Joshua Fisher - Revolutionary War and Family

Revolutionary War and Family

During the Revolution, much of Fisher's inventory of merchandise was commandeered by the military to support the revolutionary cause, but Fisher was not fully reimbursed for it. In 1779 his son Thomas and a slave worker were taken hostage from Fisher's farm in lower Delaware by the British, and Fisher was obliged to pay a ransom of 100 bullocks. As many Quakers did during the Revolution, he maintained a neutral position with respect to the fledgling country's conflicts, and he and his family suffered as a consequence. In 1777 Fisher's sons were ordered by the authorities to produce their firm's business records but they refused, and since they were Quakers they refused to swear an oath of allegiance. As a consequence sons Thomas, Samuel, Meirs were exiled to Winchester, Virginia along with several other Quakers, and kept under house arrest for a year. Although they were treated somewhat harshly they survived without severe illness, but their brother-in-law Thomas Gilpin and John Hunt died. After evacuation of the British, the group of Quakers were eventually pardoned and allowed to return to Philadelphia by order of George Washington and the Congress.

Fisher's son Samuel continued to show opposition to the revolutionary cause, and in 1779 he and was arrested on the charge of being a Tory on the basis of a letter he sent to his brother Jabez Maud on a ship unable to land in New York Harbor. Samuel exacerbated the situation by not recognizing the authority of the court and was sent to jail for 2 years. Fisher was by then too ill to be taken from his home and the charges against him were dropped. Fisher's sons continued the mercantile business and son Samuel continued the packet line to London, capturing business with catalogs of textiles and manufactured items, and the family continued to be prosperous. Fisher's great-grandson was Joseph Wharton, a prominent industrialist who founded the Wharton School of Business.