Alumni of the College of William and Mary

Richard Bland, a student in 1725, was the first to announce in a formal pamphlet in 1764 that England and the American colonies were co-ordinate kingdoms under a common crown. Dabney Carr, a student in 1762, backed the resolutions in 1775 for Committees of Correspondence, the first step toward united action by the colonies. Peyton Randolph, a student in 1735, served as Speaker of the House of Burgesses from 1766 to 1775 and as the first President of the Continental Congress in 1774. Carter Henry Harrison, a scholar of the grammar school in 1753, wrote the resolutions of Cumberland County on April 22, 1776, the first positive instructions for Continental independence. George Washington, commander-in-chief of the Continental armies and first President of the United States, was appointed by the College to his first and last public offices, as County Surveyor in 1749 and as College Chancellor from 1789 to 1799. Thomas Jefferson, a student from 1760 to 1762, authored the Declaration of Independence on July 4, 1776. George Wythe, a student in 1746, signed the Declaration of Independence and became the first Professor of Law in the United States in 1779. John Tyler, Sr., a student in 1765, authored the resolutions in the Virginia Assembly in 1786 for the Convention at Annapolis. Edmund Randolph, a student in 1766, authored the Virginia Plan, which guided the proceedings of the Constitutional Convention at Philadelphia in 1787.

Williamsburg, Virginia · United States