Harrison Gray Otis, 1765–1848, American political leader, U.S. History, Biographies

Related Category: U.S. History, Biographies

Harrison Gray Otis 1765–1848, American political leader, b. Boston; nephew of James Otis. He practiced law in Boston, and was elected (1795) to the Massachusetts legislature. A staunch Federalist, he served (1797–1801) in Congress and was again a member of the state legislature from 1802 to 1817. In 1814 he was a leader of the Hartford Convention and subsequently defended that meeting. Otis was a U.S. Senator (1817–22) and mayor of Boston (1829–31). He published Letters Developing the Character and Views of the Hartford Convention (1820) and Otis' Letters in Defence of the Hartford Convention (1824).

See biographical study by S. E. Morison (1913, repr. 1969).