John Stevens Jr. (c. 1715 – May 10, 1792) was a prominent colonial American landowner, merchant, and politician.
Early life
Stevens was born in 1715 at Perth Amboy in the Province of New Jersey in what was then British America.
Colonial politics
Stevens was a member of the New Jersey General Assembly in 1751. He served as paymaster of the 1st New Jersey Regiment (the "Jersey Blues") under Colonel Peter Schuyler from 1756 to 1760. In 1758, he was appointed by the Assembly of New Jersey to serve as a commissioner to the state's Indian tribes. In 1762, he was named a member of the New Jersey Provincial Council, a position that he resigned in 1770. When the act went into effect in 1765, he was one of a committee of four (with Robert Livingston, John Cruger Jr., and Beverly Robinson) to prevent the issue of stamps in New York City.
- John Stevens III (1749–1838), who married Rachel Cox, a descendant of the Langeveldts who originally settled New Brunswick, New Jersey. Rachel was the daughter of John Cox, Esq. of Bloomsbury, New Jersey, and the sister of Elizabeth Cox, who married Horace Binney.
His later years were spent with his son at Hoboken, where he died in May 1792. He was buried at the Frame Meeting House in Bethlehem Township, Hunterdon County, New Jersey.
Descendants
Through his son John, he was the grandfather of thirteen grandchildren, including John Cox Stevens (1785–1857), first commodore of the New York Yacht Club, Robert Livingston Stevens (1787–1856), the president of Camden and Amboy Railroad, James Alexander Stevens (1790–1873), Richard Stevens (1792–1835), Francis Bowes Stevens (1793–1812), Edwin Augustus Stevens (1795–1868), founder of Stevens Institute of Technology, Elizabeth Juliana Stevens (1797–1821), Mary Stevens (1799–1825), who was the first wife of Rear Admiral Joshua R. Sands, Harriet Stevens (1801–1844), who was the second wife of Joshua R. Sands, Esther Bowes Stevens (b. 1804), and Catherine Sophia Van Cortlandt Stevens (b. 1806).