History of Journalism in the United States/Chapter 2
CHAPTER II
THE FIRST NEWSPAPER IN AMERICA
Contemporary indifference to Harris—His important part in struggle for free press—Prosecuted by Jeffreys—Jailed and pilloried for seditious publication—Imprisoned for second time—His arrival in America—Opens coffee-shop — Publishes first newspaper in America—Reasons for suppression—Author of New England Primer—Returns to England—Date of death unknown.
Into this settlement came Benjamin Harris, arriving, according to one authority, in 1687; according to the Boston Town Records, in 1686. If ever a community needed a particular type of man, Boston of this period needed Benjamin Harris—London bookseller, printer, "brisk asserter of English liberties," and later on the author of the New England Primer. That he was suppressed and driven back to the London from which he had come, was the misfortune of a colony not liberal enough to welcome him, for he was of the type of the earlier Pilgrims and of those later New Englanders who directed the fight for independence.
Contemporary records afford us little information about Harris, though he left his impression on the journalism of two countries and was an exceptional figure in the fight for a free press in both England and America. That he has been neglected by those who have come after him, has been due, not so much to indifference to him personally as to the general indifference to the journalist who fails, no matter what the cause.
A robust, interesting character was Harris, whose contribution to the history of two continents is deserving of a better fate, for nowhere is there even a biography of him, though in his day both American and English authorities knew him well and had to take official cognizance of his endeavor to enlarge the scope of the press and to unshackle the budding journalistic idea.
Although the part he played in England as one of the most assertive of Whig journalists was not inconsiderable, apparently it brought him no attention when he came to this country, where the authorities, vigorous believers in their own liberties though they were, did not propose to undergo any unnecessary risks in behalf of so combative and unpopular a person as Harris.
The first venture of which we have any knowledge is his publication in London, begun on July 7, 1679, of the Domestic Intelligence, more a political periodical than a newspaper, for newspapers were not permitted. With other publications of a similar type, it served the purpose of keeping alive the Whig fight against Tory principles and religious persecution. Harris had his following in London even then, for we learn that the Green Ribbon Club sent its political paragraphs to him regularly. On the other hand, he had vigorous opponents, and one of his rivals, Nathaniel Thompson, accusing him of "lifting" the "stories" of his competitor, thus characterized his new venture:
"There hath lately dropped into the world an abortive birth by a factious, infamous, perjured antichristian, a senseless lying pamphlet, by the name of the City and Country News. This is the first of his offspring that ever bore name, the rest being spurious and illegitimate, like his natural issue, which he either durst not own, or would not bring to the font to receive the ma Christianity no more than himself. This pamphlet-napper and press-pirate hath cruised abroad since he put up for himself, to make a prize of other men's copies, to stuff his own cargo with ill-gotten profit, making his business cheating and usurpation, to defraud all men, and by factious libels to sow sedition amongst the people, and frighten allegiance from the subjects' bosoms. Now I have yourselves and all honest men to be judges, whether of the two be the best intelligence; he having not only stolen from other intelligences, but likewise from mine, to make up his senseless scrawl, as particularly the relation of Mr. Carte the Jesuit, taken in St. James, which he inserted in his for want of -matter, three days after the same was published by me, in a single half-sheet; and this is the whole proceeding of this infallible newsmonger."[1]
In the spring of 168p Harris was arrested for publishing a then famous Appeal from the Country to the City, in which the King was openly criticized. He was tried before Chief Justice Scroggs by the infamous Jeffreys, and what has been preserved of the record shows that the pioneer journalist of America was, even in those times of bullying judges, an independent and courageous soul.
At the trial, his neighbors testified that he was a quiet, peaceable, "fair-conditioned "man, but the Chief Justice over-rode all the testimony, declaring him to be the " worst man in the world "—surely a great distinction in times that knew many evil men—and sent the jury out with an open intimation as to the kind of verdict that was expected from them.
The courtroom was crowded with Harris' sympathizers; that he was not without friends among the jury is shown by the fact that one of the jurors asked if they might not take the seditious pamphlets with them to look over. This was refused. Harris himself had asked if he might not address the jury. This also was denied.
The opening speech of Recorder Jeffreys indicates that Harris' well-wishers gave free vent to their emotions, for the prosecutor hoped that the large numbers present had come to "blush rather than to give encouragement "to Harris' great crime.
That the hope was not well founded is shown by the recorded fact that when the jury brought in a verdict of "Guilty of selling the book,"—a plain evasion, and a direct slap at the irascible Chief Justice,—"there was a great and clamorous shout." But the. court was not going to allow the jury to interfere with the business in hand, and the foreman was informed that it was his duty to say "Guilty," which was done, and then came words from Harris that are just as fine as some of the expressions that have made famous other champions of liberty. Before he was sentenced, he earnestly besought his lordship that he might be sent to any other prison than Newgate, the horrors of which live with the pits of ancient Syracuse, but the request was denied, whereupon he said: "I hope God will give me patience to go through with it."
There is something of the best of American journalism in that simple declaration—it was the attitude of Zenger, whose willingness to combat authorities meant so much in pre-Revolutionary times; it was the spirit of Garrison, and it has been shown in a hundred and one ways, when the freedom of the press and the idea of democracy have been challenged by authority.
He was sentenced to pay a fine of £500, to stand in the pillory one hour, and to find sureties for his good behavior for three years. Indeed, had it not been for Jus tice Pemberton, the Lord Chief Justice would have added that he should be "publicly whipt."
On the 17th of February he was stood in the pillory "over against the Old Exchange "in London, and his friends were again to the fore, for they interfered with one of the main sports of the day, inasmuch as "his party hollowed and whooped and would permit nothing to be thrown at him."[2]
The next we hear of him is on April 27, 1680, when he announces that he has "for several weighty reasons,"[3] laid down his paper. The Domestic Intelligence. Both action and reasons seem most logical, in view of the fact that the communication is dated from "King's Bench Prison in Southwark."
For a while, neither the indecency of his trial nor the severe punishment meted out to him broke Harris' spirit, and he addressed to Scroggs "Twenty-four Queries" which furnish interesting comment on the trial of libel cases at that time. But his suffering must have been severe, and it was even suggested that his death was planned.[4]
It is not surprising, therefore, that we find Scroggs, at the trial of Harry Care, another writer of seditious pamphlets, declaring that Harris, deserted by his friends, had sent him word that he was ready to "cry quits." Thereupon the learned judge read the noisy crowd in front of him a lecture, pointing out that behavior like that of the "unfortunate man Harris" leads to no good,[5] and that Harris' friends had neglected to pay his fine of £500, which he said would have been about five shillings apiece, "if they had been as free of their purses as they were of their noise and acclamations."[6]
On September 18th[7] he was examined and is said to have given some information, unfortunately too soon, for in December, Scroggs and Jeffreys suffered impeachment and humiliation at the bar of Commons, Harris' own trial and conviction being cited in the impeachment of the former.[8] The dread hand for a short time was removed from the press and Harris merrily proceeded with his Intelligence, but was soon in hot water with his contemporaries as to who was telling the truth. In the spring he was arrested again on a political charge. The following year he heard that another warrant was out for him, and insisted upon being arrested while a friend of his—one Bethel, a Whig—was sheriff, showing that Mr. Harris had political wisdom as well as editorial pugnacity.
But the foresight proved unavailing and again he went to gaol. This time he broke down before the punishment, and is said to have disclosed the names of those who had written the offending articles that he had published. At least, it cannot be said that he feared to go to gaol, nor can it be denied that he went with courage and with fortitude.
After this, until he appears in America, we find no record of his activities, although his friend, John Dunton—the "crazy book-seller," Macaulay calls him—speaks of his keeping a coffee-house, and refers to his wife, "like a kind rib," defending him when he was placed in the pillory, referring doubtless to the punishment that was meted out to him by Scroggs.
Dunton, when he came to New England with a cargo of books, wrote to a friend in 1686 that Ben Harris—tired, like so many of those who were emigrating, of trying to make a living and battling for liberty in England—was contemplating coming to America. Dunton viewed the project dubiously, for while he admitted that Harris "had many good thoughts," he had "wanted the art of improving 'em and could he fix his Mercury a little, and not be so volatile, he would do well enough." He gives us our only idea of Harris' age by declaring that he is advanced in years and at best can only hope to "scuffle through this world."
Harris had little intention of "scuffling through," for that very year he appeared in Boston and opened up a "Coffee, Tea and Chucaletto" shop.
A year later he was printing books and employing printers at what he called the London Printing House.[9] In the diary of Samuel Sewall, the return of Harris from London is noted on January 25, 1688, and in the fall of the same year, when Sewall himself sailed for England, Harris was again on board.
Sewall states that the day after they sailed "the wind came out at North East to our great discomfort," and Harris read the twenty-first chapter of Proverbs, "which is the first chapter I heard read on ship-board. ... I must heed that voice—he that wandereth out of the way of understanding shall remain in the congregation of the dead."
The picture of Harris in America compares well with the Harris we have seen in England; he arrives in the country and is speedily in touch with its most distinguished judge; he has hardly been here two years when, with an energy unusual in those days, he embarks on a fourth winter ocean voyage in company with the judge, who marks him as a man of unusual piety, as well as of stout heart.
The trip abroad must necessarily have been for business purposes, whether for books or in relation to his "Coffee-house." The coffee-clubs took the place of the "saloons" of another epoch when the politician or propagandist discovered there a receptivity for his ideas that he would not have found in less social and convivial places.
It is more likely that his trip had to do with the paper which he was to issue. Without further intimation, so far as any of the contemporary records show, without fanfare or preliminary advertising, Publick Occurances appeared on September 25, 1690—the first newspaper to be printed on this continent—published from Harris" London Coffee House," the printing being done for him by Richard Pierce.
The first issue was printed on three pages of a folded sheet, leaving the last page blank, there being two columns to a page, each page being about eleven by seven inches.
Harris begins by declaring that his purpose is to furnish the country once a month with an account of "such considerable things as have arrived unto our notice," a promise calculated to arouse the interest of the dwellers in the wilderness, who must have been hungry for news of their fellow-men. He promises that he will take pains to collect his news and will "particularly make himself beholden to such persons in Boston whom he knows to have been for their own use the diligent observers of such matters."
Thirdly he states, "that something may be done toward curing, or at least the charming, of that spirit of lying which prevails among us; Wherefore, nothing shall be entered but what we have reason to believe is true, repairing to the best fountains for our information. And when there appears any material mistakes in anything that is collected, it shall be corrected in the next.
"Moreover, the Publisher of these Occurances is willing to engage, that whereas there are many false reports, maliciously made and spread among us, if any wellminded person will be at the pains to trace any such false report, so far as I find out and convict the first raiser of it, he will in this paper (unless just advice be given to the contrary) expose the name of such person as a malicious raiser of false report. It is supposed that none will dislike this proposal, but such as intend to be guilty of so villainous a crime."
Then followed the news or "Occurances," which—considering that this was seventy years after the landing of the Pilgrims on Plymouth Rock, and two hundred years after the invention of printing—shows that our pioneer journalist was not lacking in what is now called news-sense. We are informed that the Christianized Indians in Plymouth had appointed a day of Thanksgiving, and their example is commended to other non-Indian neighbors in a line that seems sarcastic.
There is a brief mention of the fact that two children had been stolen by Indians from the settlement of Chelmsford, the correspondent and not the editor being responsible for the fact that names are not given.
From Watertown there is communicated the news that an old man (again the correspondent neglects to give the name) "having lost his wife, fell into a fit of melancholy during which the devil took possession of him with the result that one morning, early in the month he was found hanging in the cow-house." It is noted that the smallpox is abating in Boston, but that another disease—seem ing to be more or less of a malignant fever, not unlike the influenza with which this generation is acquainted—is growing into a common thing, and the report states that three hundred and twenty people had died by the last visitation of smallpox.
Two fires are reported, and with much feeling it is noted that in one of them a PRINTING PRESS (the capitals are Harris') had been destroyed.
It was in his account of the battle with the French and Indians that Harris printed news which was to be his undoing. Read even to-day his report of the expedition against the French and the use of the friendly Maquas by Governor Winthrop is not bad reporting when one considers that reporting had yet to be developed or even inaugurated. It was a report, however, that contained matters that the authorities were not desirous of having printed, for it told how the Indian allies of the colonists had treated the French prisoners with great barbarity. Harris protested against trying to subdue Canada with the assistance of "these miserable savages."
Stout old Benjamin Harris, fine old Whig—even in the wilderness he was on the side of humanity and progress, to the very great displeasure of the authorities. Two days after publication. Judge Sewall noted in his diary that the paper had appeared and that it had given "much distaste "because it was not licensed and because of the "passages referring to the French King and the Maquas." Four days later the legislative authorities took the matter up officially, sagely ruling that it contained "reflections of a very high nature," and strictly forbade "anything in print without license first obtained from those appointed by the government to grant the same."[10]
We learn from Sewall, under date of the following May, that even though suppressed as a publisher, Harris was still a private purveyor of news, for he brought the information that Captain Leisler and Mr. Millburn had been executed in New York. The same year a partnership was formed with John Allen and a printing shop of their own was set up. Evidently he was working back into the graces of the authorities, for, a short time after, he was made the official printer and ordered to print the laws "that we the people may be informed thereof."
But the spirit of Harris could not be contented in the colonies so long as the mother country afforded greater prospects for safe political activity to one of his ardent temperament. Though the London Gazette was the only paper published while the licensing act was in force, the keen interest in the news was satisfied at the coffee-houses in London and by the news-letters throughout the country. The official paper was edited by a clerk in the office of the Secretary of State, who published nothing but the dullest doings of the government. The censorship law expired on May 25, 1695, and within a fortnight thereafter, Harris, back in London, was once more on the ground with the announcement that the Intelligence Domestic and Foreign that had been suppressed by tyranny, fourteen years before, would again appear.
- ↑ Cooke, History of Party, i, 363.
- ↑ Luttrell, i, 34
- ↑ Andrews, History of British Journalism, i, 70
- ↑ Sir. Roger L'Estrange, 271.
- ↑ State Trials, vii, 931.
- ↑ State Trials, vii, 1126; also Sir Roger L'Estrange.
- ↑ Luttrell, i, 127.
- ↑ Cobbett, Parliamentary History of England, iv, 1274.
- ↑ Ford, New England Primer, 31.
- ↑ Sewall, i, 332 and ii, 34s; Felt, Annals of Salem, 14.