Hopkinson, Francis (1737–91), born in Philadelphia, was the first student to enroll in the Academy of Philadelphia, and the first to receive a diploma from the College of Philadelphia. After studying law, and serving as collector of customs at Salem, N.J. (1763), he sailed for England to seek political preferment. He was unsuccessful, but on returning to the law rose rapidly, and was appointed to the New Jersey governor's council (1774) and elected to the Continental Congress (1776).
He was a distinguished harpsichordist and leader of Philadelphia musical society, and revised and composed music for Thomson and Mallet's
Alfred, a Masque, presented at the College of Philadelphia (1757). He published a collection of psalm tunes and a number of songs, and his later claim to “being the first Native of the United States who has produced a Musical Composition” is generally considered justified. His literary ability was exhibited in the many poems that he wrote in this early period, including
The Treaty (1761), an Indian poem;
Exercises for his college (1761, 1762);
Science (1762), prophesying a great future for the college; and
Dirtilla (1772), a humorous work. To the
Pennsylvania Magazine he also contributed a series of Addisonian essays, on subjects ranging from
A New Plan for Education to the state of bachelorhood. In 1774 he began his career as a political satirist with
A Pretty Story, and two years later he attacked the
Letters of Cato in
A Prophecy, which allegorically reviewed the contention with the mother country.
Meanwhile he was a signer of the Declaration of Independence, chairman of the Continental Navy Board (1776–78), treasurer of loans (1778–81), and judge of admiralty for Pennsylvania (1779–89). In
Letter Written by a Foreigner on the Character of the English Nation (1777), he satirized the peculiarities of the English. This was followed by
A Political Catechism (1777); a stirring “Camp Ballad”; and his
Answer to General Burgoyne's Proclamation (1777), burlesquing the general's manifesto. He further satirized the English in “
The Battle of the Kegs” (1778), the most popular of his writings, and “Date Obolum Bellisario” (1778), a poetical allegory in which wretched England, driven to beggary, tells of the grief caused her by her worthless son George. Hopkinson also satirized his fellow countrymen who sympathized with England, in
The Birds, the Beasts, and the Bat, a Hudibrastic fable on men who turn their allegiance according to the state of the military weather;
Two Letters (1776), supposedly written by a Tory, acknowledged the unscrupulous lies which the Americans were then attributing to the Loyalists; and
Letter to Joseph Galloway (1778) accused the prominent Loyalist of treachery to country and friends. Among other
jeux d'esprit was his publication of a mock advertisement of the King's Printer, Rivington, who it proclaimed was retiring after the surrender of Cornwallis, and auctioning off his stock of abusive books and maps.
During the war, Hopkinson also employed his several talents in writing
The Temple of Minerva (1781), a “dramatic allegorical cantata,” “consisting of an overture, arias, ensembles, and choruses in praise of the American alliance with France”; in designing seals for various departments of the new government, a number of coins and issues of paper money, and the American flag, known as the Stars and
Stripes. After the war, he was a federal judge in Pennsylvania, supported the Federalists in various writings, and published many literary essays, including
Modern Learning Exemplified (1784), satirizing educational fads, and
A Plan for the Improvement of the Art of Paper War (1786), ridiculing newspaper quarrels.
Seven Songs, for the Harpsichord or Forte‐Piano (1788), actually containing eight pieces, was the first book of music published by an American.
The Miscellaneous Essays and Occasional Writings was issued in 1792.
