John Greaton, born in Roxbury, Massachusetts, on the 10th of March,
1741, was an innkeeper prior to the Revolution, and an officer of the
militia of his native town. On the 12th of July, 1775, he was appointed
colonel in the regular army. During the siege of Boston, he led an
expedition which destroyed the buildings on Long Island in Boston
Harbor. In April, 1776, he was ordered to Canada, and in the following
December he joined Washington in New Jersey, but was subsequently
transferred to Heath’s division at West Point. He served to the end of
the war, and was commissioned brigadier-general on the 7th of January,
1783. Conscientiously performing all the duties assigned him, though
unable to boast of any brilliant achievements, he won a reputation for
sterling worth and reliability. He died in his native town on the 16th
of December, 1783, the first of the Revolutionary generals to pass away
after the conclusion of peace.