BIO: Joseph MONTGOMERY, Dauphin County, PA

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Commemorative Biographical Encyclopedia of Dauphin County, 
Containing Sketches of Representative Citizens, and Many of the 
Early Scotch-Irish and German Settlers.  Chambersburg, Pa.: 
J. M. Runk & Company, 1896, page 176.
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  MONTGOMERY, JOSEPH, son of John and Martha Montgomery, emigrants from 
Ireland, was born September 23, 1733 (O. S.), in Paxtang township, then 
Lancaster, now Dauphin county, Pa.  He was educated at the College of 
New Jersey, from which he graduated in 1755, and was afterwards 
appointed master of the grammar school connected with the college.  In 
1760 the College of Philadelphia and Yale College conferred upon him 
the Master's degree.  About this time he was licensed to preach by the 
Presbytery of Philadelphia, and soon after, by request, entered the 
bounds of the Presbytery of Lewes, from which he was transferred to 
that of New Castle, accepting a call from the congregations at 
Georgetown, over which he was settled from 1767 to 1769.  He was 
installed pastor of the congregations at Christiana Bridge and New 
Castle, Del., on the 16th of August, 1769, remaining there until the 
autumn of 1777, when he resigned, having been commissioned chaplain of 
Colonel Smallwood's (Maryland) regiment of the Continental Line.  
During the war his home was with his relatives in Paxtang. On the 23d 
of November, 1780, he was chosen by the General Assembly of 
Pennsylvania one of its delegates in Congress, and re-elected the 
following year.  He was elected a member of the Assembly of the State 
in 1782, serving during that session.  He was chosen by that body, 
February 25, 1783, one of the commissioners to settle the difficulty 
between the State and the Connecticut settlers at Wyoming.  When the 
new county of Dauphin was erected the Supreme Executive Council 
appointed him recorder of deeds and register of wills for the county, 
which office he held from March 11, 1785, to October 14, 1794, the date 
of his death.  "Mr. Montgomery filled conspicuous and honorable 
positions in church and State in the most trying period of the early 
history of the country.  In the church he was the friend and associate 
of men like Witherspoon, Rogers and Spencer, and his bold utterances in 
the cause of independence stamp him as a man of no ordinary courage and 
decision . . . He enjoyed to an unusual degree the respect and 
confidence of the men of his generation."  The Rev. Mr. Montgomery was 
twice married; married, first, in 1765, Elizabeth Reed, died March 
1769, daughter of Andrew and Sarah Reed, of Trenton, J. J.  Mr. 
Montgomery married, secondly, July 11, 1770, Rachel (Rush) Boyce, born 
1741, in Byberry; d. July 28, 1798, in Harrisburg, Pa.; widow of Angus 
Boyce, and daughter of Thomas and Rachel Rush.