Rufus McIntire


Rufus McIntire was a United States lawyer, captain of artillery in the War of 1812, congressman, land surveyor and prisoner of war.

Biography

Early life

Rufus McIntire was born on December 19, 1784 at York, Massachusetts. He attended South Berwick Academy and was graduated from Dartmouth College in 1809.

Career

Rufus McIntire was admitted to the York County Bar Association in 1812, but when the war with Great Britain intervened, he was commissioned as a captain of a United States Army artillery company during the War of 1812. McIntire's troops were deployed in northern New York State and Canada and were engaged in significant battles at Sackets Harbor and Crysler's Farm.
He was a voting member in the Brunswick Convention of 1816. In 1820, the year Maine acquired statehood, he was elected to the Maine House of Representatives. He was appointed as a boundary commissioner in 1826 and elected as a United States congressman to replace the deceased William Burleigh in the Twentieth United States Congress serving in the Twenty-first, Twenty-second, and Twenty-third U.S. Congresses from September 10, 1827 through 1835. He ran for governor of Maine in 1837. He served as the State Land Agent in 1839 and 1840 and was captured by the British during the Aroostook War. He was appointed as United States Marshall for Maine in 1845 by President James K. Polk and was appointed Surveyor of Customs in Portland, Maine by President Franklin Pierce from 1853 through 1857.
He died in Parsonsfield, Maine on April 28, 1866 and is buried in Middleroad Cemetery.

Philosophical and/or political views

Rufus McIntire was a member of the Jacksonian Party.

Marriage and family

Rufus McIntire married Nancy Rolfe Hannaford in 1819. They had eight children, three of whom died in infancy. After Nancy’s death on February 2, 1830, Rufus married her sister, Mary B. Hannaford in 1832. They had two children.