Early Life
John Graves Simcoe was the only surviving son of John and Katherine Simcoe; although his parents had four children, he was the only one to live past childhood. His father, a captain in the Royal Navy, commanded the 60-gun HMS Pembroke, with James Cook as his sailing master, during the 1758 siege of Louisbourg. When his father died of pneumonia a few months prior to the siege of Quebec, the family moved to his mother's parental home in Exeter. His paternal grandparents were William and Mary (née Hutchinson) Simcoe.
He was educated at Exeter Grammar School and Eton College. After a year at Merton College, Oxford, Simcoe was admitted to Lincoln's Inn, but then decided to follow the military career for which his father had intended him. He was initiated into Freemasonry in Union Lodge, Exeter on November 2, 1773.
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