Huntington, Thomas

honorific(s): Mr.
Birth: January 13, 1744 or 1745 in Norwich, CT
Death: February 22, 1835 in Canaan, CT
Affiliation

Yale College

Education

Yale (1768)

Nationality

Anglo-American

Occupation

Doctor and merchant

Residence(s)
  • Ashford, CT (from 1769 to 1799)
  • Canaan, CT (from 1801 to 1835-02-22)
Marital status

Married Mary Ward in 1773. They had five sons and three daughters. Seven of their children lived to adulthood.

Biography

Thomas Huntington was Eleazar Wheelock’s maternal cousin. He graduated from Yale in 1768, and, in the spring of 1769, he went on a brief mission with Levi Frisbie and John Mathews to relieve Samuel Kirkland among the Oneidas at Kanawalohale. However, the situation at the time was so volatile that Kirkland could not leave, and Huntington went home after a month. After deciding that a missionary career was not for him, Huntington built a sizable fortune in Ashford, CT, through medicine and trade. He eventually settled in Canaan, CT, where he lived to the age of 91 while practicing medicine and business. Franklin Dexter, the biographer of Yale’s graduates, characterizes him as “somewhat eccentric.”

Sources

Chase, Frederick. A history of Dartmouth College and the Town of Hanover, New Hampshire. 1891. Dexter, Franklin Bowditch. Biographical sketches of the graduates of Yale College. Volume 3: May, 1763-July, 1778. New York: Henry Holt and Company, 1903. Accessed via GoogleBooks. Love, Deloss. Samson Occom and the Christian Indians of New England. Pilgrim Press 1899.