HOPKINS. 99 



of the Declaration of Independence. Stephen was a surveyor as a young man, 

 an occupation implying a high grade of scientific achievement for those days. He 

 passed through all the political grades town clerk, president of the town council, 

 member of the assembly, and speaker thereof; he was also justice of the court 

 of common pleas and later clerk of the court. In 1755 he opened an insurance 

 office in Providence, and as he made money he bought books. In 1750 he sent 

 to London for a collection of books. He became chief justice, 1751-1755; con- 

 tinental colonial governor, 1755-1762, 1763, 1764, and 1767-1768; and delegate 

 to the colonial congresses of 1741, 1754, and 1757. In 1754 he espoused Franklin's 

 plan for a union of the colonies, and during the whole period leading up to the 

 Revolution he was one of the most active advocates of that plan. He signed the 

 Declaration of Independence. He was a member of the Rhode Island council 

 of war and a delegate to the convention of New England States. He helped found 

 Rhode Island College (now Brown University) and was its first chancellor. He 

 was editor, astronomer, historian, "orator, legislator, jurist, executive officer, and 

 public-spirited citizen." He developed a marked paralysis agitans and died in 1785. 



Esek Hopkins had a love of the sea. His brothers John and Samuel were 

 masters of vessels. Esek married Desire Burroughs, daughter of Ezekiel Bur- 

 roughs, a leading merchant and shipmaster of Newport, Rhode Island. One, at 

 least, of their sons had the love of the sea (like Esek and his consort's father) 

 and had the love of fighting like his own father. This son was John Burroughs 

 Hopkins (1742-1796), who participated (at 30 years of age) in the burning of the 

 Gaspe in Newport Harbor, 1772. He was a captain of one of the vessels of his 

 father's fleet, the Cabot, in 1775. He led in the fight with the Glasgow and his ship 

 suffered great damage, four of his crew being killed outright and seven wounded, 

 including himself. 



Esek Hopkins was a fearless man, despite his enemies' allegations. So too 

 was his son. His father's father, a man of learning, when warned by the colonial 

 authorities with others to remove to Newport for greater protection from the 

 Indians, refused to do so; and, in 1698, he was put in command of the military 

 forces of the mainland settlement of the colony. 



Esek belonged to an intellectual strain; his own interest in learning led him 

 to be put on school committees and to be made a trustee of the college. His 

 father's father is said to have been a man of learning, a surveyor. Also, his mother's 

 brother and father were surveyors. This love of learning, so marked in Stephen, 

 was also found in Esek's daughter Heart (1744-1825), a woman of great culture, 

 who, quite in advance of the period, took the regular course of study at the college 

 under the special direction of its president, the husband of her sister, Susanna 

 Maxey. 



FAMILY HISTORY OF ESEK HOPKINS. 



I 1 (F F F), Thomas Hopkins (born in England, 1616), joined in an agreement for a form 

 of government for Providence Plantations; was commissioner, deputy, and town councilman. 

 13 (M M F), Rev. William Wickenden. 



II 1 (F F), William Hopkins (born ca. 1645), was a surveyor and military leader, and a 

 man of learning and of courage (see text). II 2 (F M), Abigail Whipple. II 3, Samuel Dexter. 

 II 4 (M F), Samuel Wilkinson, an expert surveyor and justice of peace. II 5 (M M), Plain 

 Wickenden. 



III 1, Major Sylvanus Scott. Ill 3 (F), William Hopkins, a farmer. Ill 4 (M), Ruth 

 Wilkinson (1686-1738). Fraternity of M: III 5, Samuel Wilkinson (1674-172-), was a farmer, 

 tanner, currier, and shoemaker. Ill 6, John Wilkinson (1677-1751), went to New Jersey and 

 from thence to Pennsylvania. Ill 7, William Wilkinson (born 1680), was a preacher among 



