Jonathan Belcher leaves office

Today in Masonic history Jonathan Belcher leaves the office of Governor of the Province of Massachusetts bay in 1741.

Jonathan Belcher was a merchant, businessman and politician during American Colonial times.

Belcher was born into a wealthy merchant family in Massachusetts. He attended Harvard College before entering the family business and local politics.

Belcher was able to get himself the governorship of both the Massachusetts and New Hampshire regions. During his tenure he made many political enemies by trying to marginalize those he saw as a political threat. This finally game to a head when two of his rivals successfully lobbied the Board of Trade to replace him in both New Hampshire and Massachusetts due to a border dispute between the two regions. During the dispute he claimed to be impartial in the events, when he was clearly siding with Massachusetts. It would later be discovered that he was allowing illegal logging on Crown lands by political allies.

Belcher was raised in an old "Guilde Lodge" in England in 1704. This was before the founding of the Grand Lodge of England in 1717. In Massachusetts he affiliated with St. Johns Lodge in Boston.

This article provided by Brother Eric C. Steele.