At the age of eight, John Trumbull wrote a burlesque of his mother's genealogy, a genealogy which his mother prized. According to Trumbull's later account, he "deserved and received a good box on the ears" for his actions. That burlesque reflects two important facets of Trumbull's early life: his precocity and his bent for satire. The precocity--he learned to read at age two and passed the entrance examination to Yale at seven--developed into an imposing erudition. The bent for satire--at times bordering on the indecent in, for instance, "And as when Adam met His Eve"--produced Trumbull's best and most lasting work and elicited considerable personal abuse from those whom he attacked.

Born 24 April 1750 in Westbury parish, Waterbury (now part of Watertown), Connecticut, John Trumbull enjoyed an intellectual boyhood. His father, the Reverend John Trumbull, was, according to Trumbull, a "classical scholar" and a trustee of Yale College...