James Alexander
(1691-1756)
BIRTH
1691
PLACE
Muthill
DEATH
1756
PLACE
Province of New York
FAMILY
FATHER
William Alexander
(1726-1783)
WIFE
Mary Alexander
(1693-1760)
HOMES
RELIGIOUS VIEWS
RELIGION NOT DOCUMENTED
DENOMINATION NOT DOCUMENTED
MEMBERSHIPS
AMERICAN PHILOSOPHICAL SOCIETY MEMBER, KINGS COLLEGE NEW YORK COFOUNDER, NEW JERSEY GOVERNORS COUNCIL MEMBER, NEW YORK GOVERNORS COUNCIL MEMBER, NEW YORK SOCIETY LIBRARY COFOUNDER
AWARDS
James Alexander was a Scottish-born lawyer and colonial official who lived from 1691 to 1756. In New York he worked as a surveyor, served on the provincial council and became involved in opposition to Governor William Cosby. He helped defend printer John Peter Zenger in the 1730s, before being disbarred from that case. He married merchant Mary Spratt Provoost; their son William became the Continental general known as Lord Stirling. His legal papers survive in archives.
EARLY LIFE
James Alexander was born 1691 in Muthill. The external genealogical record identifies David Alexander, of Muthill as a parent. Surviving structured biographical sources provide limited detail about childhood, education, household routines, or the economic circumstances in which this person grew up.
The available external biographical record associates James Alexander with the following work or social roles: lawyer, politician. These labels provide the clearest documented basis for describing this person’s public or economic activity. James Alexander died 1756 in Province of New York. Additional claims about employment, officeholding, military service, or accomplishments have been omitted where the consulted record did not support them.
CAREER
DEATH
In New York he worked as a surveyor, served on the provincial council and became involved in opposition to Governor William Cosby. The available external biographical record associates James Alexander with the following work or social roles: lawyer, politician. James Alexander died 1756 in Province of New York. The available biographical account does not describe a continuous final medical course. It gives no dependable sequence of treatment and last symptoms from which to reconstruct a more detailed bedside narrative.
POPULAR BIOGRAPHIES
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