Richard Biddle (1796-1847)

He was born in Philadelphia and graduated from the University of Pennsylvania (1811). During the War of 1812, he served as a volunteer in the Washington Guards. After the war, he studied law and was admitted to the bar in 1817, practicing in Pittsburgh. He went to England in 1827 and remained there for three years during which time he published a critical "Review of Captain Basil Hall's Travels in North America" and "A Memoir of Sebastian Cabot, with a Review of the History of Maritime Discovery". From 1837, he was twice elected as an Anti-Masonic candidate to Congress, serving until his resignation in 1840 when he returned to Pittsburgh and the law. He married Ann Anderson and was survived by a son and a daughter.