GARRETSON, Freeborn, clergyman, born in Maryland, 15 August, 1752; died in New York, 26 September, 1827. In 1775 he became a minister of the Methodist Episcopal Church, and in December, 1784, he was ordained an elder, and volunteered as a missionary to Nova Scotia. In 1788, with twelve young ministers, he began the work of evangelizing eastern New York and western New England. He married Miss Catherine Livingston, of Rhinebeck, in 1791, and henceforth his labors were confined to New York City. He was eminently successful as a minister, and preached in almost all the eastern states from Nova Scotia to the Gulf of Mexico. He emancipated several slaves belonging to him, and made provisions in his will for the perpetual support of a missionary. See Bang's "Life of F. Garretson" (New York, 1832).--His daughter, Mary Rutherford, born in 1783, died near Rhinebeck, New York, 7 March, 1879, was of marked intellectual ability, and was noted for her works of benevolence and smallness of stature.