Colonial Despatches

Jonathan Carver joined Major Robert Rogers's mission to discover the fictional Northwest Passage in 1766.1 Soon thereafter, their journey was cut short when Rogers was arrested under charges of treason and embezzlement.2 Carver received little payment for the charts and journals that he produced on this mission, and his financial troubles followed him through life.3

Prior to his failed mission with Rogers, Carver was a captain in the Massachusetts militia and was present at the siege of Fort William Henry, in 1757.4 Carver kept a journal, and while much of his information is vauable, he has been criticized for embellishments and falsifications of events.5

Carver married twice, once in 1746 and again around 1774; he had a total of 7 children.6 He was survived by both of his wives when he died in 1780.7

• 1. Troy O. Bickham, Carver, Jonathan, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography.
• 2. Ibid.
• 3. Ibid.
• 4. Ian Kenneth Steele, Betrayals: Fort William Henry and the Massacre (New York: Oxford University Press, 1990), 158.
• 5. Troy O. Bickham, Carver, Jonathan, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography.
• 6. Ibid.
• 7. Ibid.