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Continental Congresses

Jesse Root (1736–1822)

A minister and lawyer from Connecticut, Jesse Root served in the Continental Army during the American Revolution, as a delegate to the Continental Congress (1778-82), as the Connecticut state’s attorney (1785-89), and as a judge (1789) and chief justice (1796-1807) of the Connecticut Superior Court.

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The son and youngest child of Ebenezer Root and his wife, also his second cousin, Sarah (née Strong) Root, Jesse Root was born in the town of Coventry, in Tolland County, Connecticut, on 28 December 1736. Ebenezer Root, born in 1693, was a farmer in Coventry, and, according to one source, “held various town offices.” He and his wife had eight children—five daughters and three sons—of whom, it was noted, Jesse Root was the youngest. [1]

His official congressional biography states that he graduated from Princeton College (now Princeton University) in New Jersey in 1756. He then studied theology at the Andover Academy (now the Phillips Academy) in Andover, Massachusetts. Ordained as a minister, he was a preacher from 1758 to 1763. [2] On 18 May 1758, Root married Mary Banks; the couple had at least one daughter, Sarah, who lived until 1857.

Root raised a company of militia to defend Connecticut from British invasion; in 1777, he was made a lieutenant colonel of the group. According to Root’s descendant, Judson H. Root, who applied to be admitted into the Sons of the American Revolution in 1890, “[Root] was an active and influential member of the Council of Safety which organized and completed the project of capturing Ticonderoga and Crown Point. General Washington was at Hartford in consultation with the Council of Safety when the rumor of [Benedict] Arnold’s treasury first reached him. It was in this same Council that the plan was matured for the Siege [sic] of Yorktown. Mr. Root received from Governor [John] Trumbull a Captain Commission dated Dec. 30, 1776 and in three days from the date of his com he was on his march to join the army at Peekskill, N.Y. with a full company of Volunteers which he raised at Hartford.” [3]

Root entered the political arena in 1776; in a newspaper announcement, signed by Root and two other men, “[t]he Public are desired to beware of Counterfeit Forty Shilling Bills now passing among us, of the Emission of May 10th, 1775. They are signed [by] William Pitkin, Tho’s Seymour, and Jesse Root, and though they are, upon the whole, a good Imitation of the true Bills, yet a very little attention will be sufficient to distinguish them.” [4]

The Connecticut Journal reported on 4 November 1778 that that same day, “[t]he General Assembly of this State, have been pleased to appoint the following Gentlemen [as] Delegates to the Continental Congress for the ensuing Year, viz. The Honorable Roger Sherman, Titus Hosmer, Eliphalet Dyer, Samuel Huntington, Oliver Ellsworth, Andrew Adams, & Jesse Root, Esquires. The last mentioned General is a new Member.” [5]

The Connecticut General Assembly elected Root to a seat in the Continental Congress on 21 October 1778; it reelected him on 14 October 1779, 6 January 1780, 11 May 1780, 10 May 1781, and 9 May 1782; he attended sessions of the body from 15-31 December 1778, 1 January to about 6 April 1779, 12 August to 26 November 1779, 23 November 1780 to 28 February 1781, 1 March to 14 April 1781, 7-27 May 1781, 15 July to about 23 August 1782. [6]

A report in a Connecticut newspaper on 16 May 1782 stated that two days earlier, “being the annual General Election of the Governor and Company of the State of Connecticut the following Gentlemen were duly chosen . . .” For governor, elected was Jonathan Trumbull; for deputy governor, Matthew Griswold. Elected as delegates to the Continental Congress were Samuel Huntington, Oliver Ellsworth, Richard Law, Oliver Wolcott, Benjamin Huntington, Jedidiah Strong, and Jesse Root. [7]

There are numerous published pieces of correspondence from Root during his Continental Congress service. In a letter to fellow Connecticuter [8] Jeremiah Wadsworth on 9 September 1779, Root explained:

Congress have resolved not to emit on any account whatever more than 200,000,000 dollars and Expect to depend on the States to Supply the Treasury by Taxes and loans. By official accounts from France Spain has taken an active part in the war against England, and its [sic] thought in France that England, to avoid the hard necessity of acknowledging the Independance [sic] of America will Send Commissioners with power to with draw the Troops from america [sic] and attempt a Seperate [sic] Treaty, thereby to detach us from the Alliance-they may make a Merit of necessity, being obliged to with draw their Troops to protect their own territories, make it a ground of Treaty with us, but they must, however hard and humiliating to the pride of Britain, they must acknowledge America to be Independant [sic]. Your letter to the Committee respecting the prize goods, being purchased for the use of the army is referred to the Marine Committee with orders to detain the whole of the united [sic] States part for the use of the Army. [9]

He again wrote to Wadsworth on 6 October 1779 on food supplies for the Continental Army: “I recd. your favour of the 28th ulto. Supplying the army with bread is and has been a very Serious business every exertion has been made in these States to procure and forward flour to the army for some time past with but little Success, and our dependance [sic] has been on the Contracts you entered into with the people of New York to exchange Salt Sugar etc[.]: for flour, you will before this reaches you receive the resolutions of Congress on that head.” [10] To fellow Connecticuter Oliver Ellsworth, Root penned on 25 December 1780, “The resolution of the 18th of march [sic] last was Improved by our Enemies in britain [sic] against us—was Complained of as unjust by Some Merchants in france [sic] who were interested in Speculation in america [sic] till at last the Minister of that Court wrote to Mr. John Adams upon the Subject, which drew from him a long letter Stating the principles upon which Congress adopted it and evincing in a Clear and pointed manner the Justice of the Measure with respect to both Citizens and foreigners. a Copy of the letter I have sent to Govr. Trumbull.” [11]

In the Journals of the Continental Congress for 19 November 1782, the papers of a meeting between delegates from Connecticut and Pennsylvania, who had met to discuss border issues, were printed. According to the Journals, “Eliphalet Dyer, William Samuel Johnson and Jesse Root, esquires, appearing as agents for the state of Connecticut, produce their credentials and powers . . .” Additional papers appeared on 25 November 1782, signed in part by Dyer, Johnson, and Root as the state’s agents. [12] These same Journals took note that “Mr. [Oliver] Ellsworth and Mr. [Oliver] Wolcott, two delegates for the state of connecticut [sic], attended and produced credentials, which were read, and by which it appears, that on the second Thursday of May, 1782, the day appointed by law for the choice of delegates, Samuel Huntington, esquire, Oliver Ellsworth, esquire, Richard Law, esquire, Jesse Root, esquire, Oliver Ellsworth, esquire, Benjamin Huntington, esquire, and Jedediah Strong, esquire, were elected [as] delegates to represent that state in the congress of the united states [sic].” [13]

After he left the Continental Congress, Root returned to Connecticut, where he served as the state’s attorney from 1785 to 1789. From Hartford, there is a report that on 12 November 1787, “[a]t a General Assembly of the State of Connecticut, Holten at New-Haven, on the second Thursday of October, Anno Domini 1787, The Gentlemen nominated by the votes of the Freemen of this state, Assistants to stand for Election in May next, as sent in to the present Assembly, are as follow [sic], viz.” In addition to the names of Samuel Huntington, Oliver Wolcott, William Samuel Johnson, and Jeremiah Wadsworth, is that of Jesse Root. [14] In 1789, he was appointed as a judge of the state Superior Court, rising to the position of chief justice in 1796, and serving on the court until 1807.

Starting in 1798, and continuing until 1802, Root, under his own name, published two volumes of the “Reports of Cases Adjudged in the Superior Court and Supreme Court of Errors” in Connecticut, several of which Root himself had sat on. [15] In the acts of the General Court, the state assembly of Connecticut, for 1799, we find Root’s name in “[a]n Act to incorporate the Connecticut Academy of Arts and Sciences,” as part of a committee to establish just such an institution. [16] That same year, referring to an “almanack” of offices in the “Judicial and Civil Departments” of Connecticut, it includes the judges of the Superior Court, showing Jesse Root named as chief judge. [17]

Despite his growing age, Root continued to serve his state: In 1807 he was elected to the state House of Representatives, where he sat until 1809. When the Connecticut General Assembly met for their May session in 1818, historian J. Hammond Trumbull explained, “Among the delegates to the convention at large, were three honored chiefs of federalism and pillars of the established order: the venerable ex-chief-judges, Jesse Root (now in his eighty-second year), and Stephen Mix Mitchell (in his seventy-fifth), and ex-governor [John] Treadwell (in his seventy-third).” [18] Root’s longevity was hailed the following year, when one Connecticut newspaper noted that “[i]t is a remarkable fact, that there are now living in Connecticut, seven Ex-Judges of the Supreme Court in this State, the average of whose ages is seventy-eight. They are, the Hon. William Samuel Johnson, Jesse Root, Jonathan Sturges, Stephen Mix Mitchell, Tapping Reeve, Jonathan Ingersoll, and Charles Chauncey.” [19]

Jesse Root died in Coventry on 29 March 1822 at the age of 85. [20] He was buried in Nathan Hale Cemetery in Coventry.

Jesse Root’s legacy includes being close friends with the father of Jesse Grant (named for Jesse Root), who was the father of the famed general and politician, Ulysses S. Grant. [21]

[1] [1] Dwight, Benjamin Woodbridge, “The History of the Descendants of Elder John Strong, of Northampton, Mass.” (Albany, NY: Joel Munsell; two volumes, 1871), II:955.

[2] [2] Root official congressional biography, online at http://bioguide.congress.gov/scripts/biodisplay.pl?index=R000432.

[3] [3] Application of Judson H. Root, 17 February 1890, “Sons of the American Revolution, Membership Applications, 1889-1970,” courtesy of the National Society of the Sons of the American Revolution, Louisville, Kentucky, National Membership Number 441, State [Connecticut] Number 242.

[4] [4] The Connecticut Journal [New Haven]. 17 April 1776, 3.

[5] [5] Connecticut Courant, and Weekly Intelligencer [New Haven], 4 November 1778, 3.

[6] [6] Edmund Cody Burnett, ed., “Letters of Members of the Continental Congress” (Washington, DC: Published by the Carnegie Institution of Washington; eight volumes, 1921-36), III:li; IV:xlix; V:lv; VI:xliii.

[7] [7] Connecticut Journal [New Haven], 16 May 1782, 3.

[8] [8] According to Webster’s New International Dictionary, a person or resident of Connecticut is known officially as a “Connecticuter.”

[9] [9] Jesse Root to Jeremiah Wadsworth, 9 September 1779, in ibid., IV:413-14.

[10] [10] Jesse Root to Jeremiah Wadsworth, 6 October 1779, in ibid., IV:476.

[11] [11] Jesse Root to Oliver Ellsworth, 25 December 1780, in ibid., V:497.

[12] [12] United States, Continental Congress, “Journal of the United States in Congress Assembled, Containing the Proceedings from the First Monday in November 1782, to the First Monday in November 1783. Volume VIII. Published by Order of Congress” (Philadelphia: Printed by David C. Claypoole, 1783), 59, 76.

[13] [13] “Friday, December 20, 1782,” The Pennsylvania Packet, Or, The General Advertiser [Philadelphia], 6 May 1783, 3.

[14] [14] “Hartford, Nov. 12,” The Connecticut Journal: Containing the Freshest Advices, Foreign and Domestic [New Haven], 12 November 1787, 3.

[15] [15] Root, Jesse, “Reports of Cases Adjudged in the Superior Court and Supreme Court of Errors, from July A.D. 1789 to June A.D. 1793; With a Variety of Cases Anterior to that Period. Prefaced with Observations upon the Government and Laws of Connecticut. To which is Subjoined, Sundry Law Points Adjudged, and Rules of Practice Adopted in the Superior Court. By Jesse Root, a Judge of the Superior Court” (Hartford, CT: Printed by Hudson and Goodwin; two volumes, 1798-1802). One of the cases which Root in fact did sit on begins at I:116.

[16] [16] Connecticut, “Acts and Laws, Made and Passed in and by the General Court or Assembly of the State of Connecticut, in America, Holden at New-Haven, (in said State) on the Second Thursday of October, A.D. 1799” (Hartford: Printed by Hudson and Goodwin, 1799), 515.

[17] [17] “Green’s Almanack and Register, for the State of Connecticut; for the Year of our Lord, 1799; Being the Twenty-third of the Independence of the United States” (New-London: Printed and Sold by Samuel Green, 1798), 40.

[18] [18] Trumbull, J. Hammond, “Historical Notes on the Constitutions of Connecticut, 1639-1818: Particularly on the Origin and Progress of the Movement which Resulted in the Convention of 1818 and the Adoption of the Present Constitution” (Hartford: Brown & Gross, 1873), 51-52.

[19] [19] Connecticut Herald, and General Advertiser [New Haven], 23 February 1819, 3.

[20] [20] American Mercury [Hartford, Connecticut], 8 April 1822, 3. See also The Times, and Hartford Advertiser [Connecticut], 2 April 1822, 3.

[21] [21] Marshall, Edward Chauncey, “The Ancestry of General Grant, and Their Contemporaries” (New York: Sheldon & Co., 1869), 63. See also Andrews, Henry Porter, “The Descendants of John Porter, of Windsor, Conn.” (Saratoga Springs, NY: Printed for the Compilers by G.W. Ball, 1882), 53.

Citation Types

MLA 9th
"Jesse Root (1736–1822)." Continental Congresses, edited by Mark Grossman, Salem Press, 2016. Salem Online, online.salempress.com/articleDetails.do?articleName=Cong_0367.
APA 7th
Jesse Root (1736–1822). Continental Congresses, In M. Grossman (Ed.), Salem Press, 2016. Salem Online, online.salempress.com/articleDetails.do?articleName=Cong_0367.
CMOS 17th
"Jesse Root (1736–1822)." Continental Congresses, Edited by Mark Grossman. Salem Press, 2016. Salem Online, online.salempress.com/articleDetails.do?articleName=Cong_0367.