Rash's Surname Index
Notes for James O'HARA
James O'Hara, of a distinguished Milesian family, was a native of County Mayo, Ireland, where he was born in the early part of the year 1743. He received a classical education, and was intended for the priesthood. It was supposed that he had been a subordinate officer in the British service, but the records do not bear this out. In 1770 he was in a counting house in Liverpool, and a year or two after came to America along with some mercantile friends, and resided for a period in Philadelphia. In that city he became acquainted with persons engaged in the then lucrative occupation of Indian traders, and entered their service. For several years subsequently he was at Kaskaskund, an Indian town situated on a branch of the Big Beaver, in now Lawrence county, Pennsylvania. When the war of the Revolution began, his sympathies were with the colonies in that struggle, and his every exertion was used in behalf of preserving peace with the Indians on the western frontiers, who were chiefly inimical, being under the influence of the British military authorities on the Lakes. Familiar with gathering supplies for the frontiers, it is not surprising that his assistance was desirable in the crisis of affairs. In the journal of Congress, under date of November 6, 1777, it is ordered, "that two thousand dollars be advanced to Captain James O'Hara, at the request of the Board of War, for the purchase of supplies for the use of the independent companies at Fort Pitt under the command of Brigadier General Hand." From that period until the close of the war, he was an important personage upon the frontiers, and until the treaty at Fort Mcintosh, in 1784, when money was placed in his hands by the Government for the purchase of Indian goods, he is designated as "Captain." From this [p.147] we would infer that he had received the appointment of commissary of purchases, this being the special rank of that officer. The valuable services of Captain O'Hara were properly appreciated by the authorities; and later on, when it was found necessary to defend the frontiers from the savages from the northwest of the Ohio, he was appointed Quartermaster General of the Army. After the successful termination of General Wayne's campaign against the Indians, General O'Hara resigned, but continued as a contractor for supplying the Western Army until 1802. In 1796, in connection with Major Isaac Craig, he erected the first glass works at Pittsburgh. He was also engaged in commercial pursuits on the Ohio and Mississippi rivers. He was chosen a presidential elector in 1789. In 1802, and again in 1804, he was a candidate for Congress, but failed in an election, his party being in a hopeless minority. In 1804 he was appointed a director of the Branch Bank of Pennsylvania, established that year in Pittsburgh, and subsequently entered into various enterprises. He purchased, from time to time, large tracts of land from the State, and in all his business ventures was remarkably prosperous. He died at Pittsburgh, December 21, 1819, in the 67th year of his age. Few men in the West stood higher in the respect and confidence of the community than General O'Hara. He was the forerunner of that class of successful, energetic men who took early and firm hold of affairs and made Pittsburgh the great manufacturing emporium of Western Pennsylvania.
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