Benjamin Homans

Benjamin Homans
Chief Clerk of the US Navy Department[1]
In office March 9, 1813[1] – December 1, 1823[1]
Appointed by	James Monroe
Preceded by	Charles W. Goldsborough[1]
Succeeded by	Charles Hay
4th Secretary of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts
In office 1810–1812
Succeeded by	Alden Bradford
Personal details
Children	I. Smith Homans[2]

Benjamin Homans was an American merchant captain,^[3] and politician who served as the 4th Massachusetts Secretary of the Commonwealth and who served from as the Chief Clerk of the Navy Department,^[1][2] which was at the time the second highest civilian position in the US Navy.

Early career

Homans had been a merchant captain during the 1780s and 1790s. During the Quasi war with France, because of the Sedition Act and he was an ardent Jeffersonian Homans went into exile in Bordeaux.^[3]

War of 1812

Prior to the 1814 British attack, and Burning of Washington during the War of 1812, it was Homans, along with Dolley Madison who removed two wagon loads of the Navy Department's archives; including saving Charles Willson Peale's classic portrait of George Washington.^[2]

Notes

1. McKee, Christopher (1991), A Gentlemanly and Honorable Profession: The Creation of the U.S. Naval Officer Corps, 1794-1815, Annapolis, Maryland: Naval Institute Press, p. 17.
2. Elmer H. Youngman, ed. (September 1921), The Bankers Magazine, Volume CIII, no 3, New York, New York: The Bankers Publishing Co., p. 430.
3. McKee, Christopher (1991), A Gentlemanly and Honorable Profession: The Creation of the U.S. Naval Officer Corps, 1794-1815, Annapolis, Maryland: Naval Institute Press, pp. 17–18.