Artemas Ward (November 26, 1727 – October 28, 1800) was an American major general in the American Revolutionary War and a Congressman from Massachusetts. He was considered an effective political leader, President John Adams describing him as "universally esteemed, beloved and confided in by his army and his country." Early lifer Artemas Ward was born at Shrewsbury in the Province of Massachusetts Bay in 1727 to Nahum Ward (1684–1754) and Martha (Howe) Ward. He was the sixth of seven children. His father had broad and successful career interests as a sea captain, merchant, land developer, farmer, lawyer and jurist. As a child he attended the common schools and shared a tutor with his brothers and sisters. He graduated from Harvard in 1748 and taught there briefly. On July 31, 1750, he married Sarah Trowbridge (December 3, 1724 – December 13, 1788), the daughter of Reverend Caleb Trowbridge and Hannah Trowbridge of Groton. The young couple returned to Shrewsbury where Artemas opened a general store. In the next fifteen years they would have eight children: Ithamar in 1752, Nahum (1754), Sara (1756), Thomas (1758), Artemas Jr. (1762), Henry Dana (1768), Martha (1760), and Maria (1764). Career Township accessor In 1751, at age 23 or 24, he was named a township assessor for Worcester County, the first of many public offices he was to fill. In 1752 he was elected a justice of the peace and to the first of many terms in the Massachusetts provincial assembly, or "general court." Military career French and Indian War (1754–1758) Between 1755 and 1757, Ward was called to active duty at intervals that alternated with his attendance at the General Court. In 1755 the Massachusetts militia was restructured for the war; Ward was made a major in the 3rd Regiment which drew its company mainly from Worcester County. The 3rd primarily served as a garrison force along the frontier in western Massachusetts. In 1757 he was promoted to regimental colonel of the 3rd Regiment of the militias of Middlesex and Worcester counties. In 1758 the regiment marched with Abercrombie's force to sortie on Fort Ticonderoga, but Ward was sidelined during the campaign by an "attack of the stone." Between wars By 1762, Ward returned to Shrewsbury permanently and was named to the Court of Common Pleas. In the General Court (the provincial assembly) he, with Samuel Adams and John Hancock, was appointed to the taxation