Philip Freneau

Philip Morin Freneau (January 2, 1752 – December 18, 1832) was an American poet, nationalist (also known as Federalist), polemicist, sea captain and newspaper editor sometimes called the "Poet of the American Revolution".

Freneau was born in New York City, the oldest of the five children of Huguenot wine merchant Pierre Freneau and his Scottish wife. Philip was raised in Monmouth County, New Jersey, where he studied under William Tennent, Jr., whose friend at Princeton was James Madison, a relationship that would later contribute to his establishment as the editor of the National Gazette. Freneau family tradition suggests that Madison became acquainted with and fell in love with the poet's sister, Mary, during visits to their home while he was studying at Princeton. While tradition has it that Mary rejected Madison's repeated marriage proposals, this anecdote is undocumented and unsupported by other evidence.

Freneau graduated Princeton in 1771, having written the poetical History of the Prophet Jonah, and, with Hugh Henry Brackenridge, the prose satire Father Bombo's Pilgrimage to Mecca. Following his graduation, he tried his hand at teaching, but quickly gave it up. He also pursued a further study of theology, but gave this up as well after about two years. As the Revolutionary War approached in 1775, Freneau wrote a number of anti-British pieces. However, by 1776, Freneau left America for the West Indies, where he would spend time writing about the beauty of nature. In 1778, Freneau returned to America, and rejoined the patriotic cause. Freneau eventually became a crew member on a revolutionary privateer, and was captured in this capacity. He was held on a British prison ship for about six weeks. This unpleasant experience (in which he almost died), detailed in his work The British Prison Ship, would precipitate many more patriotic and anti-British writings throughout the revolution and after. For this, he was named "The Poet of the American Revolution".

In 1790 Freneau married Eleanor Forman, and became an assistant editor of the New York Daily Advertiser. Soon after, Madison and Secretary of State Thomas Jefferson worked to get Freneau to move to Philadelphia in order to edit a partisan newspaper that would counter the Federalist newspaper The Gazette of the United States. Jefferson was criticized for hiring Freneau as a translator in the State Department, even though he spoke no foreign languages except French, in which Jefferson was already fluent. Freneau accepted this undemanding position, which left free time to head the Democratic-Republican newspaper Jefferson and Madison envisioned.

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