John Pine Decatur was born to Stephen and Anne (Pine) Decatur on September 14, 1786. Decatur was appointed a Master in the U.S. Navy on August 4, 1807, and married Maria Susanna Ten Ecyk (1789-1850) on April 6, 1809. He resigned his commission at his wife's behest on March 26, 1810. Together, the couple had eight children. Decatur returned to the military after a brief career as one of the proprietors of the Bellona Powder Mills in Belleville, New Jersey. He was commissioned as a Captain of the Fifth Company of the Essex Squadron of Cavalry on May 11, 1812, and rose to the rank of Lieutenant-Colonel, although he finished the War of 1812 as a Major. Decatur continued his career in the Navy, serving as Naval Store Keeper in the Brooklyn and Portsmouth Navy Yards. On April 8, 1829, President Andrew Jackson (a close friend of Decatur's) appointed him Collector of the Customs for the District of Portsmouth, New Hampshire. Decatur was appointed Sutler to the Army at Fort Gibson, Arkansas in April 1831 and died of typhoid fever on November 12, 1832.

Susan Wheeler Decatur (1776-1860) married Stephen Decatur Jr., military officer and brother of John Pine Decatur, in 1806. The couple lived in a home, later known as the Decatur House, next to the White House in Washington, D.C. Her husband died unexpectedly in 1820 due to wounds suffered from a duel with Commodore James Barron; in the aftermath, Susan inherited her husband’s estate. She moved out of Decatur House but maintained the property as a rental house, used by many ambassadors and politicians for the next several years. Susan died in 1860 and was buried near Georgetown University; her grave was later moved next to her husband’s at Saint Peter’s Episcopal Church in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.