History of Journalism in the United States/Chapter 9

by George Henry Payne

CHAPTER IX

JOURNALISM AND THE REVOLUTION

False impression of strength of Continental Army—Tories outnumber Patriots—Number of papers in colonies—Lieutenant-Governor Colden and Hugh Gaine—Attitude of British toward journalism—Samuel Loudon—His publication closely watched—Rivington's Gazette boycotted—Sears and McDougall wreck office—Encounter with Ethan Allen — Double-dealing of Gaine's New York Gazette—New Jersey Gazette assists Patriot cause—Tory papers picture misfortune of Americans—Change in attitude of people toward press—Encouragement of writers.

In the minds of most Americans, this country was, during the Revolution, a great battlefield on which for seven years there was continuous clash of arms. As a matter of fact, of the three million people in the country, at no time were more than a small part engaged in the war. During the campaign of 1777, Washington's army never exceeded 11,000 men.^[1]

In the spring of 1777, when the Continental Congress was enjoying its greatest authority and when, through the generosity of France, the financial condition of the temporary government was at its best, so that it was able to make liberal offers of bounties, only 34,820 were obtained, despite an earnest appeal for 80,000, less than one-fifth of the male population.^[2] The total number of men in the field for the year, including militia, was 68,720. In 1781 the total number of men in the field was only 29,340, despite the great military action.

Although what has been called the war of argument ended with the battle of Lexington on April 19, 1775, and that date, as Professor Tyler says, becomes the divisional point in any history of America or American development, it is, nevertheless, not true that the journalism of the colonies stopped in its development or its importance. The picture of an entire country engaged in battle for seven years is a companion piece to another equally false; that of an entire country fighting the British troops and their paid support. The truth is that the difficulty of holding the patriots themselves in line was the principal cause of the prolongation of the war.

The Tories asserted that they were numerically superior to the patriots. Lecky declares that the American Revolution was "the work of an energetic minority, who succeeded in committing an undecided and fluctuating majority to courses for which they had little love, and led them step by step to a position from which it was impossible to recede."^[3]

The greatest number of Tories was found in New York, while in South Carolina and Georgia they outnumbered the patriots. John Adams, in a letter written in 1813, declared that New York and Pennsylvania were evenly divided, and that only Virginia and New England kept them in line. He also stated that fully one-third of the people were averse to the Revolution^[4] and, in general, to the idea of rebellion and separation. Until the opening of hostilities, it was a war of argument, but it became necessary to keep up the argument by propaganda and printing after hostilities had begun. Such action was necessary in order to hold those who were already in sympathy with the American cause, to increase the number of patriots where it was possible, and to attack those who were circulating falsehoods intended to weaken the patriotic ranks.

In addition to the Tories, who openly supported the enemy, there were many worthy people who believed that the patriots were "going too far," as well as a number who, as Fiske says, magnified the losses and depreciated the gains.^[5] In New York and Pennsylvania there was a large non-English population, both men and women, who had come from the continent of Europe, and in them "the pulse of Liberty did not beat so quickly" as in the English commonwealths of Virginia and Massachusetts. The Quakers of Pennsylvania and New Jersey were opposed to war, and in New York City, which had been the headquarters of the British army and the seat of the principal royal government in America, there was a strong royalist feeling.

If, as Lecky says, the revolution was the work of a minority, and the army itself was so small a part of the population, it is quite evident that the propagandist part played by the forces that converted that minority into a majority, a part greatly undervalued by most of our historians, was not inconsiderable.

At the close of the year 1774, there were thirty-one newspapers printed in English in the colonies, of which twenty-one were Whig. To these thirty-one, between that time and April, 1775, were added three more, one of which was devoted to the patriotic cause, but no less than five went over to the Tory side during the course of the war.

Until the beginning of actual hostilities newspapers were maintained in the principal cities; the activities of the enemy, however, necessitated the removal of several of them to more remote places and interrupted or entirely stopped the publication of others.

The papers at that time were not by any means evenly distributed; for instance, Maryland, Virginia, the two Carolinas and Georgia, together could boast of but one more journal than Pennsylvania, and only three more than little Massachusetts. New Hampshire had only the Gazette, while in Rhode Island there were both a Gazette and a Mercury.^[6]

Early in the war the British General, Gage, recognized the necessity of putting before the public the encouraging aspect of the British cause. Immediately after the battles of Lexington and Concord, he sent to Cadwallader Colden, Lieutenant-Governor of New York, his own account of these engagements, requesting him to have them printed in some New York paper. Colden's experience is best told in his own language:

"Immediately upon the receipt of your first account of the facts of the 19th of April, I sent it to Gaine to be published in his paper. He desired leave, if asked, to say from whom he got it. I sent my son to tell him he might, and if he chose, might add that I received it from headquarters, which entirely satisfied him, and he promised to publish it on Monday. This was on Saturday evening. On Sunday he returned the copy and let me know that he could not insert it in his paper."

When the British took possession of New York the Whig printers, including Gaine, had to leave and there was no newspaper published. General Howe saw the necessity of keeping the citizens informed and of putting the best face on the British cause, and authorized Ambrose Serle to issue a newspaper and to use Gaine's establishment for that purpose. The issue of September 30th of the New York Gazette came out bearing Gaine's name, but in the issue of October 7th and those following his name was dropped. Serle, in his report to Lord Dartmouth, tells of acting as superintendent to the New York Gazette and gives an interesting view of the governmental attitude toward journalism:

"Among other Engines which have raised the present commotion, next to the indecent harangues of the preachers, none has had a more extensive or stronger influence than the newspapers of the respective colonies. One is astonished to see with what avidity they are sought after, and how implicitly they are believed, by the great bulk of the people.

"The Congress saw the necessity of securing this advantage entirely to themselves and of preventing all publications which might either expose or refute the policy of their measures. A free press, however, teeming with heterogeneous matters, would have at least retarded their great design.

"Government may find it expedient in the sum of things to employ this popular engine; and, if it be impossible to restrain the publication of falsehood, it will be its interest to give power and facility to the circulation of truth. The expense of allowing salary (if needful) to some able superintendents of the press in different colonies, who should in policy be natives of this country, would be too trifling to mention, considering the almost incredible influence those fugitive publications have upon the people. Ever since the press here has been under my direction (from the 30th of September) I have seen sufficient reason to confirm this opinion and have had the pleasure to hear that the papers, which have been circulated as extensively as possible, have been attended with the most promising effects. The advantage to the printer, upon a moderate computation in the present state, will amount to seven or eight hundred pounds a year. Sterling, clear of all deductions. I mention this to show how great the demand is and consequently how prudent it may be for the government to take care with what matter it is supplied.

"I beg leave to refer Your Lordship to the inclosed newspapers for an account of general occurrances. Nothing, to the best of my knowledge, is inserted in them, as New York intelligence, but matters of fact as they have arisen. This little business affords me some amusement, where I have no books and few friends, and engages a part of my time with the satisfaction I am otherwise deprived of, of doing some service to the cause of my King and country."^[7]

Thomas Jones, the Loyalist historian, affords us further enlightenment concerning the frame of mind of the opposition as to the attacks made on them by the patriots. It was in the office of Samuel Loudon—who afterward (January 17, 1776,) established the New York Packet, later being obliged to move it to Fishkill while the British occupied New York—that a reply was to be printed to Thomas Paine's "Common Sense." Loudon unquestionably was a Whig, but according to the account of Jones, Alexander McDougall, Isaac Sears and other "inveterate republicans "having one night imbibed plentifully of "rumbo "(the strong man's drink of the day) went to the house of Loudon aiid pulled him out of bed. Disregarding the fact that he was both "a Presbyterian and a Republican," they took the manuscript away from him and destroyed all the copies that he had printed. It is doubtful if this "Presbyterian and Republican" printer was much alarmed over the visit, as his actions indicated that he was much in sympathy with the "Sons of Liberty."

This occurred in the summer of 1775. The day following the visit to London, printers of the city were notified that they must cease to print articles in favor of our " inveterate foes, the King, Ministry and Parliament of Great Britain."

Loudon appealed to the Committee of Safety to recompense him for the loss sustained, and was appointed official printer with a salary of £200 a year, to print a weekly newspaper, in which there was to be such information as a future legislature should direct. This was the New York Packet above referred to. Doubtless it was a matter of some satisfaction to both Loudon and the patriots that they had, in destroying Tory literature, forced the royalists to assist in establishing a patriot paper.

How closely the provisional government watched over publication is shown in the action of the Committee of Safety, which on December 21, 1777, ordered Loudon to appear before them and explain why he had reprinted in his paper extracts from Gaine's New York Gazette, which contained news discouraging to the patriot cause. The following day Loudon did appear and explained that he only printed the extract to show his readers the kind of stuff that was being published in New York.

The Chairman of the Committee, on Loudon's apology, pardoned the offense, declaring that while the House of Representatives of New York had no intention of restricting the liberty of the press, they were determined "not to employ any person who shall do things inimical to the cause of American freedom."^[8]

But it is when Jones comes to tell of the attack by Sears on James Rivington's New York Gazetteer that he is unable to contain himself over the wi'ckedness, unjustness and villainy of the patriots.

Rivington was a favorite with the Loyalists. He had come to the colonies after a stormy career in London, where he had been a bookseller—fond of horse-racing and good living—with all the proclivities of a Royalist. His Gazetteer first appeared April 22, 1773, and was patronized by the royal supporters in all the principal towns. He boasted on one occasion that its circulation was 3,600—a circulation quite as large as that of any paper, not only in the colonies, but even in Great Britain.^[9]

Rivington's success, as well as his virulent pen, had made him a thorn in the side of the Whigs. His paper became known during the war as the "Lying Gazette," and even the royalists commented on his disregard for the truth. In fact he himself warned contributors to be more truthful.^[10]

So bitterly were the Whigs opposed to Rivington that members of the party passed resolutions March 1, 1775, recommending "to every person who takes his paper, to immediately drop the same." A similar resolution was passed in Freehold, New Jersey, on the sixth day of March. On the 8th a committee, consisting of Philip Livingston and John Jay, called on him to ascertain the authority for all his false statements; and on the 14th, at a meeting of the Freeholders of Ulster County, New York, a resolution was passed to have "no connection or intercourse with him." His case was examined by the Provincial Congress and referred by them to the Continental Congress, then in Philadelphia, to whoni he ad dressed his defense, declaring that "his press had always been open and free to all parties."

He stated that, while an Englishman by birth, he was an American by choice, and that it was his wish and ambition to be a useful member of society. He also stated that he employed sixteen people, costing him nearly £1,000 annually. This reply was dated May 20, 1775. On the 7th of June the Provincial Congress granted him permission to return to his house, and recommended to the inhabitants of the colony that he be unmolested, as he had apologized for his previous remarks and attitude.

Washington, on June 5th, 1775, passed through New York on his way from Mount Vernon to Cambridge; following this visit. New York was ordered by the Continental Congress to raise her quota of 3,000 men. The city presented the curious spectacle of being the seat of two governments, each denouncing the other as illegal. On August 23rd Captain Lamb and a party of "Liberty Boys "removed the twenty-one guns at the Battery, during which operation shots were exchanged. The royal Governor, Tryon, fled aboard the frigate "Asia," but continued to direct violent attacks on the Sons of Liberty through Rivington's Gazetteer, which now became the representative of the royalists.

Among the men whom Rivington had sharply attacked was Isaac Sears,—conspicuous for his zeal in the earlier patriotic movements,—who had recently moved to New Haven and there raised a company of cavalry. Rivington having become bolder and bolder. Sears took it upon himself to put an end to his activities. Arranging with McDougall and other patriots the details of the raid, he rode into the city with his men and, armed to the teeth, entered Rivington's house, demolishing his plant and carrying off the types, which were converted into bullets. The loyalists indignantly condemned the act as evidence that the patriots were trying "to restrain the freedom of the press."^[11]

Rivington used this ill-treatment as a means of courting British favor. He went to England to procure a new press, and succeeded in securing appointment as King's printer for New York. When the British recaptured the city he returned and, beginning with October 4, 1777, issued his paper anew. He was received as a martyr, welcomed with congratulatory yerses and with a public dinner, and from that time on the Royal Gazette, as he now called his paper, told not only the bitter truth about the Revolutionists but as much more as imagination could conceive and Rivington and his "lying staff" could invent.

That he was determined to recoup his fortunes is shown by the advertisement that he carried for several weeks after he had once more established his paper.

"James Rivington," he aimounces, "has brought back from London an extra fine assortment of London snuffs, shoes, gentleman's silk stockings, fishing tackle, magnifiers, buckles, small-swords, toothpick cases, pen knives, nail scissors, sleeve buttons, etc."^[12]

Rivington was a man of unquestioned ability. As one who espoused and defended the Royalist cause, he adopted the royalist costume and dressed in the extreme of fashion — curled and powdered hair, claret-colored coat, scarlet waistcoat trimmed with gold lace, buckskin breeches and top-boots—and he was very fastidious as to the society he kept and the wine he drank. His contempt for the revolutionists is shown in his own story of his treatment of Ethan Allen, the truth of which is not established in any of the biographies of Allen:

"I was sitting," said Rivington, "after a good dinner, alone, with my bottle of Madeira before me, when I heard an unusual noise in the street, and a huzza from the boys. I was in the second story, and, stepping to the window, saw a tall figure in tarnished regimentals, with a large cocked hat and an enormous long sword, followed by a crowd of boys, who occasionally cheered him with huzzas, of which he seemed insensible. He came up to my door and stopped. I could see no more. My heart told me it was Ethan Allen. I shut down my window and retired behind my table and bottle. I was certain the hour of reckoning had come. There was no retreat. Mr, Staples, my clerk, came in paler than ever, and clasping his hands, said:

"'Master, he is come.

"'I know it.'

"'He entered the store and asked if James Rivington lived there.

"'I answered, "Yes, sir." "Is he at home? "" I will go and see, sir," I said; and now, master, what is to be done? There he is in the store and the boys peeping in at him from the street.'

"I had made up my mind. I looked at the bottle of Madeira—possibly took a glass.

"'Show him up,' said I, 'and if such Madeira cannot mollify him, he must be harder than adamant.'

"There was a fearful moment of suspense. I heard him on the stairs, his long sword clanking at every step. In he walked.

"'Is your name James Rivington?'

"'It is, sir, and no man could be more happy than I am to see Colonel Ethan Allen.'

"'Sir, I have come—

"'Not another word, my dear colonel, until you have taken a seat and a glass of old Madeira.

"'But, sir, I don't think it proper—

"'Not another word, colonel. Taste this wine; I have had it in glass for ten years. Old wine, you know, unless it is originally sound, never improves by age. " He took a glass, swallowed the wine, smacked his lips and shbok his head approvingly.

"'Sir, I come—

"'Not another word until you have taken another glass, and then, my dear colonel, we will talk of old affairs and I have some droll events to detail.

"In short, we finished two bottles of Madeira, and parted as good friends as if we never had cause to be otherwise."^[13]

During the time that Rivington was in Europe arranging for a new outfit, the British side of the controversy was set forth by Hugh Gaine, once a patriotic editor, but later—for business reasons—an enthusiastic Royalist. Gaine's double-dealing had been noted for some time, but it remained for the war to develop his talents to their full. When the British took possession of the city he fled to Newark, New Jersey, and apparently edited his patriotic paper there. His paper in New York was continued by the British, The only known file of the Newark issue shows Mr. Gaine running along very smoothly until his issue of November 2, 1776, when he apparently suffered what the modern alienists would describe as "brainstorm "for he takes both sides in the same issue, an article in one column referring to the ease with which "our troops "beat the "Britishers," while in an adjoining column, he recounted the skill with which "our" troops had trounced the "rebels." Apparently this was too much for the patriots and there ended Mr. Gaine's double venture, and from that time he devoted his talents entirely to the British cause and his New York paper.^[14]

When the war ended Gaines, unabashed, petitioned the Legislature to be allowed to remain in the city, which he was permitted to do. Philip Freneau gave Gaine national fame by ridiculing him in verse, a sample of which, explaining why he deserted the Americans, follows:

"As matters have gone, it was plainly a blunder,
But then I expected the Whigs must knock under,
But I always adhere to the sword that is longest.
And stick to the party that's like to be strongest:
That you have succeeded is merely a chance,
I never once dreamed of the conduct of France!
If alliance with her you were promised—at least
You ought to have showed me your star of the East,
Not let me go off uninformed as a beast.
When your army I saw without stockings or shoes.
Or victuals or money—to pay them their dues.
Excepting your wretched congressional paper.
That stunk in my nose like the snuff of a taper," etc.

But Gaine was hot daunted. He stayed along and, on July 23, 1788, when New York celebrated the adoption of the Constitution, he was one of the marshals of the great parade!

After the desertion of Gaine during the campaign in New Jersey, the necessity for answering the attacks and the ridicule of James Rivington's Royal Gazette, led Governor William Livingston of New Jersey to aid Isaac Collins in establishing the New Jersey Gazette at Burlington. This paper, like some of the other patriotic journals, was obliged to move from town to town when the situation dictated prudence, but kept up its issuance with reasonable regularity.^[15]

Livingston had had considerable training in newspaper work; in 1752 he^had edited the Independent Reflector, and it was he who, in February, 1765, commenced a series of papers entitled the Sentinal which were published in Holt's New Jersey Weekly Post Boy. He was a steady contributor to the New Jersey Gazette, under the noms de plume of "Hortentius" and "Scipio," and on those occasions when he was presiding over the Council of Safety, somewhere in the mountains or woods of New Jersey, his gifted daughters are said to have written the caustic articles for him.^[16]

The Tory editors found solace in recounting the misfortunes of their foes. The fall of Continental money, or the impoverishment of the rebel provinces, provided a subject for much jesting. "At Boston," said Gaine, "the people are starving and rebellious; food was brought them from the South by a land carriage of 1,700 miles; damaged Bohea tea, transported in this way from Charleston, was selling at $15 a pound; West India Rum was $12 a gallon; a plain surtout brought $60 and not a single hat could be bought in all Boston. The Yankee privateers had been chased from the seas by the King's ships; and the chief supplies of the Eastern states were wholly cut off. Trade was sunk; gold and silver had disappeared. Of the vile Continental currency a cart-load was not worth a dollar; and a piece of coin was not to be seen in all the New England states."

In the South the provinces were described as being even more unhappy, half the soldiers being depicted as laid low by fever while the other half were longing to enjoy once more the protection of King George. The people of Maryland were preparing to rise and reconquer the province. Connecticut was in a state of riot and disorder from one end to the other, and everywhere the people were sick of the unnatural war and were anxious to bring it to an end.

Such was the pabulum that was distributed, not only to the Loyalists but to the many weak-kneed patriots who came within the sphere of influence of the New York and Philadelphia papers. To counteract such statements was in itself a difficult task; in addition the patriotic press not only had to deny what was untruthful in the Loyalist press, but had to write, in the face of undeniable misfortune, what would be encouraging and would keep the weaker element from getting still weaker.

A feature of importance in a review of journalism during the Revolution was the changed attitude of the public toward the new institution. From indifferent onlookers in the contest between the first printers and the government; from slowly awakened people, conscious of their rights, but not particularly interested in the press that had awakened them, they had now passed to the point where the freedom of the press was asserted by them as boldly and as proudly as it was asserted by the press itself; it was now regarded as their instrument, to which they had every right and in which the setting forth of their views was not to be stopped. They now proclaimed it the great engine of civilization and, as one of them declared, "The test of truth, the bulwark of public safety and the guardian of freedom."^[17]

This changed attitude made it necessary that the press be allowed such encouragement as was possible; it was the beginning of the desire for news, the supplying of which in the middle of the next century was to be found so profitable by many editors, but especially by the Greeleys and the Bennetts. This changed attitude on t^ie part of the people was what led Washington—the first general in history to do so—to carry with him a literary assistant. This assistant was Thomas Paine, a born journalist if there ever was one, and his series of essays, called "The Crisis," was read to every corporal's guard.

Thomas Paine arrived in America November 20, 1774, with a letter of introduction from Benjamin Franklin to his son-in-law, Richard Bache. For eighteen months Paine edited the Pennsylvania Magazine or American Museum, and during that time the magazine was "A seed bag from which this sower scattered the seeds of great reforms, ripening with the progress of civilization."^[18]

He was for republican equality and against privilege. He was the first to urge an extension of independence to the enslaved negro; the first to arraign monarchy, to denounce dueling, to suggest more radical ideas of marriage and divorce, to call for justice for women and kindliness toward animals, and to advocate national and international copyright.

It was while he was working on the Pennsylvania Magazine that he composed "Common Sense," with an effect "which has rarely been produced by types or paper in any age or country."^[19] Leaving the Pennsylvania Magazine, he joined the army "as a sort of itinerant writer, of which his pen was an appendage, almost as necessary and formidable as its cannon." When the spirit of the colonists drooped he revived them with his writings, the first number of "The Crisis" appearing in December, 1776, beginning with the famous lines: "These are the times that try men's souls." In January, 1777, the second number was published, and the remaining six appeared at irregular intervals. When the first number reached England, it was ordered to be burned by the common hangman near Westminster Hall, but a mob assembled and put out the fire by throwing on it dead dogs and cats.

The lot of the patriot editors was not always the happiest, but it had its later compensations. When the British took New York, Holt was obliged to flee with his presses to Esopus, (Kingston), which then became the seat of the New York government. When this place was taken and burned by the British, October 16, 1777,^[20] he fled with the government. Indeed, George Clinton, the Governor, and Holt with his printing press, (he had now been made Provincial printer) practically constituted the government. As long as there was a printing press and a rowboat to take it away in, the government of New York was non-capturable.

Poughkeepsie was the next official resting place. Here Holt issued his paper regularly until January 6, 1782, when he announced that "as the people have been greatly inconvenienced because they have not known what laws have been passed in the pa~st few years "he had acceded to the request of those in authority and would discontinue the publication of his paper for the time being, in order that he might devote his time to the printing of the laws.

He promised that when the paper was resumed it should be better than it had ever been and parenthetically observed that the period of non-publication would give those who were behind in their subscriptions an opportunity to catch up.^[21]

The evacuation of Boston by the British, early in the war, allowed the patriot journals to hold sway there unmolested. For three years, during which Newport was in the hands of the enemy, the Newport Mercury was published at Rehoboth, but upon their withdrawal the paper was brought back to Newport, and there resumed its original influence under the editorship of Henry Barber.^[22]

The only paper in Baltimore, Goddard's Maryland Journal and Baltimore Advertiser, gave the patriots no little concern. Associated with Goddard was Colonel Eleazer Oswald, one of the finest artillery officers in the American army—a man who, despite his services in the patriot cause, suffered because of his association with Goddard, when the latter's friendship for Charles Lee led him to take up Lee's fight against Washington. Goddard was mobbed for his attacks on General Washington and Oswald left Baltimore and went to Philadelphia.

As might be expected from the leading position of the city in both politics and journalism, the service rendered by the Philadelphia papers was second to none during the war. When the British entered the city, however, both the Pennsylvania Gazette and Bradford's Journal suspended publication. The Pennsylvania Packet or General Advertiser followed the example of Holt and moved with the government up to Lancaster, where it remained until the British withdrawal. The Packet was owned by Dunlap and Claypoole and afterward became the first daily paper in America.

Imitating the Mercury of Hugh Gaine, the Evening Post of Philadelphia did not move out with the American troops, but remained behind to welcome the Britishers. When Washington regained his position the editor unsuccessfully endeavored to reestablish old friendship; unhke Gaine, he was not successful.

The Pennsylvania Ledger, a Tory sheet which had been suspended for a year before the occupation by the British, blossomed anew when Philadelphia changed hands, and when the British moved out of the city the paper moved with them. The Royal Pennsylvania Gazette was started by the British theniselves, which would indicate that the advice of Serle to use the newspapers as much, as possible had been transmitted to the commanding generals.

The reward of the patriotic editors at the end of the war came in the form of great influence and, in some cases,—that of Isaiah Thomas, for instance—wealth and prosperity as the country developed. A number of Tory editors sought refuge in Nova Scotia and New Brunswick and established papers there.

One or two of them remained in this country, however, and finally succeeded in hving down their reputations. A "literary fair" was held in New York in 1802 and Hugh Gaine, then acclaimed the oldest living bookseller, was chosen President of the bookselling fraternity, showing how soon the people forget,—and forgive.

1. Fiske, American Revolution, ii, 27.
2. Fiske, Critical Period, 102.
3. Lecky, History of England, iii, 443.
4. Works of John Adams, x, 63.
5. Fiske, American Revolution, i, 56.
6. Lorenzo Sabine, The American Loyalists, 53.
7. Stevens, Facsimiles, Nos. 2044-2046.
8. Journal of the New York Provisional Congress, i, 781.
9. Rivington's New York Gazetteer, October 13, 1774, No. 78.
10. 10 July 10, 1782.
11. Lamb and Harrison, History of New York City, ii, 49.
12. New York Royal Gazette, November 1, 1777.
13. Lossing, Field-book of the Revolution, i, 508.
14. New York Gazette and Weekly Mercury, September 21st to November 2nd, 1776, Nos. 1301 to 1307. This file of the Newark issue is in the New York Public Library.
15. Lamb and Harrison, ii, 175.
16. Theodore Sedgwick, Jr., Life of William Livingston, 248.
17. Connecticut Commercial Gazette, November 1, 1765, quoted in Barry's History of Massachusetts, second period, 275.
18. Moncure D. Conway, Life of Thomas Paine, 47.
19. Cheetham, Life of Thomas Paine, 55.
20. Public Papers of George Clinton, ii, 457.
21. For Holt's official record, see Public Papers of George Clinton, iv, S48, 659, 791, 821, 831; V, 116-623-626, 633; vi, 252, 869; vii, 193; viii, 24, 33.
22. Greene, Short History of Rhode Island, 248.