{{Short description|British diplomat and politician}} {{For|the Bishop of Swansea and Brecon|Benjamin Vaughan (bishop)}} {{Use dmy dates|date=October 2016}} {{Use British English|date=October 2016}} {{infobox person |name = Benjamin Vaughan |image = Benjamin Vaughan.jpg |birth_date = {{birth date|1751|4|19|df=y}} |birth_place = Colony of Jamaica, British Empire |death_date = {{death date and age|1835|12|8|1751|4|19|df=y}} |death_place = Hallowell, Maine, United States |alma_mater = Newcome's School<br />Warrington Academy<br />Trinity Hall, Cambridge |occupation = Commissioner, politician |spouse = {{marriage|Sarah Manning|1781}} |parents = Samuel Vaughan<br />Sarah Hallowell |relatives = William Vaughan (brother)<br />John Vaughan (brother) }}
'''Benjamin Vaughan''' MD FRSE LLD (19 April 1751 – 8 December 1835)<ref name="rayment">{{Rayment-hc|c|1|date=March 2012}}</ref> was a British political radical. He was a commissioner in the negotiations between Britain and the United States at the drafting of the Treaty of Paris.{{Citation needed|reason=Was he a commissioner?|date=June 2023}}
==Life== Vaughan was born in Jamaica to Samuel Vaughan, a British banker and West India merchant planter of Irish Protestant descent, and his Anglo-American wife, Sarah Hallowell, daughter of shipbuilder, Benjamin Hallowell.<ref name="ucl.ac.uk">{{Cite web|url=https://www.ucl.ac.uk/lbs/person/view/2146643669|title=Summary of Individual | Legacies of British Slavery|website=www.ucl.ac.uk}}</ref>
He was educated at Newcome's School and Warrington Academy and attended Trinity Hall, Cambridge, without graduating.<ref name="HoP">[http://www.historyofparliamentonline.org/volume/1790-1820/member/vaughan-benjamin-1751-1835 ''Vaughan, Benjamin (1751-1835), of Finsbury Square, London.''] historyofparliamentonline.org</ref> He then studied medicine at the University of Edinburgh. In 1785, during his stay in Edinburgh, he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh. His proposers were Allan Maconochie, Lord Meadowbank, Dugald Stewart, and James Hutton.<ref>{{cite book|title=Biographical Index of Former Fellows of the Royal Society of Edinburgh 1783–2002|date=July 2006|publisher=The Royal Society of Edinburgh|isbn=0-902-198-84-X|url=https://www.royalsoced.org.uk/cms/files/fellows/biographical_index/fells_indexp2.pdf|access-date=4 January 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160304074135/https://www.royalsoced.org.uk/cms/files/fellows/biographical_index/fells_indexp2.pdf|archive-date=4 March 2016|url-status=dead}}</ref>
His broader long-term interest was in politics and sciences, the latter leading to his friendship with Benjamin Franklin.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.bartleby.com/1/1/4.html|title=Paras. 151-200. Benjamin Franklin. 1909-14. His Autobiography. The Harvard Classics|website=www.bartleby.com|date=25 August 2022 }}</ref> In 1786, Vaughan was elected a member of the American Philosophical Society in Philadelphia, to which his father, Samuel Vaughan, had been elected a member two years prior.<ref>{{Cite web|title=APS Member History|url=https://search.amphilsoc.org/memhist/search?creator=benjamin+vaughan&title=&subject=&subdiv=&mem=&year=&year-max=&dead=&keyword=&smode=advanced|access-date=2020-12-16|website=search.amphilsoc.org}}</ref>
Vaughan was a political economist, merchant and medical doctor. Through Benjamin Horne, brother of John Horne, he met the politician Lord Shelburne.<ref>Edmond George Petty-Fitzmaurice, Baron Fitzmaurice, ''Life of William, Earl of Shelburne, afterwards first Marquess of Lansdowne'' vol. 2 (1912), p. 165 note 3; [https://archive.org/stream/lifeofwilliam02fitziala#page/n191/mode/2up archive.org.]</ref> Shelburne then used Vaughan in a diplomatic role, to try to bring peace between Great Britain and the United States, towards the end of the American War of Independence. He was also a middleman in reconciling Franklin and Shelburne.
He was elected at a by-election in 1792 as a Member of Parliament (MP) for the borough of Calne in Wiltshire, and held the seat until the 1796 general election (he was absent from 1794). He spoke in parliament in strong defence of slavery in Jamaica, in his maiden speech. However, in February 1794, he came out in favour of the abolition of the slave trade.<ref name="HoP"/> He felt that since slaves could no longer be repressed by ignorance and fear, they should be given inducements not to rebel.<ref name="HoP"/> During his period in London he lived in Finsbury Square. He was arrested in 1794 on grounds of treason, regarding the supposed invasion of England by the French.<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://www.historyofparliamentonline.org/volume/1790-1820/member/vaughan-benjamin-1751-1835|title=VAUGHAN, Benjamin (1751-1835), of Finsbury Square, London. | History of Parliament Online|website=www.historyofparliamentonline.org}}</ref>
After 1794, Vaughan left France for Switzerland and later to America. His interest in republicanism lead to his permanent departure from Britain. He settled in Boston and then on a farm in Hallowell, Maine in 1797.
He is thought to be the builder (or related to the builder) of Hallowell House in Boston, and it is possible his Jamaican links give rise to the district being called Jamaica Plain.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.digitalcommonwealth.org/search/commonwealth:v405t118m|title=Hallowell house, Jamaica Plain|website=www.digitalcommonwealth.org}}</ref>
In 1805, Vaughan was elected a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences,<ref name=AAAS>{{cite web|title=Book of Members, 1780–2010: Chapter B|url=http://www.amacad.org/publications/BookofMembers/ChapterB.pdf|publisher=American Academy of Arts and Sciences|accessdate=28 July 2014}}</ref> and in 1813, he was elected a member of the American Antiquarian Society.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.americanantiquarian.org/memberlistv|title=MemberListV | American Antiquarian Society|website=www.americanantiquarian.org}}</ref>
He died in Hallowell in 1835.
==Family== 150px|thumb|Coat of Arms of Benjamin Vaughan Vaughan married in 1781 to Sarah Manning, daughter of William Manning (died 1791), and sister of William Manning.<ref>{{cite web |title=William Manning senior ???? - 1791, Legacies of British Slavery |url=https://www.ucl.ac.uk/lbs/person/view/2146645245 |website=www.ucl.ac.uk}}</ref> They had several children, including: * Harriet Manning Vaughan (1782–1798) * William Oliver Vaughan (1784–1826), who married Mary Argy (1786–1856) * Sarah Vaughan (1785–1847) * Henry Vaughan (1786–1806) * Petty Vaughan (1788–1854) * Lucy Vaughan (1790–1869), who married William Emmons (1784–1855) * Elizabeth Frances Vaughan (1793–1855), who married Samuel Clinton Grant (1796–1853)
The family and their descendants remained in Maine after Vaughan settled in Hallowell in 1797<ref>[http://www.masshist.org/findingaids/doc.cfm?fa=fa0040 Vaughan Family Papers] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131126215604/http://www.masshist.org/findingaids/doc.cfm?fa=fa0040 |date=26 November 2013 }}. Massachusetts Historical Society</ref> and continue to reside in the town today.<ref>[http://vaughanhomestead.org/welcome-to-the-vaughan-homestead/ Historic Homestead]. vaughanhomestead.org</ref>
John Vaughan and William Vaughan were his brothers.
==Legacy==
Several places are named after Vaughan:
* City of Vaughan, Ontario is in his honour * Indirectly Vaughan Road is linked to him as the northern end of the road headed into then Township of Vaughan. * Vaughan Road Academy, named after Vaughan Road * Vaughan Stream in Hallowell, Maine<ref>[http://historichallowell.mainememory.net/page/2467/display.html Historic Hallowell]. historichallowell.mainememory.net</ref> * Vaughan Field in Hallowell * Vaughan Homestead, his Hallowell estate, now a museum * Vaughan Secondary School until name change to Hodan Nalayeh Secondary School in 2021
==References== {{Commons category|Benjamin Vaughan}} {{reflist}}
{{s-start}} {{s-par|gb}} {{s-bef | before = John Morris | before2 = Joseph Jekyll }} {{s-ttl | title = Member of Parliament for Calne | years = 1792 – 1796 | with = Joseph Jekyll }} {{s-aft | after = Sir Francis Baring, Bt | after2 = Joseph Jekyll }} {{s-end}}
{{Authority control}}
{{DEFAULTSORT:Vaughan, Benjamin}} Category:1751 births Category:1835 deaths Category:British diplomats Category:Jamaican emigrants to the United Kingdom Category:Merchants from the British West Indies Category:19th-century English medical doctors Category:British republicans Category:British emigrants to the United States Category:Fellows of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences Category:People from Hallowell, Maine Category:People from Boston Category:Members of the Parliament of Great Britain for Calne Category:British MPs 1790–1796 Category:19th-century American people Category:People educated at Newcome's School Category:Alumni of Trinity Hall, Cambridge Category:18th-century Jamaican politicians Category:Fellows of the Royal Society of Edinburgh Category:Members of the American Philosophical Society