In May, 1789, there was a brilliant banquet given at the public house of Colonel Mathias Slough, on the southeast corner of Penn Square and South Queen Street, Lancaster. This social function was attended by a large number of officers and soldiers who had fought in the Revolutionary War, among whom were Captain Stephen Chambers and Surgeon Jacob Rieger.
Captain Chambers was neatly dressed in his military uniform, and in personal appearance was one of the finest-looking officers of that period. Dr. Rieger was quite the opposite, rather diminutive in stature, unshaven and otherwise very untidy.
During the progress of the banquet Captain Chambers made some disparaging remark about Dr. Rieger, which the latter overheard and deemed insulting. The result was a challenge to a duel, which was as promptly accepted.
The parties immediately named their seconds, who fixed the following Monday evening, May 11, as the time. The parties met according to arrangement on the outskirts of Lancaster, and after the necessary details were concluded the antagonists faced each other, and at the command of fire neither shot took effect. The seconds, at this point, made an earnest effort to reconcile the principals, Captain Chambers and his seconds being in a mood to offer such terms as they believed to be proper and satisfactory, but Dr. Rieger would not consent to any terms of reconciliation.
They took their places and on the command of fire Captain Chambers snapped his pistol without discharging, but Dr. Rieger sent a ball crashing through both legs of Captain Chambers. His wounds bled freely, and for two days it was thought they were not dangerous; mortification, however, set in and he died in great agony on Saturday morning following, May 16.
Thus perished one of the noblest patriots and most brilliant legal minds of the bar, an event which agitated the public mind for years afterward as an unwarranted and cold-blooded murder.
Judge John Joseph Henry married Chambers’ sister, Jane, and was the attorney for his executors.
Captain Chambers was a native of Ireland, being born there in 1750. He came to Pennsylvania prior to the Revolution, and settled at Lancaster. He studied law and as soon as he was admitted to practice in 1773, he removed to Sunbury, where he became the first resident attorney of Northumberland County. Fithian, in his journal under date July 20, 1775, met him at Sunbury, “a lawyer, serious, civil and social.”
At the outset of the Revolution he entered the service. He was appointed first lieutenant of the Twelfth Regiment of the Continental Line, October 16, 1776, and promoted to captain in 1777.