Oliver Partridge

Oliver Partridge (1712-1792) was a military commander, politician and early American patriot. He represented Massachusetts at the Albany Congress of 1754, and at the Stamp Act Congress of 1765 where he supported resistance to the British Stamp Act in the events leading up to the American Revolution.

Partridge was born in Hatfield, Massachusetts to a family of English colonial officers and magistrates. He was a member of the Dudley-Winthrop Family, known for their involvement in colonial politics. He was a great-grandson of Massachusetts Royal Governor Simon Bradstreet and a great-great-grandson of Massachusetts Governor and Harvard founder Thomas Dudley. He was the only son of Colonel Edward Partridge, and grandson of Colonel Samuel Partridge. His grandson, Edward Partridge (1793 – 1840), was an early convert to the Latter Day Saints and the church's first Presiding Bishop. His great-grandson Edward Partridge Jr. was a member of the Utah Legislature and the Utah Constitutional Convention of 1895 which ratified Utah statehood.

His commanding position among the "River Gods" or ruling families of Western New England is reflected in his ranking 2nd in his Yale class of 1730 at a time when Harvard and Yale graduates were ranked according to their family’s social standing. Oliver’s uncle, Col. Elisha Williams, of the influential Williams clan that later founded Williams College, was the president of Yale College during Partridge’s student years there, reading law and surveying. President William's The Essential Rights and Liberties of Protestants (1744) is one of the most powerful articulations of the English Natural Law position and though published after Partridge's graduation, similar views on natural liberty were likely imbibed by Partridge under the tutelage of his uncle. Col. Williams went on to serve as a judge on Connecticut's Supreme Court. In 1734 Partridge married Anna Williams, the daughter of the Reverend William Williams of Weston and was appointed joint Clerk of the Court of Hampshire County. He also served as a selectman of Hatfield almost every year from 1731 to 1774 and again in 1780–81; a representative in the Massachusetts General Court 1741, 1761, and 1765-1767; and High Sheriff of Hampshire County from 1741-1743.

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