Langdon, Woodbury
Langdon, Woodbury
LANGDON, WOODBURY. (1738?–1805). Patriot merchant, congressman. New Hampshire. Elder brother of John Langdon, Woodbury also acquired wealth before the Revolution but unlike his brother, took the conservative side. He kept Portsmouth, New Hampshire, out of the nonimportation agreement of 1769, but was nevertheless elected to the Provincial Congress in 1775. At the outbreak of war, Langdon went to England on financial business. He returned in the summer of 1777 to New York City, where the British insisted he stay. By the end of 1777 he had escaped back to New Hampshire. The legislature elected him to Congress in 1779, but he refused to attend longer than one year. He served as a justice on the superior court from 1782, but was impeached in 1790 for not attending to duty. The electorate rejected his candidacy for a congressional seat in 1796 and 1797. He was married to Sarah, neé Sherburne. He died on 13 January 1805 in Portsmouth.
SEE ALSO Langdon, John.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Adams, Steve. "Woodbury Langdon." In New Hampshire: Years of Revolution. Edited by Peter E. Randall. Portsmouth, N.H.: Profiles Publishing, 1976.
Upton, Richard F. "John Langdon and John Sullivan: A Biographical Essay." In New Hampshire: The State That Made Us a Nation. Edited by William M. Gardner, Frank C. Mevers, and Richard F. Upton. Portsmouth, N.H.: Peter E. Randall, 1989.
revised by Frank C. Mevers