Lieutenant Colonel William Ward Burrows, second Commandant of the Marine Corps, was born in Charleston, South Carolina, on 16 January 1768. He served in the Revolutionary War with the state troops of South Carolina, but later become a citizen of Philadelphia. On 12 July 1798, the day following the approval of an act of Congress establishing a permanent United States Marine Corps, President John Adams appointed him as Major Commandant of the newly created organization which consisted of 881 officers, noncommissioned officers, privates and musicians.

The Marine Corps, as well as the Navy, had had its humble beginning a short time prior to its actual authorization as a Corps and both were formed to meet an impending national crisis. The first Marine units to be organized by Major Burrows were ship detachments for newly acquired vessels of the American Navy, which were being hurriedly placed in commission at Philadelphia and hurried off to sea to fight cruisers and destroy commerce in the naval war with France. During the first several months that he was Commandant, his principal concern was the supplying and keeping up to strength the Marine detachments for the vessels of the Navy.

Headquarters of the Corps was in camp near Philadelphia until the national capital began its move to Washington in 1800. A small detachment of Marines was sent to the new capital in March of that year to protect the newly-established navy yard, while Major Burrows, with his staff and headquarters troops, moved to Washington in late July and set up their camp.

Major Burrows was promoted to lieutenant colonel on 1 May 1800. The Quasi-War with France continued until September of that year, when matters were finally adjusted. The insistence of Congress that the cost of the naval establishment be immediately reduced caused considerable embarrassment to Burrows in his effort to establish the Marine Corps on a peacetime basis. The wars with the Barbary States broke out soon afterwards and the main concern of the Corps was to supply detachments to naval vessels for duty in the Mediterranean.

Lieutenant Colonel Burrows is credited with beginning many of the Corps' institutions, including most notably the U.S. Marine Band, which he financed in part by levying contributions from his officers. He demanded high standards of professional performance and personal conduct of his officers and these have become hallmarks of the Corps. Ill health forced his resignation on 6 March 1804.

Lieutenant Colonel Burrows died in Washington, D.C., on 6 March 1805. He was buried in the Presbyterian Cemetery, Georgetown, in the District of Columbia. His remains were re-interred in Arlington National Cemetery on 12 May 1892.