James Allen (c.1742–1778), son of William and Margaret Hamilton Allen, was a lawyer and a member of the common council of Philadelphia. In May 1776 he was elected to the Pennsylvania assembly from Northampton, where his country seat, Trout Hall (near Allentown, Pa.), was located. Although a Patriot at this time, he, like his father and brothers, could not accept the Declaration of Independence and in the late summer of 1776 left the assembly to retire to Trout Hall (ALLEN description begins James Allen. “Diary of James Allen, Esq., of Philadelphia, Counsellor-at-Law, 1770–1778.” Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography 9 (1885): 176–96, 278–96, 424–41. description ends , 176–77, 188–91).