Major General John Joyner was adopted by explorer Henry Ellis, 2nd Governor of Georgia. The first known connection between the two is after Ellis returned from Georgia. In a letter John wrote to his parents (the Joyner's) on Dec. 2nd 1762, about a trip he was on with Ellis to Holland, Germany, and Flanders, and sending Governor Ellis' best regards. He was adopted shortly thereafter and know as John Joyner Ellis. He had a successful military career and was sent to Fort Pitt, Pennsylvania, with the 18th Royal Irish Regiment in 1771. In 1773 he went to Philadelphia. He was likely among the three companies who marched on Lexington and Concord and were badly defeated by the Massachusetts's Minutemen. In 1775 he returned to England to recruit soldiers for the coming war. He did not return to the Colony, or I might not be writing this to you. He married Sarah Walton of Worcestershire in 1781. He went on to fight in the Napoleonic Wars, leading the 23rd Royal Welsh Fusiliers, with his young son Henry joining the 41st at age 9. Father's 23rd was almost wiped out by yellow fever in Martinique and French Sainte Domingue, and with only 30 healthy men he returned to England in 1796. 14 year old Captain Lieutenant Henry Walton Ellis survived in the 41st regiment as well and returned to England to join his father's regiment on 20 Jan 1796 in Worcester.
John Joyner Ellis was promoted to Major General in 1798 and retired. He went on to represent Worcester in Parliament until his death in 1804.
Unlike many men of the period, Father and Son loved each other very much. At John's death his son Henry said, "His talents and urbanity of manners endeared him to an amiable and intelligent society; with less ability but an equal warmth of heart, I hope, some future day, to solicit and transfer of those bonds of affection, and to live in the same social habits which my father enjoyed in this city and neighborhood.'