Hibbert Newton, his signature from a regimental paylist dated Lincoln, England, 9 August 1781
Nationality: American (possibly from the Province of Nova Scotia)
Born: 1762
Regimental commission dates:
Ensign, 1 March 1776
Lieutenant, 19 April 1780
Location during the Northern Campaign of 1777: recruiting in Ireland or Great Britain
Exchanged into another regiment: 11 January 1782 (with Lieutenant William Oldham, 53rd Regiment)
Died: Ireland, 1795
Hibbert Newton was one of the small number of British Army officers of American birth serving in the 62nd Regiment. His father, Philips Newton, was from a founding family of civil and military officers of Nova Scotia, while his mother Elizabeth (née Wickham), was of a prominent Newport, Rhode Island, family. Although Hibbert was born in America, he spent most of his youth in Ireland and on 1 March 1776, at age 14, was commissioned an ensign and appointed to Captain Richard Baily's additional company of the 62nd Regiment of Foot. In this capacity, he helped recruit new men for his regiment while it was serving in America. Because of his recruitment duties, Newton did not serve in the Northern Campaign of 1777 and was therefore not part of the subsequent prisoner Convention Army. It is ironic that one of the regiment's few officers to have been born in the Western Hemisphere should have spent the war in Britain.
After the 62nd Regiment was repatriated to England in 1781, Newton, then a lieutenant, was assigned to Lieutenant-Colonel John Anstruther's company. Newton soon after engaged in the first of a series of lateral exchanges into other corps which, in the records, would define the rest of his martial career. On 11 January 1782, he swapped regiments with Lieutenant William Oldham of the 53rd Regiment of Foot, a regiment long assigned to the Canada garrison. Newton remained with that regiment until he exchanged into O'Donnell's Irish Regiment, with a commission date of 20 July 1794. Newton's final commission, with a date of 12 November 1794, was in Fox's Irish Regiment. He died soon after.