was in violation of the Navigation Acts, and some was supposedly conducted with pirates. However he made his money, he became one of the wealthiest men in Massachusetts in the 1680s and 1690s. To promote the family's status, he sent his son to the Boston Latin School in 1691, and then Harvard College in 1695, where Belcher was listed second (the order of listing being a rough indication of a family's importance) behind Jeremiah Dummer. Belcher and Dummer both went on to political careers in the province, sometimes as allies, but also as opponents. Belcher's five sisters all married into politically or economically prominent families, forging important connections that would further his career. In January 1705/06 Belcher married Mary Partridge, the daughter of former New Hampshire Lieutenant Governor William Partridge, an occasional business partner of his father's. The couple had three children (Andrew, Sarah, and Jonathan) before she died in 1736. His brother-in-law through this marriage was the painter Nehemiah Partridge. Agent for his father's commercial empire Belcher graduated from Harvard at the age of 17, and then entered into his father's business. The trading empire his father built encompassed trade from the West Indies to Europe, and included shares or outright ownership of more than 15 ships. In the spring of 1704 Belcher's father sent him to London to cultivate business contacts of his own, and to secure military supply contracts. After forging relations based on his father's letters of introduction in London, Belcher traveled to the Netherlands to do the same with Dutch merchants, and to begin a tour of western Europe. After seeing the sights of Rotterdam and Amsterdam he traveled to Hanover, where he was received by Electress Sophia and met the future King of Great Britain, George, Duke of Brunswick-Lüneburg. After calling on the Prussian court in Berlin, he returned to New England. During these travels he was exposed to a variety of religious practices, but found regular comfort in Christian services most similar to the Calvinist-leaning New England Congregational Church. He eventually came to see himself as a defender of that faith practice, which permeated his political life. During the years of the War of the Spanish Succession (whose North American theater is also known as Queen Anne's War), Belcher's father was retained as a major supplier to the colonial militia and served as the province's commissary general. Belcher was involved in the management