Harlan, Josiah

Harlan, Josiah

(1799–1871) soldier, adventurer; born in Newlin Township, Pa. (brother of Richard Harlan). During 17 years in the Far East (1823–41) he was a Bengal Artillery medical officer, secret agent in Afghanistan, and Punjabi governor; he told his story in A Memoir of India and Avghanistaun [sic] (1842). He was a Union cavalry commander during the Civil War and afterwards a San Francisco physician.

The Cambridge Dictionary of American Biography, by John S. Bowman. Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1995. Reproduced with permission.