Gregores Antones Perdicaris was born in
Naousa, a city in the present
Imathia regional unit of
Macedonia,
Greece. He was son of Antones Perdicaris a doctor and politician. The Perdicaris family is an aristocratic Greek family with centuries-old origins in Crete, Corfu and Monemvasia. The Patriarch Licinius, the personal doctor to the Ottoman Sultan, was named a Count by the Republic of Venice for his services, and was beheaded by the Ottomans for the same reason in 1715. Gregory Perdicaris was about 12 years old when he fled the Massacre of Naousa in 1822. Perdicaris and his father fled into the mountains. His two brothers-in-law were killed. His mother, two brothers, and four sisters were taken by the Ottomans and sold into slavery. He eventually fled to Izmir without his father. Afterward, he made his way to Jerusalem where he met
Pliny Fisk. Fisk helped secure his passage to the United States. He was brought to America on the ship Romulus on July 7, 1826. On his way to the United States, he was told his family's freedom was purchased. He was sixteen and traveled with Nicolus Prassas and Nicolus Vlassopoulo, none of whom spoke English. In the later part of the 1820s he learned English and taught at
Mount Pleasant Classical Institute. While he was at Mount Pleasant he wrote
Suffering Greece; the essay was published in local newspapers. It was an outcry to the people of the United States about war-torn Greece. While Perdicaris was at Mount Pleasant he taught with
Petros Mengous author of the book
Narrative of a Greek Soldier in 1830. Their students included
John C. Zachos,
Christophoros Plato Castanes, Alexandros Georgios Paspates, Constantine Fundulakes, and Christopher Evangeles. By 1830, he was a professor at Washington College, now
Trinity College in Hartford Connecticut. He was a Greek teacher from 1830 to 1832 and librarian at the institution from 1832 to 1833. He also obtained a master's degree at the college. Prominent future Harvard Professor
Evangelinos Apostolides Sophocles lived in Hartford Connecticut during this period. Around 1834, Perdicaris wrote
Dr. Coray and the Greek Church. The essay discussed the future of the Greek government and the Greek Church. Perdicaris traveled to many American cities lecturing about Greece from 1834-1837. His lectures created awareness about the war-torn country and its current state. The themes varied from the:
Moral and Intellectual Condition on Modern Greece,
History and Topography of Macedonia, and the
modern Greek language vs Ancient Greek. He also discussed education in the country prior to the war. He briefly lectured at Yale and Harvard University. Gregory was made an Honorary member of Yale's Phi Beta Kappa in 1834. Phi Beta Kappa eventually made him a life member. Some of the prominent locations he lectured included: the
Franklin Institute,
New York Mercantile Library, Washington D.C., and the Brooklyn Lyceum. His lectures usually cost 50 cents per person, per lecture, and 2 dollars per person, for the entire series. American Poet
Edgar Allan Poe enjoyed his lectures and featured two articles about them in the Southern Literary Messenger between 1836 and 1837. His lectures were so popular local newspapers gave Perdicaris rave reviews. Around the fall of 1837, Perdicaris was in North Carolina lecturing. He suddenly stopped his lecture tour around May 1837. He married Margret Hanford on May 25, 1837, in Society Hill, South Carolina. Margret was the granddaughter of American Revolutionary War hero Captain
William Dewitt. They were a politically elite Southern family of planters. Margret was an orphan but her sister Mary married into the family of Governor
David Rogerson Williams. Mary's husband was State Congressman Alexander Markland McIver. Their son was Chief Justice of the South Carolina Supreme Court
Henry McIver. Margret's uncle was Senator
Josiah J. Evans. ==Greek consul==