Name: John Hart147 
   Born: prob 1713
  Place: Hopewell, Hunterdon co, New Jersey
   Died: May 11, 1779
  Place: Hunterdon co, New Jersey

"Honest" John Hart was one of the signers of the Declaration of Independence. Earlier in the year, as a member of the New Jersey Provincial Congress, he signed this thirty shillings note. His wife, Deborah Scudder, died in October of the same year.

John's signature as it appears on the Declaration of Independence:

John Hart served with the Continental Congress for only about three months. Once independence was declared, and like other delegates to the Congress (Jefferson included), Hart felt he would best serve the new nation by returning home and working in the state assembly. It was at the state level, the delegates felt, the real action was occurring. It's largely because of his short tenure in Congress, advanced age (he was 64 at the time of the signing) and early death that he is not better known. But also, very little of his writing has been found. Transcriptions of his five surviving letters appear in Cleon Hammond's biography of Hart. This one appears on page 147:

Princeton, N.J.
September 12, 1776

To Francis Hopkinson, Esq.

Dear sir: I have now before me your favor of the 7th instant. I am sorry that you intend to resign the appointment of such an important office as one of the Judges of the Supreme Court of this State at this critical crisis when the assistance of every good man is wanted to add strength to our new Constitution, to which I know you are a staunch friend. Notwithstanding yours to me is to be considered as a private letter, I thought the public so much interested in the affair that I could not refrain letting some of your and my particular friends know something of your intention. They are no more at a loss to guess than myself what is the reason that you decide to accept. But as it is now out of our powers to make any alteration, they are desirous that you will please reconsider the matter and are of the opinion with me that it is best for you, as well as the public, to take upon yourself the office. I wish it was in my power to have a personal conference with you on this important affair, but as it is not at present, I must conclude with leaving these few broken hints to your serious consideration.

Great regard, your sincere friend
and humble servant,
John Hart

1848 Biographical Sketch

From Lives of the Signers of the Declaration of Independence (1848), by B J Lossing, pages 87-89 (WallBuilder Press edition):

One of the most unbending patriots of the Revolution was John Hart, the New Jersey farmer. His father, Edward Hart, was also a thrifty farmer, and a loyal subject of his King. In 1759 he raised a volunteer corps, which he named "The Jersey Blues," and joined Wolfe at Quebec in time to see that hero fall, but the English victorious. He then retired to his farm, and every afterward held a high place in the esteem and confidence of the people. The time of birth of his own son is not on record, and but few incidents of his early life are known.¹

Mr. Hart pursued the avocation of his father, and was in quite independent circumstances when the Stamp Act and its train of evils attracted his attention, and aroused his sympathies for his oppressed countrymen in Boston, and elsewhere, where the heel of tyranny was planted. Although living in the secluded agricultural district of Hopewell, in Hunterdon county, yet he was fully conversant with the movements of public affairs at home and abroad, and he united with others in electing delegates to the Colonial Congress that convened in New York city, in 1765. From that time, until the opening scenes of the war, Mr. Hart was active in promoting the cause of freedom; and his fellow citizens manifested their appreciation of his services, by electing him a delegate to the first Continental Congress, 1774. He was re-elected in 1775, but finding that his estate and family affairs needed his services, he resigned his seat, and for a time retired from public life. He was, however, elected a member of the Provincial Congress of New Jersey, and was Vice President of that body.

The talents of Mr. Hart were considered too valuable to the public, to remain in an inactive state, and in February, 1776, he was again elected a delegate to the General Congress. He was too deeply impressed with the paramount importance of his country's claims, to permit him to refuse the office; and he took his seat again in that body, and voted and signed the Declaration of Independence.

Nothing would have seemed more inimical to Mr. Hart's private interests, than this act, which was the harbinger of open hostilities, for his estate was peculiarly exposed to the fury of the enemy. Nor was that fury withheld when New Jersey was invaded by the British and their mercenary allies, the Hessians. The signers of the Declaration everywhere were marked for the vengeance, and when the enemy made their conquering descent upon New Jersey,² Mr. Hart's estate was among the first to feel the effects of the desolating inroad.³ The blight fell, not only upon his fortune, but upon his person, and he did not live to see the sunlight of Peace and Independence gladden the face of his country. He died in the year 1780 (the gloomiest period of the War of Independence), full of years and deserved honors.

[Footnotes from original text]

1. His contemporaries represent him as about sixty years of age when first elected to Congress. If so, he must have been born about the close of the reign of Queen Anne, 1714.
2. After the capture of Fort Washington, on York Island, in November, 1776, Lord Cornwallis crossed the Hudson at Dobb's Ferry, with six thousand men, and attacked Fort Lee opposite. To save themselves, the Americans were obliged to make a hasty retreat, leaving behind them their minions of war and all their stores. The garrison joined the main army at Hackensack which for three weeks fled across the level country of New Jersey, before the pursuing enemy, at the end of which time a bare remnant of it was left. The troops dispirited by late reverses, left in large numbers as fast as their term of enlistment expired, and returned to their homes; and by the last of November the American army numbered scarcely three thousand troops, independent of a detachment left at White Plains, under General Lee. The country was so level that it afforded no strong position to fortify; indeed, so necessarily rapid had been the retreat, that no time was allowed for pause to erect defenses. Newark, New Brunswick, Princeton, Trenton, and smaller places, successively fell into the hands of the enemy, and so hot was to pursuit, that the rear of the Americans was often in sight of the van of the British. On the eight of December, Washington and his army crossed the Delaware in boats, and Cornwallis arrived at Trenton just in time to see the last boat reach the Pennsylvanian shore. -- "1776, or the War of Independence," page 209.
3. Mr. Hart's family, having timely warning of the approach of the enemy in pursuit of Washington, fled to a place of safety. His farm was ravaged, his timber destroyed, his cattle and stock butchered for the use of the British army, and he himself was hunted like a noxious beast, not daring to remain two nights under the same roof. And it was not until Washington's success at the battle of Trenton, that this dreadful state of himself and his family ended.

Obituary

The following transcription of Hart's obituary was lifted from http://www.barefootsworld.net/johnhart.html.

May 19, 1779 - The New Jersey GAZETTE said: "On Tuesday the 11th instant, departed this life at his seat in Hopewell, JOHN HART, Esq., the Representative in General Assembly for the county of Hunterdon, and late Speaker of that House. He had served in the Assembly for many years under the former government, taken an early and active part in the present revolution, and continued to the day he was seized with his last illness to discharge the duties of a faithful and upright patriot in the service of his country in general and the county he represented in particular. The universal approbation of his character and conduct among all ranks of people, is the best testimony of his worth, and as it must make his death regretted and lamented, will ensure lasting respect to his memory."

Basic biographical data about John Hart can be found at

• wikipedia
• ushistory.org
• doublegv.com
• Conservapedia
• Barefoot's World

John Hart's "Portrait"

From Hammond's biography, page 106:

...it may come as a disappointment to many that the tradition "likeness" of John Hart does not, in fact, portray him. None of the evidence allows room for this possibility. On the contrary, all of the evidence is totally against it. Whose image Hall copied, or whether he simply fabricated the "original," will never be known. It is also evident that the possibility of still finding an authentic likeness of Hart, hidden in someone's attic, is non-existent in view of the many fruitless searches that must have begun so after his death.

There had been a tradition that three of John Hart's grandsons, for whom portraits exist, looked a lot like him. Hammond hired Charles Howard Waterhouse to make this composite portrait. (The name is printed wrong on this page in the book.) Later, a photograph of Joseph Hart, John's grandson, was located. Hammond believed that it served as evidence that this likeness of Hart is fairly accurate. I rather doubt that it looks anything like he did.

Hammond says,

In his concept, Waterhouse has captured both the character and personality associated with Mr Hart, and certainly demonstrated by his many endeavors and achievements.

Keep in mid that Hart was 64 years old when he signed the Declaration of Independence. In both portraits, he is depicted as a man about thirty years or more younger.

I find little about Waterhouse on the web. Hammond says that he was wounded at Iwo Jima and served as a combat artist in Viet Nam.