Chief Justice Benjamin CHEW b. 19 NOV 1722 Anne Arundel Co., Maryland d. 20 JAN 1810 Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

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Prefix	Chief Justice
Birth	19 Nov 1722	Anne Arundel Co., Maryland
Gender	Male
Religion	Quaker; later Episcopal.
Died	20 Jan 1810	Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
Buried	St. Peter's Churchyard, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
Age	87 years
Person ID	I7909	Pitards and Lansdales
Last Modified	11 Mar 2007

Father	Dr. Samuel CHEW, b. 30 Aug 1699, d. 16 Jun 1744 (44 years)
Mother	Mary GALLOWAY, b. 5m 15, 1697, d. 26 May 1734 (37 years)
Married	22 Oct 1715	West River Meeting, Anne Arundel Co., Maryland
Family ID	F5624	Group Sheet

Family 1 Mary GALLOWAY, b. 1729

Married 13 Jun 1747 West River, Anne Arundel Co., Maryland

Children

>	1. Sarah "Sally" CHEW, b. 1753, d. 1826 (73 years)
>	2. Harriet CHEW, b. 22 Oct 1775, d. 8 Apr 1861 (85 years)

Family ID F5628 Group Sheet

Family 2 Elizabeth OSWALD, b. Abt 1732, d. Abt 1819 (~ 87 years)

Married 1757

Children

>	1. Margaret Oswald CHEW, b. 16 Dec 1760, d. 29 May 1824, Baltimore Co., Maryland (63 years)

Family ID F6397 Group Sheet

Notes

This couple had 9 children. He was Chief Justice of the Pennsylvania Supreme Court from 1774-1777. His family papers are at the Historical Society of Pennsylvania; see http://www.cliveden.org for information--you can download much information about the family here. See also his biography in the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (rev. 2004), and the American National Biography for more information.

According to the Wikipedia:

Benjamin Chew (November 19, 1722 – January 20, 1810) was the Chief Justice of colonial Pennsylvania.
Chew was the son of a doctor, Samuel Chew, and Mary Galloway Chew (1697-1734). He was born in Anne Arundel County, Maryland, at his father's estate of Maidstone.
Chew read law in the office of Andrew Hamilton at Philadelphia in 1738. After Hamilton's death on August 4, 1741, Chew visited his father's new home, in Kent County, Delaware before going abroad. He studied law at the Inns of Court in London, and returned to America in 1744. He began to practice law in Dover, Delaware in 1746, but moved to Philadelphia in 1754. He was raised as a Quaker, but became an Anglican after he argued that the use of force in self-defense should be allowed.
He held a number of offices in the Pennsylvania colonial government, both elected and appointed. In 1751, he served on the Boundary Commission that supervised the creation of the Mason-Dixon line. He was Speaker of the House for the Delaware counties from 1753 to 1758, Attorney General and member of the Council of Pennsylvania (1754-1769), and Chief Justice of the Supreme Court (1775-1777).
Chew married twice. He wed Mary Galloway (1729-1755), his mother's niece, on June 13, 1747 at West River, Maryland. They had five daughters (Mary, Anna Maria, Elizabeth, Sarah, and Henrietta) before she died. He married again on September 12, 1757 to Elizabeth Oswald, and had nine more children (Benjamin, Margaret, Joseph, Juliana, Henrietta, Sophia, Maria, Harriet, and Catherine).
He built his estate, named Cliveden, at Germantown, Pennsylvania between 1763 and 1767. This house gained fame during the Battle of Germantown, when it was known as the Chew House. It still stands as an historic site, and is open to the public.
Early in the American Revolution, both sides claimed his allegiance, since he had a visible position in the Colony. Chew himself was apparently undecided about the correct course to take. In August of 1777 he was arrested along with Governor John Penn, and taken to Union, New Jersey. He was released at Union after giving his parole that he wouldn't try to leave the area. On May 15, 1778 the Continental Congress passed a resolution that released him from that parole, and he returned to his home.
After independence, Chew was the President of Pennsylvania's Court of Appeals from 1791 until he retired in 1806. He died at Germantown and is buried in Philadelphia's St. Peters Churchyard.

Sources

[S162] Maryland Historical Magazine, L. Morris Leisenring, 207.
[S180] The Political Graveyard, Lawrence Kestenbaum.
[S290] American National Biography OnLine.
[S288] Wikipedia.
[S289] Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, (Oxford: Oxford University Press).
[S305] Cliveden of the National Trust, The National Trust.

Chief Justice Benjamin CHEW[1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6] 1722 - 1810

Chief Justice Benjamin CHEW^{[1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6]}
1722 - 1810