Thomas Mifflin

Thomas Mifflin was born into a prominent Quaker merchant family in Philadelphia in 1744 and received an education befitting his class before entering the family mercantile business. His Quaker upbringing sat uneasily with his political temperament, and he broke with the pacifist traditions of his faith to embrace the Patriot cause enthusiastically as the conflict with Britain intensified. He was elected to the Continental Congress in 1774 and quickly became one of its most energetic members, using his considerable personal charisma and speaking ability to recruit soldiers and build support for the military effort.

Mifflin served as Washington's first aide-de-camp and later as the Continental Army's first Quartermaster General, a position in which he was responsible for supplying the army's food, equipment, and transportation. His performance in this role was uneven at best, and he faced serious accusations of corruption and mismanagement during the darkest years of the war. He was associated with the Conway Cabal, the 1777-1778 movement among some officers and congressmen to replace Washington with Horatio Gates, a connection that permanently damaged his relationship with the commander in chief. Nonetheless, Mifflin continued in public life and was elected President of the Continental Congress in 1783, placing him in the chair at one of the most symbolically important moments of the entire Revolutionary era. On December 23, 1783, he presided over Washington's resignation of his military commission in the Maryland State House at Annapolis, accepting on behalf of the republic the sword that Washington surrendered and completing the formal transfer from military to civilian authority.

Mifflin went on to serve as the first governor of Pennsylvania under the Constitution of 1790, holding that office until 1799. He proved a capable if occasionally erratic executive, navigating Pennsylvania through the Whiskey Rebellion and the turbulent politics of the early republic. He died in 1800, his historical significance anchored most securely to the moment he received Washington's resignation, a ceremony that defined the American model of civil-military relations.