death_date birth_place name birth_date known_for signature image article_title birth_name occupation
09 april 1841 exeter , new hampshire william ladd 10 may 1778 founder and first president of the american peace society william ladd signature.svg william ladd c1830.jpg william ladd
 william c ladd ship captain
william ladd

william ladd -lrb- may 10 , 1778 -- april 9 , 1841 -rrb- was one of the earliest american anti-war activists , and the first president of the american peace society .
ladd was born in exeter , new hampshire as a direct lineal descendant of daniel ladd , sr. -lrb- 1613 -- 1693 -rrb- .
after he graduated from harvard in 1797 he shipped as a seaman from portsmouth , new hampshire in a vessel owned by his father , a local merchant .
at 20 years old he was a capable new england captain and had seen much of the world .
he briefly had a plantation in florida which ultimately failed as he refused to use slave labor .
a disbeliever in war for any purpose , he turned landsman at the outbreak of the war of 1812 , when the british blockade temporarily stopped commerce .
he moved to minot , maine , became a prosperous farmer , and devoted both his tongue and his pen to preaching non-resistance .
in 1823 he wrote the first of 32 `` essays on peace and war '' , published in the `` christian mirror '' of portland , maine , which laid out a christian case for pacifism .
subsequent essays would criticize the slave trade and the raising of the bunker hill monument in charlestown , massachusetts as a memorial to war .
state and local `` peace societies '' already existed in the 1820s , but in 1828 the american peace society was formed with ladd as its first president .
the first meeting was held in new york city .
ladd wrote and published the society 's newspaper , `` the harbinger of peace '' -lrb- later `` the calumet '' -rrb- from his house in minot , maine .
in 1837 , due to ladd 's influence and against the arguments of other members , including the president of bowdoin college , the constitution of the american peace society was amended to declare that all war was contrary to the christian gospel .
in 1840 ladd proposed a plan for a world congress and court of nations , somewhat similar to the later league of nations or united nations .
he published `` an essay on the congress of nations '' -lrb- 1840 -rrb- .
he was partly influenced by the military build-up the year before in his home state of maine because of a border dispute with britain , the so-called aroostook war .
ladd is buried in portsmouth , new hampshire
