John Penn

John Penn (22 February 1760 – 21 June 1834) was an English politician and writer who was the chief proprietor of the Province of Pennsylvania from 1775 to 1776. He and his cousin, John Penn ("John Penn, the Governor") held unsold property, of , which the Pennsylvania legislature confiscated after the American Revolution. Penn lived in Philadelphia for five years after the Revolution, from 1783 to 1788, building a country house just outside the city. He returned to Great Britain in 1789 after receiving his three-fourths portion of £130,000, the compensation for the proprietorship by the Pennsylvania government. He and his cousin, John Penn, who remained a resident in US, received compensation from Parliament for their losses in the former colony. In 1798, he was appointed as High Sheriff of Buckinghamshire and served as a Member of Parliament (1802–1805). He was appointed in 1805, as governor of the Isle of Portland. Also a writer, he published in a variety of genres. Life He was born in London, England, the son of Thomas Penn and his wife Lady Juliana Fermor Penn (the daughter of Thomas Fermor, first earl of Pomfret), elder brother to Granville Penn, and a grandson of William Penn, founder of Pennsylvania. He studied at Eton College. On the death of his father in 1775, he succeeded to his father's interests, and inherited three quarters of the proprietorship of Pennsylvania. The other quarter of the proprietorship belonged to his cousin, also named John Penn, the colonial governor of the province. The Penns later lost the proprietorship as a result of the American Revolution.