Moses Younglove

b. April 23, 1752 Somerset County, NJ                       d. January 31, 1829 Hudson, NY

Revolutionary Service: Brigade Surgeon, Tryon County Militia under General Nicholas Herkimer; captured in Oriskany Battle. 
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Captured During the Revolution, Doctor, Proponent of Smallpox Vaccine

Dr. Younglove was taken prisoner at the Battle of Oriskany August 6, 1777 and carried to Canada. He suffered greatly at the hands of his Indian captors and had a lifelong antipathy toward them. The following from the 1778 Deposition of Moses Younglove in the Annals of Tryon County recounts the cruelty of the British officer who turned Moses over to the Mohawk allies who were fighting alongside the British. It also recounts Younglove’s loyalty to the new nation.

“That this deponent was brought before [Colonel John Butler, a Loyalist officer], who demanded of him what he was fighting for? to which deponent answered: 'He fought for the liberty that God and nature gave him, and to defend himself and dearest connexions from the massacre of the savages.' To which Butler replied: 'You are a damned impudent rebel!' and so saying immediately turned to the savages, encouraging them to kill him, and if they did not, the deponent and the other persons should be hanged on the gallows....”

Dr. Younglove and his wife Polly Patterson Younglove (1762-1847) had no children, but adopted their niece Polly who went on to marry Elam Tilden and become the mother of Samuel Jones Tilden. Samuel Tilden was governor of New York and an unsuccessful presidential candidate against Rutherford B. Hayes. Tilden won the popular vote, but lost in the electoral college, the first time in a presidential election in American history.