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Continental Congresses

Thomas Lynch, Jr. (1749-1779)

Elected to serve in the Continental Congress to replace his ailing father, Thomas Lynch, Jr. signed the Declaration of Independence, becoming, at age 26, the youngest signer of that document. Four years later, he was dead—the first signer to die, when he and his wife were lost in a storm aboard a ship headed to Europe.

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He was born in Prince George’s Parish, at his family estate, “Hopseewee,” near Wynah, South Carolina, on 5 August 1749, the son of Thomas Lynch, Sr., and his second wife Hannah (née Motte) Lynch. The family had long had ties to the farming culture of South Carolina, and Thomas Lynch, Jr., followed in his father’s footsteps by becoming a rice planter. Because of his father’s wealth, Lynch was able to obtain a first-rate education. When he was just 12, his parents sent him to England, where he attended the prestigious Eton College, from which he graduated with honors, and then at Cambridge [1]. He then attended the Middle Temple, one of the four Inns of Court of the English judicial system, in London. When he had completed his studies, it was 1772, and he returned to America that same year.

From the time he arrived home, Lynch decided that a legal career was not for him, and his father advanced his interest in agriculture by giving him the plantation called “Peach Tree” on the North Santee Rive in St. James Parish. Lynch soon married Elizabeth Shubrick in May 1772, and settled down as a farmer. The couple had no children before their deaths eight years later.

As the elder Lynch was an important figure in South Carolina colonial politics, so must his son become equally involved: He served as a member of the First and Second South Carolina Provincial Congresses (1774, 1776), and, in 1776, as a member of the constitutional committee for South Carolina. According to historian John G. Van Deusen, “On 12 June 1775, the provincial congress elected him [as] one of the captains in the 1st South Carolina Regiment. He accepted the command, somewhat in opposition to the wishes of his father, who offered to use his influence to obtain him a military appointment of higher rank.” [2] While in North Carolina to find troops for his company, he contracted a sickness, perhaps bilious fever, which nearly killed him and left him seriously ill for the remainder of his short life.

From the official journals of the South Carolina Provincial Congress, on 11 February 1776, is the following: “The Congress then proceeded to ballot, for the members of the Committee, to prepare a plan or form of government. And the following gentlemen were, by Mr. President, declared duly elected, by a majority of votes, viz.” The committee included Charles Cotesworth Pinckney, John Rutledge, Charles Pinckney, Henry Laurens, Christopher Gadsden, Arthur and Henry Middleton, Thomas Bee, Thomas Heyward, Jr., and Thomas Lynch, Jr. [3]

In the meantime, Lynch’s father was serving in the Continental Congress; in early 1776, he suffered a serious stroke that rendered him incapable of serving properly. On 23 March 1776, the South Carolina General Assembly elected the younger Lynch to the Continental Congress, not in place of his father, but to go and assist him in his duties. In the journals of the South Carolina General Assembly it was noted that they voted “[t]hat Thomas Lynch, jun. Esq; on account of the alarming ill state of health of his father, one of the delegates from this colony, at Philadelphia, have leave of absence.” Based on this action, the body elected the younger Lynch as a delegate to the Continental Congress. [4] At the time, a declaration of independence was under consideration, and the younger Lynch arrived in time to sign the document on behalf of his father as well as the people of South Carolina. The two Lynches remained in Philadelphia for several months so that both men could recuperate their health; they departed for South Carolina late in the year. While in Annapolis, Maryland, where they had stopped, the elder Lynch suffered a second stroke and died, and his son buried him there and proceeded home. When he arrived, his health was so precarious that many in the state believed that he would not survive long. For the next few years, he remained in seclusion at “Peach Tree” with his wife, attempting to recover his health.

By early 1779, however, nothing had changed, and doctors that were tending to the young man urged him to go to Europe, despite the war between England and America, to try to gain some of his health back.

In late 1779, Lynch and his wife boarded a ship to France, via the West Indies. Neither was ever heard from again. Although there is no documentation, it is believed that their ship hit a rough storm somewhere near the Bermuda Triangle and foundered with all aboard. There was one mention of his passing in an 1892 journal in 1892 that noted, “Of Thomas Lynch, Jr., son of a worthy sire and lost at sea on a voyage undertaken for his health in 1779, we are told in the annals of his life that ‘he bore his severe illness with the resignation of a Christian.’” [5]

[1] [1] Thomas Lynch, Jr., official congressional biography, online at http://bioguide.congress.gov/scripts/biodisplay.pl?index=L000535. Other sources do not mention that the younger Lynch attended Cambridge.

[2] [2] Van Deusen, John G., “Thomas Lynch, Jr.,” in Allen Johnson, et al., “Dictionary of American Biography” (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons; eleven volumes and five supplements, 1958-77), XI:523-24.

[3] [3] South Carolina, Provincial Congress, “Extracts from the Journals of the Provincial Congress of South-Carolina. Held at Charles-Town, February 1st, 1776. Published by Order of the ­Congress” (Charles-Town, SC: Printed by Peter Timothy, 1776), 26-27.

[4] [4] Ibid., 126-27.

[5] [5] The Churchman, LXV (30 April 1892), 551.

Citation Types

MLA 9th
"Thomas Lynch, Jr. (1749-1779)." Continental Congresses, edited by Mark Grossman, Salem Press, 2016. Salem Online, online.salempress.com/articleDetails.do?articleName=Cong_0271.
APA 7th
Thomas Lynch, Jr. (1749-1779). Continental Congresses, In M. Grossman (Ed.), Salem Press, 2016. Salem Online, online.salempress.com/articleDetails.do?articleName=Cong_0271.
CMOS 17th
"Thomas Lynch, Jr. (1749-1779)." Continental Congresses, Edited by Mark Grossman. Salem Press, 2016. Salem Online, online.salempress.com/articleDetails.do?articleName=Cong_0271.