William Heath (March 2, 1737 – January 24, 1814) was an American farmer, soldier, and political leader from Massachusetts who served as a major general in the Continental Army during the American Revolutionary War.
Life and career
Heath made his home for his entire life at his family's farm in Roxbury, Massachusetts (present day Jamaica Plain, Massachusetts, part of the city of Boston). He was born on a farm that had been settled in 1636 by his ancestors. He became active in the militia, and was a captain of the Roxbury Company of the Suffolk County militia regiment in 1760. By 1770 he was the regiment's colonel and its commanding officer.
In 1765 he was elected as a member of the Ancient and Honorable Artillery Company of Massachusetts and was elected as the company's lieutenant in 1768 and as its captain in 1770.
In December 1774 the revolutionary government in Massachusetts commissioned him as a brigadier general. -->
He was admitted as an original member of The Society of the Cincinnati in the state of Massachusetts when it was established in 1783.
After the war, Heath was a member of the Massachusetts Convention that ratified the United States Constitution in 1788. He served in the Massachusetts Senate from 1791 to 1792, and as a probate court judge. He was also a candidate for Congress in 1792 and 1798, and was the Democratic-Republican nominee in the 1799 gubernatorial election. In 1806 he was elected the Lieutenant Governor of Massachusetts, but declined the office. A street in the west Bronx is named in his honor.