William Eustis was an early American physician, politician, and statesman from Massachusetts.
36 Facts About William Eustis
2.
William Eustis resumed medical practice after the war, but soon entered politics.
3.
William Eustis briefly returned to state politics after losing reelection in 1804, and was chosen to be Secretary of War in 1809 by President James Madison.
4.
William Eustis's Boston mansion, built in the 1750s by royal governor William Shirley, is known as the Shirley-Eustis House and is a National Historic Landmark.
5.
William Eustis was the second surviving son of twelve children.
6.
William Eustis was educated at the Boston Latin School before he entered Harvard College, from which he graduated in 1772.
7.
William Eustis served with the Continental Army in the New York and New Jersey campaign, refusing a lieutenant colonel's commission offered by artillery chief Henry Knox.
8.
In 1777 William Eustis was placed in command of a military hospital established at the former residence of Loyalist Beverley Robinson north of New York City, where he remained for the duration of the war.
9.
William Eustis was called on to serve in military matters when Shays' Rebellion broke out in western Massachusetts in 1786, becoming surgeon to the militia force raised by General Benjamin Lincoln that quashed the rebellion in the early months of 1787.
10.
William Eustis was admitted as an original member of the Society of the Cincinnati in the state of Massachusetts when it was established in 1783.
11.
William Eustis later served as Vice President of the Massachusetts Society from 1786 to 1810, and again from 1820 to 1821.
12.
William Eustis was elected to the Massachusetts General Court from 1788 to 1794, which he left because he was "sick of" the political gamesmanship in the body.
13.
William Eustis was thereafter chosen to serve on the Governor's Council for two years.
14.
William Eustis publicly denied being the author of the letters, but was silent on his role in the affair.
15.
William Eustis was a moderate Democratic-Republican who did not seek the significant reforms more radical Republicans wanted.
16.
William Eustis demonstrated this by voting against President Thomas Jefferson's repeal of the Judiciary Act of 1801, a Federalist bill passed in the late days of the John Adams administration that had greatly expanded the number of seats on the federal bench.
17.
In 1802 William Eustis was reelected, defeating John Quincy Adams, and in a rematch of the 1800 election with Quincy, William Eustis was defeated by fewer than 100 votes.
18.
William Eustis was not a good choice for the post, lacking the necessary administrative skills and detailed military background.
19.
William Eustis had difficult relations with James Wilkinson and Wade Hampton, two senior army commanders.
20.
William Eustis made a major push to update the military's field manuals, which had not changed since the Revolutionary War.
21.
William Eustis was next appointed minister of the United States to the Netherlands by President Madison, serving from 1814 to 1818.
22.
William Eustis unsuccessfully pursued claims against the Dutch for seizures of American goods and ships that had taken place during the reign of Louis Bonaparte over the Kingdom of Holland.
23.
William Eustis was elected a member of the American Antiquarian Society in 1815.
24.
William Eustis was at a disadvantage due to his lack of French language skill, and was recalled in 1818 after the Dutch government reduced its American delegation head to a charge d'affaires.
25.
William Eustis was again elected to Congress in a special election called after the resignation of Representative Edward Dowse.
26.
William Eustis served from 1820 to 1823, presiding as chairman of the US House Committee on Military Affairs.
27.
William Eustis ran unsuccessfully for Governor of Massachusetts three times, losing each time to the popular moderate Federalist John Brooks.
28.
In 1823 William Eustis won the seat in a highly contentious contest with the unpopular arch-Federalist Harrison Gray Otis.
29.
William Eustis carried Federalist strongholds in Hampshire and Essex Counties, and very nearly defeated in Otis in Boston.
30.
William Eustis died in Boston of pneumonia while governor on February 6,1825.
31.
Burr and William Eustis exchanged letters on the most intimate subjects, recommending potential romantic partners to each other and sharing a taste for well-educated women.
32.
William Eustis aided Burr on one occasion by helping him find accommodations for a young woman whose mother had been involved in an adulterous relationship with Alexander Hamilton; she was placed in a Boston-area boarding school.
33.
William Eustis was for many years a confirmed bachelor, described as urbane and charming.
34.
William Eustis married Caroline Langdon in 1801; they had no children.
35.
William Eustis was the sister of Henry Sherburne Langdon, who had married Eustis' sister Ann, and the daughter of Woodbury Langdon, a prominent Portsmouth, New Hampshire merchant and judge.
36.
William Eustis's wife survived him by forty years, after which his Boston property was divided among relatives.