George Ross (May 10, 1730—July 14, 1779) was born in New Castle, Delaware, the son of Rev. George and Catherine Van Gezel Ross, studied in Philadelphia, opened his law practice in Lancaster in 1751, and was named the King’s attorney for Cumberland County.
John Armstrong has rightly been labeled "the First Citizen of Carlisle. "He was a justice of the peace, the principal official of local government in the British dominions; a county judge, chief land surveyor of Cumberland County, assemblyman, colonel of the colonial Pennsylvania Regiment, an original member of the Pennsylvania revolutionary committee of safety; brigadier general of the Continental Army, major general of the Pennsylvania militia, delegate to the Continental Congress, and an original trustee of Dickinson College.
The frontier in American history, in fact and in fiction, was everywhere the site of excesses, violence, and license. Cumberland County from its first settlements through the post revolutionary years was no exception.