Benjamin Homans

Benjamin Homans
Chief Clerk of the US Navy Department
In office March 9, 1813 – December 1, 1823
Appointed by	James Monroe
Preceded by	Charles W. Goldsborough
Succeeded by	Charles Hay
4th Secretary of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts
In office 1810–1812
Succeeded by	Alden Bradford
Personal details
Children	I. Smith Homans

Benjamin Homans was an American merchant captain, and politician who served as the 4th Massachusetts Secretary of the Commonwealth and who served from as the Chief Clerk of the Navy Department, which was at the time the second highest civilian position in the US Navy.

Homans had been a merchant captain during the 1780s and 1790s. During the Quasi war with France, because of the Sedition Act and he was an ardent Jeffersonian Homans went into exile in Bordeaux.

Prior to the 1814 British attack, and Burning of Washington during the War of 1812, it was Homans, along with Dolley Madison who removed two wagon loads of the Navy Department's archives; including saving Charles Willson Peale's classic portrait of George Washington.

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