Henry Knox

Rare card · No. 64875

Henry Knox (July 25, 1750 – October 25, 1806) was an American military officer, politician, bookseller, and a Founding Father of the United States. Knox, born in Boston, became a senior general of the Continental Army during the Revolutionary War, serving as chief of artillery in all of George Washington's campaigns. Following the war, he oversaw the War Department under the Articles of Confederation from 1785 to 1789. Washington appointed him the nation's first secretary of war, a position which he held from 1789 to 1794. He is well known today as the eponym of Fort Knox in Kentucky, which is often conflated with the adjacent United States Bullion Depository. He was also known for being the first senior officer after George Washington. Knox was born and raised in Boston where he owned and operated a bookstore, cultivating an interest in military history and joining a local artillery company. He was also on the scene of the 1770 Boston Massacre. He was barely 25 when the Revolutionary War...

Read on Wikipedia · Image Charles Peale Polk, Public domain