His descendants held positions of trust and responsibility under the State, his grandson and great-grandson being each in his turn governor of Rhode Island. The latter, Gov. Samuel Ward, has the distinction of being the only Colonial governor who refused to take the oath to enforce the Stamp Act. As the Chief Executive of “little Rhody” was chosen by the people, his views were naturally more democratic than those of governors appointed by the crown. Still, it took courage to refuse to obey the royal mandate. He early foresaw the separation from Great Britain and wrote to his son in 1766, “These Colonies are destined to an early independence, and you will live to see my words verified.” He was a member of the Continental Congresses of 1774 and 1775. The latter resolved itself into a committee of the whole almost every day, and Governor Ward was constantly called to the chair on such occasions, until he was seized with fatal illness, March 13, 1776, dying soon afterward. At this time vaccination had not been discovered, the only preventive of the terrible scourge of smallpox being inoculation. Now Governor Ward could not spare time for the brief illness which this process involved. In addition to his duties in Congress he was obliged, owing to the physical disability of his colleague, Gov. Stephen Hopkins, to conduct all the official correspondence of the Rhode Island delegation, with the Government and citizens of the colony. His services were required on many committees, notably on the secret committee which contracted for arms and munitions of war. Hence, worn down by overwork, he fell an easy victim to smallpox. He died three months before his colleagues signed the Declaration of Independence. As he early saw the necessity of separation from the mother country, he would certainly have affixed his signature to it had he lived. His descendants may be pardoned for thinking that he made a great mistake in not taking the time required for inoculation. Many of Governor Ward’s letters have been preserved. These show his ardent patriotism as well as the devout religious spirit of the men of 1776. He writes to his brother: “I have realized with regard to myself the bullet, the bayonet, and the halter; and compared with the immense object I have in view they are all less than nothing. No man living, perhaps, is more fond of his children than I am, and I am not so old as to be tired of life; and yet, as far as I can now judge, the tenderest connections and the most important private concerns are very minute objects. Heaven save my country! I was going to say is my first, my last, and almost my only prayer.” Gov. Samuel Ward was a Seventh-Day Baptist. The little church in which he worshiped at Newport has all the charm of the best architecture of that period. It now forms part of the Historical Society’s rooms.