Thornton, Matthew, 1714-1803

Matthew Thornton (March 3, 1714 – June 24, 1803) was an Irish-born Founding Father of the United States who signed the United States Declaration of Independence as a representative of New Hampshire.

Born in Ireland, Thornton's family immigrated to North America in 1716, first settling in Wiscasset, Maine before moving to Worcester, Massachusetts. Thornton completed studies in medicine at Leicester, Massachusetts, became a physician and established a medical practice in Londonderry, New Hampshire. He was appointed as a surgeon for the New Hampshire Militia troops in an expedition against Fortress Louisbourg in 1745. He served in the New Hampshire Provincial Assembly from 1758 to 1762, had royal commissions as justice of the peace, and served as colonel in the militia from 1775 until his resignation in 1779.

Thornton served as the President of the New Hampshire Provincial Congress in 1775, and from January to September 1776, as Speaker of the New Hampshire House of Representatives. He was elected to the Continental Congress after the debates on independence had occurred, but as he did not arrive in Philadelphia until November 1776, he was granted permission to actually sign the Declaration of Independence late. Thornton retired from his medical practice and in 1780 moved to Merrimack, New Hampshire, where he farmed and operated Thornton's ferry with his family. Although he did not attend law school, he served as a judge on the New Hampshire Superior Court from 1776 to 1782. In 1783, Thornton represented the towns of Merrimack and Bedford in the New Hampshire House of Representatives, and then Hillsborough County in the New Hampshire Senate from 1784 to 1787, while simultaneously serving as a State Councillor from 1785 to 1786, and as a state representative again for Merrimack in 1786.

Thornton died at the age of 89, while on a visit to his daughter in Newburyport, Massachusetts, in 1803. He is buried in Thornton Cemetery in Merrimack, and his cenotaph reads "The Honest Man."