Turner, Peter, 1751-1822

Peter Turner was born September 2, 1751, in Newark, New Jersey, son of Dr. William Turner (1712-1754) and Mehitable Foster (b. 1715). In 1754, Peter's father died, and Peter was placed in the care of his half-brother, Dr. Jabez Campfield (1737-1821), who was his mother's son with the deceased Benjamin Campfield. On March 17, 1776, he married Eliza Child and they had at least four children: Daniel, Henry, Mehitable, and James. In 1777, Turner volunteered as a surgeon in the 1st Rhode Island regiment under Colonel Christopher Greene (1737-1781), serving for three years, including at Red Bank, Rhode Island, and Valley Forge, Pennsylvania. Postwar, he ran a large surgical practice in East Greenwich, Rhode Island. He died following a stroke on February 14, 1822.

Jabez Campfield was born December 24, 1737. According to his own statement made when applying for a federal pension in 1818, he was appointed surgeon of Colonel Spencer's Continental Regiment on January 1, 1777. He continued in this position until June 1780, when he became surgeon of the Light Infantry under Colonel Matthias Ogden, and served until early 1781. His commission as surgeon of the Second Continental Light Dragoons was dated August 17, 1781; he served in this regiment until the close of the war, June 15, 1783, and was discharged at Danbury, Connecticut. Campfield married Sarah Wood, and by 1818, he lived in Morristown, New Jersey. He died there on May 20, 1781.

Samuel Tenny served as surgeon's mate of Gridley's Regiment of Massachusetts Artillery, June to December 1775. He was surgeon of the 11th Continental Infantry in 1776, and the next year, appointed surgeon of the 2nd Rhode Island Infantry. He served through the end of the war with this regiment, being retained by Olney's Rhode Island Battalion in April 1783. He was discharged December 25, 1783, and died February 6, 1816.

From the guide to the Peter Turner papers, Turner, Peter papers, 1774-1789, (William L. Clements Library, University of Michigan)