Five Independent Souls: The Signers from New Jersey

This exhibition at Morven Museum & Garden in Princeton examines the lives of the Declaration’s signers, and those they enslaved, through over 100 historic artifacts.

In June 1776, the provincial congress of New Jersey sent five replacement delegates to Philadelphia. In a letter, John Adams confidently referred to them as “independent souls.”

Five Independent Souls: The Signers from New Jersey at Morven Museum & Garden examines the lives of these lesser-known signers — Abraham Clark, John Hart, Francis Hopkinson, Richard Stockton, and John Witherspoon — and confronts a confounding actuality: while risking their lives for liberty, freedom, and equality, they denied these rights to the people they enslaved. Visitors can learn about these subjugated men, women, and children, as well as the impact of American independence on NJ’s indigenous population.

On display are manuscripts, paintings, furniture, and personal objects on loan from the collections of: the American Antiquarian Society; the American Philosophical Society; Historical Society of Philadelphia/Atwater Kent Collection at Drexel University; The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston; Historical Society of Princeton; the Hopewell Museum; Independence National Historical Park; Museum of the American Revolution; the National Gallery of Art; Presbyterian Historical Society; Princeton University Art Museum; Princeton University Library; The Rosenbach Museum & Library; The New York Public Library; The US Naval Academy Museum; Yale University Art Gallery; and numerous private lenders.

One of the highlights includes Congress Voting Independence, the first known American depiction of the vote for Independence, considered the most accurate portrayal of the Assembly Room of Independence Hall. It predates John Trumbull’s more famous version by three decades.

The museum is uniquely part of the exhibition. Built for Richard Stockton, Morven was briefly occupied by the British after Stockton became a POW.

Curated by Elizabeth Allan and Jesse Gordon Simons, Five Independent Souls is on view May 3, 2026, through January 17, 2027, at 55 Stockton Street, Princeton, New Jersey.

Funding provided by the New Jersey Historic Trust and the New Jersey Historical Commission.