Newport before the Revolution. 95 Helmbolds, Knoxes, Brandreths, opera-houses or theatres, steamship lines, or Schiedam schnapps in those days. There was very little local news. In that period of hebdominalism the arrivals and departures of vessels were given briefly-so briefly, indeed, that the sea-captains of the last century were not enrolled on the pages of history as they have since been. There were no gentlemanly captains then, nor polite pursers. Newport was not a fashionable watering-place, per se, in 1732, as it is in this fast and elegant age. It promised then to be the Commercial Emporium of the Western World. It could boast of its foreign commerce, and bid fair to be more than a rival to New York, in consequence of possessing one of the finest harbors on the North Atlantic coast. There was no idea then of simply being wealthy in magnificent summer residences, and having its splendid bay merely the summer rendezvous of the New York Yacht squadron. One number of the Gazette, in 1732, contained the following marine report of Newport for one week: Entered Inward.-Vincent from Virginia, Dyer & Sears from Eustatia, Gullin from Hispaniola, and Walters from Boston. Outward Bound.-Briggs for Barbados. Cleared Out. - Bell for Barbados, Linsey for Leward Islands, and Fame for Antigua. One number of the Newport Mercury of 1871 contained, in amount of tonnage as well as in number of vessels, more arrivals in one day, of pleasure yachts alone, than is embraced in the above list of arrivals and departures for a week. If any Rip van Winkle, who saw the Vincent, and Gullin, and Walters enter that port in 1732, stood at the railroad dépôt in the summer of 1871, and saw the Sappho, and Cambria, and Dauntless, and Fleetwing come bouncing up that expansive and beautiful bay, he must have been bewildered with the sight, or believed it all a dream. CHAPTER V. APPEARANCE OF THE PRESS AT THE SOUTH. THE FIRST NEWSPAPER IN SOUTH CAROLINA. THE FIRST IN VIRGINIA.— THE BRADFORD FAMILY IN PENNSYLVANIA. THE STAMP ACT. ITS ORIGINATOR IN BOSTON. ·OPPOSITION OF JOURNALS. THE FIRST PAPER IN MARYLAND. VERY OLD PRESS. -THE FIRST CARRIERS' ADDRESS. — THE GERMAN PRESS. OUR sketches of the Press of the colonial period must necessarily be written with a running pen. The South must have her chronicles. On the 8th of January, 1731, the South Carolina Gazette was published in Charleston by Thomas Whitemarsh. It was printed on a half sheet for about a year, and died with its proprietor. In February, 1734, it reappeared in name, and was published for several years by Lewis Timothy. The first paper in Virginia made its debut in Williamsburg in 1736 -a rare old town, the society of which has been graphically described by Wirt in his Life of Patrick Henry. This newspaper was the Virginia Gazette, and printed by William Parks, sometimes on half a sheet of foolscap, and sometimes on a whole sheet. It was continued till Parks's death in 1750, and during that time was under the influence of the governor. After the death of Parks the Gazette was revived under new auspices, and issued in February, 1751, as the Virginia Gazette, with the freshest advices, Foreign and Domestic. The new paper was printed on a crown sheet, and had a cut of the arms of Virginia incorporated with the title. It bore this imprint: Williamsburg: Printed by Wm. Hunter, at the Post Office, by whom persons may be supplied with this paper. Advertisements of a moderate length for Three shillings for the first week, and Two shillings each week after. With Hunter's death in 1761 the Gazette was enlarged, and published by Joseph Royle. On his demise it was conducted by Purdie and Dixon till the Revolution. It was managed by Purdie alone during the war. The Boston Weekly Post-Boy, in imitation of Parker's paper, was published by Ellis Huske. Its first number appeared in 1734. Huske was Postmaster of Boston. It was believed that he recommended the obnoxious Stamp Act of 1765 to the British govern ment. He must have been astonished with the excitement and in The Bradfords and the Stamp Act. 97 The Post-Boy dignation that his measure created in the colonies. lived nearly a quarter of a century, but did not reach the period of the odious act he had suggested to the home government to inflict on the colonial Press. Nearly ten years elapsed before another paper appeared in the colonies. Then William Bradford, grandson of the one who printed the Gazette in New York, issued the Pennsylvania Journal and Weekly Advertiser in 1742. Bradford was father of William Bradford who was Attorney General of the United States in 1794-5. This Bradford family, like the Franklins, had newspaper on the brain, as much so as De Foe had in the earlier part of the century in Scotland. They were ready to print one or edit one wherever and whenever such an institution was wanted. The Journal was established at an important era in American journalism-shortly before the passage of the famous Stamp Act. It was devoted to the interests of the colonies, and was a strong advocate of freedom from England. On the 31st of October, the day before the Stamp Act was to take effect, the pages of the Journal were inclosed in black lines, with a picture of a skull and cross-bones over the title, and with these words printed beneath: "EXPIRING: In Hopes of a Resurrection to Life again." On the border of the first page were printed, “Adieu, adieu, to the Liberty of the Press." On the last column of the third page were the words "FAREWELL LIBERTY." On the fourth page was an engraving of a coffin, under which was this epitaph : The last Remains of THE PENNSYLVANIA JOURNAL, Which departed this Life, the 31st of October, 1765, Aged 23 years. With these typographical demonstrations the publisher issued the following patriotic card: I am sorry to be obliged to acquaint my readers, that, as the Stamp act is feared to be obligatory upon us after the First of November evening, (the fatal To-morrow,) the Publisher, unable to bear the Burthen, has thought it expedient to STOP awhile, in order to deliberate, whether any methods can be found to elude the chains forged for us, and escape the insupportable Slavery; which, it is hoped, from the just representations now made against this Act, may be effected. Meanwhile I must earnestly request every individual of my Subscribers, that they would immediately discharge their respective arrears, that I may be able, not only to sup port myself during the Interval, but be the better prepared to proceed again with the paper, whenever an opening for that purpose appears, which I hope will be WILLIAM BRADFORD. soon. PHILADELPHIA, Oct. 31, 1765. No resurrection was necessary, for Bradford continued the publication of the Journal; but in the next issue, in place of its regular G title, "No Stamp-Paper to be had" appeared, and the paper came out as usual after this. Thomas Bradford, a son of the publisher, was taken into partnership in 1766, and the firm then became William & Thomas Bradford. In the conflict with the authorities in regard to the unpopular Stamp Act, a member of the Pennsylvania Assembly, named John Hughes, sent a communication to the Journal, defending Franklin on the charge that he was an instigator of this infamous act. Hughes also wrote several letters to the commissioner of the Stamp Office in London. He was afterward appointed Commissioner of Stamps for Pennsylvania. These letters appeared in September, 1766, and were pronounced forgeries by Hughes. He commenced actions. against the Journal, on a charge of libel, for their publication. As Selden said that "more solid things do not show the complexion of the Times so well as Ballads and Libels," we insert the remarks of the Journal on this attempt of Hughes to disown his own letters in his prosecution of Bradford : His suing the Printers of the Pennsylvania Journal, for printing an exact copy of his own letters, is no more than the ill-judged effect of that insatiable passion which he has, to trample upon the most sacred Rights and Privileges of British subjects in America. The letters themselves, which are but the history of his own conduct for a considerable time past, plainly discover how heartily and passionately he wished for the favourable opportunity which would put it into the power of this excellent patriot, to execute the detestable STAMP ACT, which no American can mention without abhorrence, and to reduce the free born Sons of Britain to a state of the most wretched slavery. What else can be the meaning of his barefaced Falsehood, in representing North-America as in a state of absolute rebellion against the best of Kings, and in using all his feeble endeavours to excite his Majesty and his Ministers to send over an armed force to quell us, as he modestly terms it? But such is his insensibility to all the dictates of Honour or publick Virtue, that to compleat his character, he would now attempt to demolish the Liberty of the Press, that invaluable privilege of a free people; because through that channel his hidden arts are brought to Light. 'Tis but a piece of justice to the public, to let them know his last effort to prop his sinking character, which has long laboured under violent suspicions. He procured a writ for the printers of his letters, on Saturday last, which was executed by the Sheriff on Monday morning following; as twelve hundred pounds damages were marked upon the writ, the printers sent him a notice about 12 o'clock, to appear before a Magistrate to shew cause of action; but he refused to appear. At 4 o'clock, the same afternoon, they sent him another notice, to appear for the same purpose at 10 o'clock the next day, and informed him, that unless he appeared, they would move for a discharge from the arrest. But such was the consciousness of his guilt, that he refused again to appear, and as he could not be compelled by law to shew cause of action, the arrest was accordingly discharged. We are only the printers of a free and impartial paper, and we challenge Mr. Hughes and the world, to convict us of partiality in this respect, or of even an inclination to restrain the freedom of the press in any instance. We can appeal to North-America not only for our impartiality as printers, but also for the great advantages derived to us very lately from the unrestrained liberty, which every Briton claims of communicating his sentiments to the public thro' the channel of the press. What would have become of the liberties of the British Colonies in North-America, if Mr. Hughes's calls on Great Britain had been heard, to restrain the printers here from publishing what he is pleased to stile inflammatory pieces, and if every pros The First Carriers' Address. 99 titute scribbler, and enemy to his country had been suffered, without control from the pens of true patriots, to rack their distempered brains, to find out arguments to gull a free-born people into a tame submission to perpetual slavery, and to impose their flimsy cobwebs upon us, instead of solid and substantial reasoning? To the freedom of the press in America we may in a great measure attribute the continuance of those inherent and constitutional privileges, which we yet enjoy and which every Briton, who is not inslaved to private or party interests, prefers to his life. We cannot therefore doubt, but that the happiness, which now reigns through all the British plantations, will inspire every friend of his country with an honest and generous indignation against the wretch that would attempt to enslave his countrymen by restraints on the press. We would now inform the publick, that the letters of Mr. Galloway and Mr. Hughes, which we printed in our last week's paper, were transmitted to Philadelphia, by Capt. Sparks, from a gentleman in London of character and integrity, who is a friend of North-America, and never was accounted capable of imposing upon the publick. They were publickly seen and read in the Coffee-Houses in London by great numbers, were laid before the Parliament, and are copied verbatim in their Books. They came as genuine into our hands, as such we laid them before the publick, and such, we have it in our power to prove them. But were there no other evidences of his writing the letters we printed, there may be sufficient Proofs of the Fact taken from the very letters themselves, to show them the genuine Productions of his accurate pen.-Let not Mr. Hughes therefore think that his weak and faint denial of the Genuineness of the Letters will pass with the impartial world, as sufficient to overthrow such a Variety and Strength of Evidence, as the Publick is already possessed of against him. Let him reconcile the assurances he has given to the Commissioners of the Stamp Office, that he would faithfully execute the stamp-office when it would be in his power, with his full resignation of it which he made to the public, before he can expect to be believed in any matter by his fellow citizens. WILLIAM & THOMAS BRADFORD. "Carriers' Addresses," which are now going out of use as scarcely dignified and proper enough for the Press of 1872 to indorse or encourage, originated with Bradford in 1776, nearly a century ago, as an indirect means of making the public pay more than the regular subscription price of his paper. The first address was headed, THE NEW-YEAR VERSES OF THE PRINTER'S LADS, WHO CARRY THE PENNSYLVANIA JOURNAL, TO THE CUSTOMERS, PHILADELPHIA, JANUARY 1, 1776. What oceans of ink have been pressed into the service of Thalia since she stepped forward in aid of the "Printer's Lads" of the Philadelphia Journal! Not much money was paid, it is true, in those times of limited means, but in 1860 or 1865, the carriers of the New York papers, in English, German, French, Irish, Welsh, Political, Literary, Theatrical, Scientific, and Religious, with their enormous issue, no doubt received, on a single New Year's Day, no less than $5000 in pour-boires at the doors of newspaper subscribers in that city alone. The Newspaper Carriers' Address is probably the last of its class. Thirty or forty years ago, the Lamplighters, the |