Taylor, John (4)

a Revolutionary patriot and professor of natural philosophy and mathematics in Queen's College. He was elected by the trustees at their first meeting in 1771, and Rev. Dr. Jacobus Rutsen Hardenbergh was chosen as president. The college went into operation at once, and before the war several students were graduated. When the war broke out, these two illustrious men threw themselves ardently into the cause of independence. Professor Taylor drilled the students as a military company, and they were quite expert in the use of arms. The irruption of the British troops who occupied New Brunswick broke up the college. An advertisement is still extant that the exercises of the college would be continued at a private house at the head of the Raritan during one of these years. Subsequently professor Taylor became colonel of the New Jersey State regiment; but he continued to discharge his professional duties for a time. In a letter to governor Livingston, Sept. 25, 1779, he speaks of "the necessity of attending the examination of the students; and as the trustees insist upon my fulfilling my engagements, I hope I shall be discharged from the regiment as soon as possible." Of his subsequent life there is no public record accessible to the writer; but his name and relationship to the college are important and interesting as showing the patriotism of both officers and students of the infant college, and the close connection between enlightened academic education and the spirit of independence in that period of New Jersey history. Among those whom Prof. Taylor drilled in the company of students the most eminent was the first graduate of the college, Simeon De Witt, who was Washington's chief "geographer to the army," or topographical engineer, as the office is now termed. See Revolutionary Correspondence of N. J. p. 177; Hist. of Rutgers College. (W. J. R. T.)