. Battalion. In this capacity he was actively engaged in service at the North until 1780, when he was transferred to the First Regiment of Cavalry, and ordered South, to assume general command of the cavalry in that department.
In July, 1780, despairing of receiving the promised aid from the State of Virginia, and anxious to join the army under Gates, then in South Carolina, Colonel White procured on his own personal credit, the funds necessary to remount and support for a short time, two regiments; with which he marched to join Gates—fortunately too late to share in the defeat at Camden (and yet, that same rout might have been a victory, had a sufficient force of cavalry been among Gates’ men). In 1781, White was ordered to Virginia to coöperate with Lafayette’s force against Cornwallis, and several times skirmished with Tarleton. In the winter of 1781–2, he was again in the Carolinas, opposed to him; and in the operations of Wayne at Savannah, May 21, 1782, Colonel White by his bold and adroit conduct, contributed largely to the success which followed. After the evacuation of the city by the enemy, he returned to South Carolina, and entered Charleston, where his noted generosity was exemplified by his becoming security for the debts of the officers and men of his command, who were in want of almost all the necessaries of life.
They agreed to repay him in tobacco—then the only currency of any stable value—which was to be delivered to him at Charleston on a fixed date. Owing partly to the failure of the crop that year, and partly to the inability of his beneficiaries to carry out their part of the agreement, he had to part with a large part of his Northern property, at a ruinous sacrifice. In the spring of 1783, he was married to Margaret Ellis, a young girl of only fifteen, but who is described as of remarkable accomplishments, as well as of wealth and beauty. After the conclusion of hostilities, he returned to the North and settled in New York City to spend the remainder of his life, as he hoped, in tranquil enjoyment of well-earned repose, and regain his former affluence; but was unhappily persuaded by his old army friends to join them in a speculation which, as the only responsible member of the organization, nearly ruined him as a result.
In 1793 he removed from New York to his native New Brunswick, where he spent the rest of his life. He was destined, however, to be once more called to arms; being appointed by Washington, in 1794, to command the cavalry in the expedition under Henry Lee, against the Western insurgents; in the delicate management of which duty, he not only won the esteem and gratitude of the inhabitants of the region which was the scene of the insurrection, but the gratitude even of the prisoners whom he was obliged to take to Philadelphia. He then petitioned Congress for repayment of the large sums he had advanced to the State of Virginia—but unsuccessfully; and though his last years were clouded by the loss of almost all the wealth which was once his, he endured the reverses of fortune with the courage of an ancient Roman. His homestead at New Brunswick was frequently the resort of the leading men of the day—and Kosciuszko was there nursed through a severe sickness, by the unremitting care of Mrs. White and her daughter, which he gratefully acknowledged, in letters still owned by the great-granddaughter of General (as he became) White, Miss Bellita Evans of New Brunswick. General White was a member of the Society of the Cincinnati,[[9]] his insignia of which is now owned by his descendant, Mr. Anthony Walton White Evans.[[10]]
General White’s grave, in the cemetery of Christ Church, New Brunswick, is inscribed:
Brig. Gen. Anthony Walton White,
who departed this life
on the 10th of February, 1803
in the 53d year of his age,
Rests beneath this monumental stone.
He was an affectionate husband, a tender parent, a sincere and generous friend, a zealous and inflexible Patriot and a faithful, active and gallant officer in the Army of the United States during the Revolutionary War.