Nicholas Greenberry

Nicholas Greenberry (* 1627 in England , † December 17, 1697 in Annapolis , Maryland) was an English colonial governor of the Province of Maryland .

Life

Nicholas Greenberry came to Maryland, England, a free man with his wife and two children in 1674. There is no information in the sources about his life before this point in time. The family settled in Anne Arundel County , where Nicholas worked as a planter and trader. In Maryland at the time there was a religious conflict between Catholics and Protestants. The colony was once founded by the Calvert family (Lords Baltimore) as a purely Catholic settlement. Over the decades, more and more Protestants immigrated to the colony. This increased tension between these groups. As a result of the Glorious Revolution in England, there was also a revolution in Maryland under the leadership of John Coode . The until then dominant family Calvert (Lords Baltimore) was expropriated and disempowered. The Catholic Church, which had been influential until then, was also robbed of its strong position. Now the Protestants dominated, including Greenberry. However, tensions in the colony continued. Greenberry took over leading positions in Anne Arundel County after the revolution of 1688/89 and he was meanwhile a member of the upper house of the colonial parliament. Between 1691 and 1697 he was a member of the council of the colony. In 1693 and 1694 he was its president. During this time he represented Edmund Andros as acting governor of the colony . One of his domestic political opponents was Thomas Lawrence , who was twice acting governor of Maryland. After the end of his governorship, Greenberry continued to hold leading positions in colonial administration until his death. At the time of his death, he was a wealthy man with considerable land and financial wealth.

Web links

• Greenberry in the Archives of Maryland
• Online Sketch about Greenberry
• Nicholas Green Berry in the database of Find a Grave (English)