1766

 

GEORGE WASHINGTON has a slave he describes as a “Rogue & Runaway.” To be rid of him, he sells him to a buyer in the West Indies.

 

* 

THE STAMP ACT is repealed, although some members of Parliament favor using the army to enforce it. 

Declaratory Act. The repeal of the Stamp Act did not mean that Great Britain was surrendering any control over its colonies. The Declaratory Act, passed by Parliament on the same day the Stamp Act was repealed, stated that Parliament could make laws binding the American colonies “in all cases whatsoever.” 

Resistance to the Quartering Act in New York. New York served as headquarters for British troops in America, so the Quartering Act (1765) had a great impact on New York City. When the New York Assembly refused to assist in quartering troops, a skirmish occurred in which one colonist was wounded. Parliament suspended the Assembly's powers but never carried out the suspension, since the Assembly soon agreed to contribute money toward the quartering of troops.

The Third Amendment will eventually be added to the U.S. Constitution, as part of the Bill of Rights, to address this quartering matter.

1767

A modern curry comb for horses.

“IN 1767,” John C. Miller has noted, “four Virginia slaves found guilty of conspiring to murder an overseer were hanged, their heads cut off, and put on public display.” (300/156) 

    In Philadelphia, a French traveler reported: 

Slaves are here regarded as being part of the family: they are assiduously cared for when they are sick; they are well fed and clothed. They attached themselves to their masters, whose children they regard as their own. Several women of my acquaintance have brought to them daily the children of their negroes, caress them, feed them, have them play with their own children. While traveling I have often happened to spend the night in the houses of Dutch or Germans. In the morning the negroes wake them, crying “Get up, master, it is time for us to go to work.” The master gets up, they eat a light breakfast, work together, and dine together as equals. They are clothed in the same way, and the slave can be recognized only by his color.

(300/157-158)

 

* 

TO HELP PAY the expenses of governing the Thirteen Colonies, Parliament passes the Townshend Acts. Duties are placed on glass, paper, lead, painter’s colors and tea.

 

    Massachusetts leaders call for nonimportation of British goods – a boycott – if you will. 

   “Letters from a Farmer in Pennsylvania to the Inhabitants of the British Colonies” is published, first in newspapers and then as a popular pamphlet. John Dickinson declares that Parliament cannot tax the colonies. He calls the Townshend Acts unconstitutional, and denounces the suspension of the New York Assembly as a threat to colonial liberties. 

(As already noted, this suspension does not occur.)

 

    Philip Vickers Fithian reports on colonial life, including slavery, in his journals and letters. On one occasion he talked to a cruel overseer who told him how he handled disobedient slaves: 

For Sullenness, Obstinacy or Idleness, says he, Take a Negro, strip him, tie him fast to a post; take then a sharp Curry-Comb, & curry him severely till he is well scrap’d; & call a Boy with some dry Hay, and make the Boy rub him down for several Minutes, then salt him, & unloose him. He will attend to his Business (said the inhuman Infidel) afterwards! (300/151-152)

 

1768

 

Massachusetts Circular Letter. Samuel Adams wrote a statement, approved by the Massachusetts House of Representatives, which attacked Parliament’s persistence in taxing the colonies without proper representation, and which called for unified resistance by all the colonies. Many colonies issued similar statements. In response, the British governor of Massachusetts dissolved the state’s [sic] legislature. British Troops Arrive in Boston. Although the Sons of Liberty threatened armed resistance to arriving British troops, none was offered when the troops stationed themselves in Boston.

 

* 

ACCORDING to Lancaster and Plumb, freedom of the press was not always honored by or forefathers: 

Editorially there was a massive unanimity in the press, for the Sons of Liberty were more than reluctant to allow much liberty to opposition sheets. Mr. Royle of the Virginia Gazette, the man who suppressed all mention of the Virginia Resolves, was hustled out of the way and his paper taken over by local Sons. In Boston, John Mein closed his Chronicle and fled to England.

 

The patriot press, with the field to itself and often bolstered by a stern, unbending disregard for the truth, bombarded inlanders with blood-chilling warnings. If a tax on merchandise went through unchallenged, who was foolish enough to think that a killing land tax was impossible? (48/63)

 

* 

FOUR BRITISH REGIMENTS are sent to Boston, “a military guard over a peaceable community.” (2/45)

1769

__________ 

“Children on the very brink of the Grave … have almost miraculously recovered after having worn the famous Anodyne Necklace but one night’s time.” 

A miracle medical cure is proclaimed

__________

A colonial gentleman.

AS EXPLAINED by the Library of Congress, it was in 1769 that, 

The Virginia House of Burgesses passed resolutions condemning Britain’s actions against Massachusetts, and stating that only Virginia’s governor and legislature could tax its citizens. The members also drafted a formal letter to the King, completing it just before the legislature was dissolved by Virginia’s royal governor.

 

* 

GEORGE WASHINGON warned his fellow colonists: “Our lordly masters in Great Britain will be satisfied with nothing less than the deprivation of American liberty.”

 

* 

AS JOHN C. MILLER explains, in 1769, “it was forbidden in Virginia to castrate slaves for any offense other than a rape or attempted rape upon a white woman.” (300/156)

 

* 

CHILDREN AFFLICTED with rickets are common in the Thirteen Colonies. Today we know that the problem is caused by lack of Vitamin D or calcium, or both, in the diet. 

Alice Morse Earle notes that in the latter part of the seventeenth century, “Snails furnished many doses for the rickets. The cure suggested by Rev. Joseph Perry of Windsor, Connecticut to a friend is little better: 

Rev’d Sir 

In ye Rickets the best Corrective I have ever found is a Syrup made of Black Cherrys. Thus. Take of Cherrys (dry’d ones are as good as any) & put them into a vessel with water. Set ye vessel near ye fire and let ye water be Scalding hot. Then take ye Cherrys into a thin Cloth and squeeze them into ye Vessell, & sweeten ye Liquor with Melosses. Give 2 Spoonfuls of this 2 or 3 times in a day. If you Dip your Child, Do it in this manner: viz: naked, in ye morning, head foremost in Cold Water, don’t dress it Immediately, but let it be made warm in ye Cradle & sweat at least half an Hour moderately. Do this 3 mornings going & if one or both feet are Cold while other Parts sweat (which is sometimes ye Case) Let a little blood be taken out of ye feet ye 2nd Morning and yt will cause them to sweat afterwards. Before ye dips of ye Child give it some Snakeroot and Saffern Steep’d in Rum & Water, give this Immediately before Diping and after you have dipt ye Child 3 Mornings Give it several times a Day ye following Syrup made of Comfry, Hartshorn, Red Roses, Hog-brake roots, knot-grass, petty-moral roots, sweeten ye Syrup with Melosses. Physicians are generally fearful about diping when ye Fever is hard, but oftentimes all attemps to lower it without diping are vain. Experience has taught me that these fears are groundless, yt many have about diping in Rickety Fevers; I have found in a multitude of Instances of diping is most effectual means to break a Rickety Fever. These Directions are agreable to what I have practiced for many years.

 

Another “surefire” cure for all kinds of illnesses and ailments was a special “Anodyne necklace.” When children were teething, it could be had for only twenty shillings, but what mother could be without it! 

Children on the very brink of the Grave and thought past recovery with their teeth, fits, fevers, convulsions, hooping and other violent coughs, gripes, looseness, and all proceeding from their teeth who cannot tell what they suffer nor make known their pains any other way but by crying and moans, have almost miraculously recovered after having worn the famous Anodyne Necklace but one night’s time. A mother then would never forgive herself whose child should die for want of so very easy a remedy for its teeth. And what is particularly remarkable of this necklace is, that of those vast numbers who have had this necklace for their children, none have made any complaints but express how glad they have been that their children have worn it whereas if they had not had it, they believed their children would have been in the grave, all means having been used in vain until they had the necklace.

 

Other devices for easing teething in infants: necklaces of fawn’s teeth or wolf’s fangs.

1770

 __________ 

“They had laid a foundering stone

for the Minutemen at Lexington

& Concord, first to defy & die.” 

Yusef Komunyakaa

__________ 

IN THIS ERA, you might catch sight of John Hancock, attired in lavender jacket, lilac-colored breeches, with frills of lace on his cuffs and shirt front. (300/117)

A leader in the battle against British taxation.

 

* 

The Boston Massacre. 

THIS DESCRIPTION comes from Coe’s Makers of the Nation, written in 1914: 

    Nothing serious, however, occurred until the evening of the fifth of March, 1770. A barber’s boy had jeered at a British officer passing through King Street. A sentry stationed near by had knocked him down. A small crowd of rough young men and boys began to pelt the sentry with stones. “Kill him! Kill him!” they shouted in a most threatening manner.

 

    The sentry was alarmed and called for aid. Colonel Preston and seven soldiers came to his assistance and lined themselves up beside him, facing the crowd, which had by this time increased to the number of fifty. The muskets, however, did not daunt the mob. They pressed forward and struck the guns with sticks, at the same time shouting and calling upon the redcoats to fire. In the confusion the soldiers thought that Preston had given the order to shoot, and discharged their arms. Five citizens were wounded and three killed. There they lay, their blood staining the whiteness of the newfallen snow.

 

    Pointing at Gov. Thomas Hutchinson afterwards, Sam Adams exclaimed with flashing eyes: “If you have the power to remove one regiment, you have the power to remove both. It is at your peril if you do not.”

    As Adams said later, in talking over the event with Dr. Joseph Warren, “I observed his knees to tremble, I saw his face grow pale, and I enjoyed the sight.”

 

* 

ANDREWS makes note of the results of the soldiers’ trial: “That the soldiers had considerable justification is proved by the fact that a jury acquitted all but two, who were convicted of manslaughter, and branded.” (2/46)

 

*

 

YUSEF KOMUNYAKAA, a modern poet, points out the role of Crispus Attucks on that fateful day,

 

Five colonists lay for calling hours

  in Faneuil Hall before sharing a grave

    at the Granary Burying Ground.

 

They had laid a foundering stone

  for the Minutemen at Lexington

    & Concord, first to defy & die,

 

& an echo of the future rose over

  the courtroom as John Adams

    defended the Brits, calling the dead

 

a ‘‘motley rabble of saucy boys,

  negroes & mulattoes, Irish

    teagues & outlandish jacktars,’’

 

who made soldiers fear for their lives,

  & at day’s end only two would pay

    with the branding of their thumbs

 

*

 

DURING the French and Indian War, the Virginia legislature had promised George Washington and his men 200,000 acres in the Ohio Valley; but the grant was not made till 1769. The next year Washington traveled west to spot good lands. The mouth of the Kanawha, he observed was “abounding in Buffalo and Wild game of all kinds as also in all kinds of Wild fowl.” He and his companions, with Native American guides, were gone nine weeks. (109/39)

 

1771

Year 1771

__________

 

“You will be turn’d into hell, with ugly devils, to eternity.”

 

Mr. Beacon

__________

A trip by stage from Philadelphia to New York City would take two days.

This was considered so fast, the stages were called "flying machines."

 

 

ANNA GREEN WINSLOW has just turned twelve, when her 72-page diary or journal (edited in 1894, by Alice Morse Earle) begins. It has been a hard winter in Boston, where her parents have sent her to “finishing school.”

 

She writes home from Nova Scotia to let them know how she is faring, as well as to practice her penmanship.

 

Earle sets the scene:

 

Through this journal we see “Nanny Green’s” simple and monotonous daily life; her little tea-drinkings; her spinning and reeling and knitting; her frequent catechisings, her country walks. We find her mother’s testimony to the “appearance of reason that is in my children and for the readiness with which they seem to learn what is taught them.” And though she repeatedly thanks God for living in a warm house, she notes that “my bason of water froze on the hearth with as good a fire as we could make in the chimney.” This rigor of climate and discomfort of residence, and Anna’s evident delicacy shown through the records of her fainting, account for her failing health.

 

Anna herself begins with an undated note, and then an entry for November 18, 1771, addressed to her mother:

 

I guess I shall have but little time for journalising till after thanksgiving. My aunt Deming says I shall make one pye myself at least. I hope somebody beside myself will like to eat a bit of my Boston pye thou’ my papa and you did not (I remember) chuse to partake of my Cumberland performance. I think I have been writing my own Praises this morning. Poor Job was forced to praise himself when no man would do him that justice. I am not as he was. I have made two shirts for unkle since I finish’d mamma’s shifts.

 

*

 

November 18:

 

Mr. Beacons text yesterday was Psalm cxlix. 4. For the Lord taketh pleasure in his people; he will beautify the meek with salvation. His Doctrine was something like this, viz: That the Salvation of Gods people mainly consists in Holiness. The name Jesus signifies a Savior. Jesus saves his people from their Sins. He renews them in the spirit of their minds – writes his Law in their hearts. Mr. Beacon ask’d a question. What is beauty – or, wherein does true beauty consist? He answer’d, in holiness – and said a great deal about it that I can’t remember, & as aunt says she hant leisure now to help me any further – so I may just tell you a little that I remember without her assistance, and that I repeated to her yesterday at Tea – He said he would lastly address himself to the young people: My dear young friends, you are pleased with beauty, & like to be tho’t beautifull – but let me tell ye, you’l never be truly beautifull till you are like the King’s daughter, all glorious within, all the orniments you can put on while your souls are unholy make you the more like white sepulchres garnish’d without, but full of deformyty within. You think me very unpolite no doubt to address you in this manner, but I must go a little further and tell you, how cource soever it may sound to your delicacy, that while you are without holiness, your beauty is deformity – you are all over black & defil’d, ugly and loathsome to all holy beings, the wrath of th’ great God lie’s upon you, & if you die in this condition, you will be turn’d into hell, with ugly devils, to eternity.

 

NOTE TO TEACHERS: I wonder what modern students would think of Mr. Beacon’s lecture. Would they see any relevance to their lives?

*

 

November 29:

 

My aunt Deming gives her love to you and says it is this morning 12 years since she had the pleasure of congratulating papa and you on the birth of your scribling daughter. She hopes if I live 12 years longer that I shall write and do everything better than can be expected in the past 12.

 

Miss Attwood as well as Miss Winslow are of this family. And Miss N. Glover did me honor by her presence, for she is older than cousin Sally and of her acquaintance. We made four couple at country dansing; danceing I mean. In the evening young Mr. Waters13 hearing of my assembly, put 7his flute in his pocket and played several minuets and other tunes, to which we danced mighty cleverly. But Lucinda14 was our principal piper. Miss Church and Miss Chaloner would have been here if sickness,—and the Miss Sheafs, if the death of their father had not prevented. The black Hatt I gratefully receive as your present, but if Captain Jarvise had arrived here with it about the time he sail’d from this place for Cumberland it would have been of more service to me, for I have been oblig’d to borrow. I wore Miss Griswold’s Bonnet on my journey to Portsmouth, & my cousin Sallys Hatt ever since I came home, & now I am to leave off my black ribbins tomorrow, & am to put on my red cloak & black hatt—I hope aunt wont let me wear the black hatt with the red Dominie—for the people will ask me what I have got to sell as I go along street if I do, or, how the folk at New guinie do? Dear mamma, you dont know the fation here—I beg to look like other folk. You dont know what a stir would be made in sudbury street, were I to make my appearance there in my red Dominie & black 8Hatt. But the old cloak & bonnett together will make me a decent bonnett for common ocation (I like that) aunt says, its a pitty some of the ribbins you sent wont do for the Bonnet.—I must now close up this Journal. With Duty, Love, & Compliments as due, perticularly to my Dear little brother (I long to see him) & Mrs. Law, I will write to her soon.

 

I am Hon^d Papa & mama,

 

Yr ever Dutiful Daughter

 

Anne Green Winslow.

 

N.B. My aunt Deming dont approve of my English & has not the fear that you will think her concernd in the Diction.

 

*

 

December 6: Yesterday I was prevented dining at unkle Joshua’s by a snow storm which lasted till 12 o’clock today, I spent some part of yesterday afternoon and evening at Mr. Glovers. … The snow is up to the peoples wast in some places in the street.

 

*

 

December 14:

 

I went to Mrs. Whitwell’s last wednessday—you taught me to spell the 4 day of the week, but my aunt says that it should be spelt wednesday. My aunt also says, that till I come out of an egregious fit of laughterre that is apt to sieze me & the violence of which I am at this present under, neither English sense, nor anything rational may be expected of me.

 

*

 

December 24:

 

Elder Whitwell told my aunt, that this winter began as did the Winter of 1740. How that was I dont remember but this I know, that to-day is by far the coldest we have had since I have been in New England. (N.B. All run that are abroad.) 

 

This day, the extremity of the cold is somewhat abated. I keept Christmas at home this year, & did a very good day’s work, aunt says so. How notable I have been this week I shall tell you by & by. I spent the most part of Tuesday evening with my favorite, Miss Soley, & as she is confined by a cold & the weather still so severe that I cannot git farther, I am to visit her again before I sleep, & consult with her (or rather she with me) upon a perticular matter, which you shall know in its place. How strangely industrious I have been this week, I will inform you with my own hand – at present, I am so dilligent, that I am oblig’d to use the hand & pen of my old friend, who being near by is better than a brother far off. I dont forgit dear little John Henry so pray mamma, dont mistake me.

 

* 

December 28: Last evening a little after 5 o’clock I finished my shift. I spent the evening at Mr. Soley’s. I began my shift at 12 o’clock last monday, have read my bible every day this week & wrote every day save one. 

1772

 

__________ 

“There is danger from all men. The only maxim of a free government ought to be to trust no man living with power to endanger the public liberty.”   

John Adams

__________

The Americans set fire to the Gaspee.

 

January 1: Anna Green Winslow, age twelve, writes in her journal

 

I wish my Papa, Mama, brother John Henry, & cousin Avery & all the rest of my acquaintance at Cumberland, Fortlaurence, Barronsfield, Greenland, Amherst &c. a Happy New Year, I have bestow’d no new year’s gift, as yet. But have received one very handsome one, viz. the History of Joseph Andrews abreviated. In nice Guilt and flowers covers. This afternoon being a holiday I am going to pay my compliments in Sudbury Street.

 

*

 

January 17: Anna describes a party she has attended with a “Miss Soley,” which she had previously explained to her mother she would be attending:

 

I have now the pleasure to give you the result, viz. a very genteel well regulated assembly which we had at Mr Soley’s last evening, miss Soley being mistress of the ceremony. Mrs Soley desired me to assist Miss Hannah in making out a list of guests which I did some time since, I wrote all the invitation cards. There was a large company assembled in a handsome, large, upper room in the new end of the house. We had two fiddles, & I had the honor to open the diversion of the evening in a minuet with miss Soley. Here follows a list of the company as we form’d for country dancing.

 

(There are seventeen girls and young women present.)

 

 Miss Cregur (usually pronounced Kicker) & two Miss Sheafs were invited but were sick or sorry & beg’d to be excus’d. There was a little Miss Russell & the little ones of the family present who could not dance. As spectators, there were Mr & Mrs Deming, Mr. & Mrs Sweetser Mr & Mrs Soley, Mr & Miss Cary, Mrs Draper, Miss Oriac, Miss Hannah – our treat was nuts, rasins, Cakes, Wine, punch, hot & cold, all in great plenty. We had a very agreeable evening from 5 to 10 o’clock. For variety we woo’d a widow, hunted the whistle, threaded the needle, & while the company was collecting, we diverted ourselves with playing of pawns, no rudeness Mamma I assure you. Aunt Deming desires you would perticulary observe, that the elderly part of the company were spectators only, they mix’d not in either of the above describ’d scenes.

 

I was dress’d in my yellow coat, black bib & apron, black feathers on my head, my past comb, & all my past garnet marquesett & jet pins, together with my silver plume – my loket, rings, black collar round my neck, black mitts & 2 or 3 yards of blue ribbin, (black & blue is high tast) striped tucker and ruffels (not my best) & my silk shoes compleated my dress.

 

*

January 18: Miss Winslow writes:

 

Yesterday I had an invitation to celebrate Miss Caty’s birth-day with her. She gave it me the night before. Miss is 10 years old. The best dancer in Mr Turners school, she has been his scoller these 3 years. My aunt thought it proper (as our family had a invitation) that I should attend a neighbor’s funeral yesterday P.M. I went directly from it to Miss Caty's Rout & arriv’d ex 

*

 

January 31:

 

I spent yesterday with Aunt Storer, except a little while I was at Aunt Sukey’s with Mrs Barrett dress’d in a white brocade, & cousin Betsey dress’d in a red lutestring, both adorn’d with past, perls marquesett &c. They were after tea escorted by Mr. Newton & Mr Barrett to ye assembly at Concert Hall. This is a snowy day, & I am prevented going to school.

 

*

 

February 9:

 

My fingers are not the only part of me that has suffer’d with sores within this fortnight, for I have had an ugly great boil upon my right hip & about a dozen small ones—I am at present swath’d hip & thigh, as Samson smote the Philistines, but my soreness is near over. My aunt thought it highly proper to give me some cooling physick, so last tuesday I took 1-2 oz Globe Salt (a disagreeable potion) & kept chamber. Since which, there has been no new erruption, & a great alteration for the better in those I had before.

 

I have read my bible to my aunt this morning (as is the daily custom) & sometimes I read other books to her. So you may perceive, I have the use of my tongue & I tell her it is a good thing to have the use of my tongue. Unkle Ned called here just now—all well—by the way he is come to live in Boston again, & till he can be better accomodated, is at housekeeping where Mad^m Storer lately lived, he is looking for a less house. I tell my Aunt I feel a disposician to be a good girl, & she pleases herself 22that she shall have much comfort of me to-day, which as cousin Sally is ironing we expect to have to ourselves.

 

*

 

February 10:

 

This day I paid my respects to Master Holbrook, after a week’s absence [at school]. … Yesterday was very bad weather, neither aunt, nor niece at publick worship.

 

*

 

February 12:

 

Yesterday afternoon I spent at unkle Joshuas. Aunt Green gave me a plaister for my fingure that has near cur’d it, but I have a new boil, which is under poultice, & tomorrow I am to undergo another seasoning with globe Salt. The following lines Aunt Deming found in grandmama Sargent’ pocket-book & gives me leave to copy ’em here.

 

Dim eyes, deaf ears, cold stomach shew,

My dissolution is in view

The shuttle’s thrown, my race is run,

My sun is set, my work is done;

My span is out, my tale is told,

My flower’s decay’d, & stock grows old,

The dream is past, the shadows fled,

My soul now longs for Christ my head,

I’ve lived to seventy six or nigh,

God calls at last, & now I’ll die.

 

Anna later adds:

 

My honor’d Grandma departed this vale of tears 1-4 before 4 o’clock wednesday morning August 21, 1771. Aged 74 years, 2 months & ten days.

 

*

 

April 1: Like any student today, she likely enjoyed the day off. The winter drags on in Boston, as she reports.

 

Will you be offended mamma, if I ask you, if you remember the flock of wild Geese that papa call’d you to see flying over the Blacksmith’s shop this day three years? I hope not; I only mean to divert you. The snow is near gone in the street before us, & mud supplys the place thereof; After a week’s absence, I this day attended Master Holbrook with some difficulty, what was last week a pond is to-day a quag, thro’ which I got safe however, & if aunt had known it was so bad, she sais she would not have sent me, but I neither wet my feet, nor drabled my clothes, indeed I have but one garment that I could contrive to drabble.

 

*

 

 May 16: She writes:

 

Last Wednesday Bet Smith was set upon the gallows. She behav’d with great impudence. Thursday I danc’d a minuet & country dances at school, after which I drank tea with aunt Storer. To day I am somewhat out of sorts, a little sick at my stomach.

 

 

   It would be interesting to know what crime Bet Smith committed that led her to her execution.

 

 

 

June 10: Rhode Islanders board, burn, and sink the British revenue cutter, H.M.S. Gaspee. Andrews says the Gaspee, which had run aground, was captured “after a spirited fight.” (2/58)

 

    The British vessel had been chasing a smuggler.

* 

In Massachusetts, Governor Thomas Hutchinson announced that, as of 1773, his salary and those of all Massachusetts judges would be paid by the Crown. It would have been hard to dream up a step more fatal to the British cause. The instant colonial officials looked to England for pay and support, they slipped completely out of local control.

 

… what the announcement actually did was to hand Samuel Adams and like-minded men a glittering propaganda weapon. Adams sprang into action at once, toiling to revive and greatly expand those Committees of Correspondence that earlier troubles had called into being. A Boston Committee was set up, its 21 members empowered to communicate with other Massachusetts towns. Then, as though intoxicated by this success, the Committee’s field was widened to take in all colonies and, in a final wild gesture, “the World!” (48/74-75)

 

*

 

GENERAL THOMAS GAGE, commander-in-chief of British forces in North America, orders all settlers beyond the Appalachians to quit these countries “instantly and without delay.” (125/134)

 

    This policy, he believes, will keep the settlers from riling up the natives, requiring British troops to support the settlers.