Editing William Henry Harrison (section)

==Early life and education==
William Henry Harrison was the seventh and youngest child of [[Benjamin Harrison V]] and Elizabeth (Bassett) Harrison. Born on February 9, 1773, at [[Berkeley Plantation]], the home of the [[Harrison family of Virginia]] on the [[James River]] in [[Charles City County, Virginia|Charles City County]],{{sfn|Dowdey|1957|pp=291–315}} he became the last [[President of the United States|United States president]] not born as an American citizen.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://touringohio.com/profiles/harrison.html|title=William Henry Harrison|publisher=Touring Ohio, Heart of America|access-date=November 18, 2021}}</ref> The Harrisons were a prominent political family of English descent whose ancestors had been in [[Virginia]] since the 1630s.<ref name= "Smith">{{cite book|editor-last1=Smith|editor-first1=Howard|editor-last2=Riley|editor-first2=Edward M.|title=Benjamin Harrison and the American Revolution|publisher=Virginia Independence Bicentennial Commission|series=Virginia in the Revolution|year=1978|location=Williamsburg, VA|pages=59–65|oclc=4781472}}</ref> His father was a Virginia [[Planter class|planter]], who served as a delegate to the [[Continental Congress]] (1774–1777) and who signed the [[United States Declaration of Independence|Declaration of Independence]].<ref name= "Smith"/> His father also served in the Virginia legislature and as the fifth governor of Virginia (1781–1784) in the years during and after the [[American Revolutionary War]].<ref name= "Smith"/> Harrison's older brother [[Carter Bassett Harrison]] represented Virginia in the House of Representatives (1793–1799).<ref>{{cite web|title=Carter Bassett Harrison|work=Biographical Directory of the United States Congress|publisher=U.S. Congress|url=http://bioguide.congress.gov/scripts/biodisplay.pl?index=H000266|access-date=September 14, 2016}}</ref> William Henry often referred to himself as a "child of the revolution", as indeed he was, having grown up in a home just {{convert|30|mi|abbr=on}} from where Washington won the war against the British in the [[Battle of Yorktown]].<ref name="Freehling">{{Cite web| last=Freehling| first=William| title=William Henry Harrison: Life Before the Presidency| url=https://millercenter.org/president/harrison/life-before-the-presidency| publisher=Miller Center of Public Affairs, University of Virginia| location=Charlottesville, Virginia| access-date=March 8, 2019| date=October 4, 2016}}</ref>

Harrison was tutored at home until age 14 when he attended [[Hampden–Sydney College]], a [[Presbyterianism|Presbyterian]] college in [[Hampden Sydney, Virginia]].<ref name= "Smith"/><ref name=Perrysburg>{{cite web|url=https://www.historicperrysburg.org/wh-harrison|title=W. H. Harrison biography|publisher=Perrysburg, Ohio|access-date=November 13, 2021}}</ref> He studied there for three years, receiving a classical education that included Latin, Greek, French, logic, and debate.{{sfn|Gugin|St. Clair|2006|p=18}}{{sfn|Madison|Sandweiss|2014|p=45}} His Episcopalian father removed him from the college, possibly for religious reasons, and after brief stays at an academy in [[Southampton County, Virginia]], and with his elder brother [[Benjamin Harrison VI|Benjamin]] in Richmond, he went to [[Philadelphia]] in 1790.{{sfn|Owens|2007|p=14}}

His father died in the spring of 1791, and he was placed in the care of [[Robert Morris (financier)|Robert Morris]], a close family friend in Philadelphia.<ref name= "Rabin">{{Cite news|url=https://www.thedp.com/article/2017/01/william-henry-harrison-history|title=A Penn graduate in the Oval Office|last=Rabin|first=Alex|date=January 25, 2017|work=[[The Daily Pennsylvanian]]|access-date=April 3, 2019}}</ref> He studied medicine at the [[University of Pennsylvania]]. During his time at Penn, he studied with Doctor [[Benjamin Rush]], a [[Founding Father of the United States]] and a Penn professor of chemistry and medicine and [[William Shippen Sr.]]<ref name= "Rabin"/> His older brother inherited their father's money, so he lacked the funds for his further medical schooling, which he had also discovered he didn't prefer.<ref name="Freehling"/> He therefore withdrew from Penn, though school archives record him as a "non-graduate alumnus of Penn's medical school class of 1793".<ref name= "Rabin"/> With the influence of his father's friend, Governor [[Henry Lee III]], he embarked upon a military career.{{sfn|Langguth|2007|p=16}}

===Early military career===
On August 16, 1791, within 24 hours of meeting Lee, Harrison, age 18, was commissioned as an [[Ensign (rank)#United States|ensign]] in the Army and assigned to the [[First American Regiment]].{{sfn|Gugin|St. Clair|2006|p=19}} He was initially assigned to [[Fort Washington (Ohio)|Fort Washington]], [[Cincinnati]] in the [[Northwest Territory]] where the army was engaged in the ongoing [[Northwest Indian War]].{{sfn|Owens|2007|pp=14, 16, 22}} Biographer [[William W. Freehling]] says that young Harrison, in his first military act, rounded up about eighty thrill-seekers and troublemakers off Philadelphia's streets, talked them into signing enlistment papers, and marched them to Fort Washington.<ref name="Freehling"/>

Harrison was promoted to [[first lieutenant (United States)|lieutenant]] after Major General [[Anthony Wayne|"Mad Anthony" Wayne]] took command of the western army in 1792, following a disastrous defeat under [[Arthur St. Clair]].{{sfn|Gugin|St. Clair|2006|p=19}} In 1793, he became Wayne's [[aide-de-camp]] and acquired the skills to command an army on the frontier;<ref name=Perrysburg/> he participated in Wayne's decisive victory at the [[Battle of Fallen Timbers]] on August 20, 1794, which ended the Northwest Indian War.{{sfn|Owens|2007|pp=23–26}} He received the following commendation from Wayne for his role in the battle: "I must add the name of my faithful and gallant Aide-de-camp&nbsp;... Lieutenant Harrison, who&nbsp;... rendered the most essential service by communicating my orders in every direction&nbsp;... conduct and bravery exciting the troops to press for victory."<ref name="Freehling"/> Harrison was a signatory of the [[Treaty of Greenville]] (1795), as witness to Wayne, the principal negotiator for the U.S.{{sfn|Gugin|St. Clair|2006|p=19}} Under the terms of the treaty, a coalition of Indians ceded a portion of their lands to the federal government, opening two-thirds of [[Ohio]] to settlement.<ref>{{cite book |last=Nelson |first=Paul David |year=1985 |title=Anthony Wayne, Soldier of the Early Republic |publisher=Indiana University Press |location=Bloomington, IN |isbn=0253307511 |url=https://archive.org/details/anthonywaynesold00nels/page/282 |page=[https://archive.org/details/anthonywaynesold00nels/page/282 282] }}</ref>{{sfn|Owens|2007|pp=21, 28–30}}

At his mother's death in 1793, Harrison inherited a portion of his family's Virginia estate, including approximately {{convert|3000|acre|km2}} of land and several slaves. He was serving in the Army at the time and sold the land to his brother.{{sfn|Owens|2007|p=39}} Harrison was promoted to [[Captain (United States O-3)|captain]] in May 1797 and resigned from the Army on June 1, 1798.{{sfn|Burr|1840|pp=67–69}}

===Marriage and family===
Harrison met [[Anna Harrison|Anna Tuthill Symmes]] of [[North Bend, Ohio]] in 1795 when he was 22. She was a daughter of Anna Tuthill and Judge [[John Cleves Symmes]], who served as a colonel in the Revolutionary War and as a representative to the [[Congress of the Confederation]].{{sfn|Madison|Sandweiss|2014|p=46}} Harrison asked the judge for permission to marry Anna but was refused, so the couple waited until Symmes left on business. They then eloped and were married on November 25, 1795, at the North Bend home of Stephen Wood, treasurer of the Northwest Territory.{{sfn|Owens|2007|pp=38–39}} They honeymooned at [[Fort Washington (Cincinnati, Ohio)|Fort Washington]], since Harrison was still on military duty.{{sfn|Owens|2007|p=40}} Judge Symmes confronted him two weeks later at a farewell dinner for General Wayne, sternly demanding to know how he intended to support a family. Harrison responded, "by my sword, and my own right arm, sir".<ref>{{cite book |url=https://archive.org/details/greatpresidentia00dole |url-access=registration |page=[https://archive.org/details/greatpresidentia00dole/page/222 222] |title=Great Presidential Wit: – I Wish I was in this Book |publisher=Scribner |location=New York |isbn=978-0-7432-0392-0 |last1=Dole |first1=Bob |author-link=Bob Dole|year=2001 }}</ref> The match was advantageous for Harrison, as he eventually exploited his father-in-law's connections with land speculators, which facilitated his departure from the army.<ref name="Freehling"/> Judge Symmes' doubts about him persisted, as he wrote to a friend, "He can neither bleed, plead, nor preach, and if he could plow I should be satisfied."<ref name="Freehling"/> Matters eventually became cordial with the father-in-law, who later sold the Harrisons {{convert|160|acres|ha}} of land in North Bend, which enabled Harrison to build a home and start a farm.{{sfn|Owens|2007|p=40}}

Anna was frequently in poor health during the marriage, primarily because of her many pregnancies, yet she outlived William by 23 years, dying on February 25, 1864, at 88.{{sfn|Gugin|St. Clair|2006|p=18}}{{sfn|Owens|2007|p=56}}

The Harrisons had ten children:

*Elizabeth Bassett (1796–1846)
*John Cleves Symmes (1798–1830), who married the only surviving daughter of [[Zebulon Pike]]
*Lucy Singleton (1800–1826)
*William Henry Jr. (1802–1838)
*[[John Scott Harrison|John Scott]] (1804–1878), father of future U.S. president [[Benjamin Harrison]]<ref>{{cite web|url=https://bioguide.congress.gov/search/bio/H000272|title=John Scott Harrison|publisher=U. S. Congress|access-date=January 26, 2022}}</ref> 
*Benjamin (1806–1840)
*Mary Symmes (1809–1842)
*Carter Bassett (1811–1839)
*Anna Tuthill (1813–1865)
*James Findlay (1814–1817)<ref>{{Cite web|title=William Henry Harrison: Fast Facts| url=https://millercenter.org/president/harrison| publisher=Miller Center of Public Affairs, University of Virginia| access-date=March 9, 2019| date=September 26, 2016}}</ref>

Professor Kenneth R. Janken, in his biography of [[Walter Francis White]], claims that Harrison had six children by an enslaved African-American woman named [[Dilsia (slave)|Dilsia]] and gave four of them to a brother before running for president to avoid scandal. The assertion is based on the White family's oral history.<ref>{{cite book|first=Kenneth Robert|last=Janken|title=White: The Biography of Walter White: Mr. NAACP|location=New York|publisher=The New York Press|year=2003|page=3|isbn=978-1-5658-4773-6}}</ref><ref>{{cite news |last1=Phillips |first1=Amber |title=Warren Harding and 5 other presidents who have faced 'love child' questions |url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2015/08/13/warren-harding-and-the-5-other-presidents-who-have-faced-love-child-questions/ |newspaper=[[The Washington Post|Washington Post]] |date=August 13, 2015}}</ref> In her 2012 biography of Harrison, author [[Gail Collins]] describes this as an unlikely story, although White believed it to be true.{{sfn|Collins|2012|p=103}}