Happy Rhody Independence Day!

Two full months before the Continental Congress in Philadelphia declared independence from Great Britain, the General Assembly of Rhode Island passed and printed an act renouncing our allegiance to the King of England.

Printed in Providence by John Carter, the town’s 3rd printer who operated from1767-1814, the Rhode Island Historical Society holds one of the two known copies of this broadside (the other is atPrincetonUniversity). But to make ours unique, a contemporary, un-named hand wrote the word “State” over each occurrence of “Colony” in the “General Officers” and “Town Officers” paragraphs of the newly revised oaths. The original manuscript of the act is held by the Rhode Island State Archives.

“An Act Repealing an Act Intituled [sic], ‘An Act for the More Effectual Securing to His Majesty the Allegiance of His Subjects in this His Colony and Dominion of Rhode-Island and Providence Plantations;’ and Altering the Form of Commissions, of All Writs and Processes in the Courts, and of the Oaths Prescribed by Law.”  [G1157 Broadsides 1776 No.6; Alden 661]

On July 18th the Rhode Island General Assembly officially voted to abandon the word “colony”, but this early scribe demonstrates the zealous excitement of the day, and heralds the political winds of change that would blow down the Bay and set the rest of the British colonies inNorth Americaon fire.

Last year our copy of the Act of Renunciation was  on full display for public viewing at the John Brown House Museum in conjunction with a lauded display of a rare “Dunlap copy” of the Declaration of Independence  printed on the eve of July 4, 1776 in Philadelphia by John Dunlap. There are 25 known copies of the Dunlap imprint still in existence. These were distributed to each colony in order to be reprinted by the local printers. The RIHS hold two distinct imprints of the R.I. version — both printed at Newport by Solomon Southwick.

This year, we will open an exhibition on Thursday, June 28 at the John Brown House  Museum that will feature relics and artifacts from the Revolutionary War including a replica of the warrant for any information leading to the capture of any of the Gaspee participants–One hundred pounds, which in good Rhode Island tradition was never claimed.

-P. Bean, Printed Collection Librarian

Register and Read

Have you been pining for JSTOR? I know I have, and I was delighted by the Early Journal Content.  (That’s  free online access to content  in JSTOR published prior to 1923 in the United States and prior to 1870. AS JSTOR says,  This “Early Journal Content” includes discourse and scholarship in the arts and humanities, economics and politics, and in mathematics and other sciences.It includes nearly 500,000 articles from more than 200 journals. This represents 6% of the content on JSTOR.” Read about it here.

But everything else was inaccessible, though tantalizing in search results. Now, JSTOR will make more content available to individuals who do not have JSTOR access through an institution. This is still limited access (even if content wants to be free, content providers have to eat and pay for bandwidth) but it is a fantastic step forward.  “Register & Read includes approximately 75 journals from more than 40 publishers, a subset of the content in JSTOR. This includes content from the first volume and issue published for these journals through a recent year (generally 3-5 years ago).” Find out more here.

A search of available content turns up a range of citations:

Internal Factors Influencing Egg Production in the Rhode Island Red Breed of Domestic Fowl. III  
H. D. Goodale
The American Naturalist, Vol. 52, No. 618/619 (Jun. – Jul., 1918), pp. 301-321

Child Labor Law, Rhode Island  
Grace Sherwood
The American Political Science Review, Vol. 4, No. 2 (May, 1910), pp. 212-213

An Account of a Meteor Seen in New England, and of a Whirlwind Felt in That Country: In a Letter to the Rev. Tho. Birch, D. D. Secretary to the Royal Society, from Mr. John Winthrop, Professor of Philosophy at Cambridge in New England  
John Winthrop
Philosophical Transactions (1683-1775), Vol. 52, (1761 – 1762), pp. 6-16

Accessible history: that’s always a good thing.

~ Kirsten Hammerstrom, Director of Collections

Soldiers’ Winter

Sometimes you find the best things in a random way: thanks to an emailed reference question, I discovered the diary of Albigence Waldo, surgeon with the 1^st Connecticut Regiment, Continental Army, covering the period November 10, 1777-January 8, 1778. The “So what?” of this for Rhode Island is that the 1^st Connecticut and the 2^nd Rhode Island were both engaged in the Defense of the Delaware in 1777 and encamped at Valley Forge in 1777-1778, months recorded in the Diary of Jeremiah Greenman, sergeant with the 2^nd Rhode Island. (Full disclosure: this writer’s family belongs to the reenacted 2^ndRhode Island Regiment.) While the RIHS does not own the original of either of these diaries (Waldo’s is at Harvard, and Greenman’s remains in private hands), both have been published and can be compared.At 17, Greenman joined the army in 1775 and participated in Benedict Arnold’s expedition to Quebec; the privations of that starving march when soldiers ate squirrel head and candle wick soup, killed and ate their own dogs, and abandoned their sicker comrades, surely colored Greenman’s experience of Valley Forge. Waldo, well-educated, a scholar of Latin, left behind a flourishing practice, a comfortable home, wife, and children; his perspective and his language, are far different from Greenman’s.

But to compare them is to understand each man better, and to understand the war better—so hard to do now, when it is so long ago and far away in time, technology, and myth-making.

West Jersey History Project Hessian Map

To begin with, some minor background: After the battle and retreat from Fort Mifflin in November, the Continental Army fell back to Whitemarsh, Pennsylvania, and engaged in minor skirmishes with British forces in early December 1777. The goal was to get to winter quarters at Valley Forge, and to build shelter for the coming winter.

Here is the action at Fort Mifflin, side by side:

Waldo November 10 After describing the turn of fortune experienced by Captain Nichols, caption of an English packet captured at New Castle, Waldo notes, “An incessant cannonading at or near Red Bank this day. No salt to eat dinner with. November 11, 12, 13, & 14—Nothing material happened.

Greenman M 10.  this day the Enemy set out a new, resolving if posable to reduce the fort, knowing if it was nor done they would be obliged to evacuate Philadelphia, [they] opened three more batteries upon it & keep up an incessant fire on the Fort, all the palisades where broken dow[n], the Diches filled up with Mud by the strong tides, Capn. Treet, who distinguished himself by his bravery, and his Lieut, was killed / the Garrison exhausted & almost reduced. T 11. this morn cule / We burst an eighteen pounder which was got from the wreck of the agusta, and killed one Many & by the Scales & peaces of the Carriage Eighteen More where slightly wounded— W. 12 Colo. Smith was wounded and went out of the [fort] with the old Garrison, being relieved by Major Thare [Thayer] with sum of our men, the Enemy now began to doubt the promises of their Engineer Montresor who had constructed the Fort & had bosted at the beginning that he would reduce it in a few days…

Greenman, uneducated, a sergeant, has a different set of responsibilities than Waldo, and a in every sense, a different position. He seems unlikely to have agreed with Waldo’s estimation that “Nothing material happened” those days in November, 1777.

~Kirsten Hammerstrom, Director of Collections

You can read Greenman’s published diary, Diary of a common soldier in the American Revolution, 1775-1783 : an annotated edition of the military journal of Jeremiah Greenman by Robert C. Bray and Paul E. Bushnell (DeKalb, IL: 1978)  in the RIHS Library. Waldo’s diary was published in the Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography, Volume 21 No. 3, 1897, now available free through JSTOR. The Map of the American Fortifications on the Delaware is one of the Revolutionary War Era Maps available through the West Jersey History Project.

One for the Little Boy

1959.6.1, Boy's frock ca. 1762

At an event commemorating the 235th anniversary of the Fall of Fort Lee in New Jersey, I watched the re-enactors’ children playing, dressed in period style, and was reminded of children’s struggles with clothing in multiple centuries. The Rhode Island Historical Society is fortunate to own children’s clothing from the 18^th and 19^thcenturies, including this boy’s jacket (1959.6.1) worn by William Batter of Scituate, Rhode Island around 1762.

Wiliam Battey (1759-1842) was the son of John and Priscilla Battey, Quakers who owned a large farm in South Scituate. William grew up to own and manage a tavern on the main road that connected New York, Providence, and Boston; in 1797, he expanded the tavern and added a sign advertising “Entertainment by William Battey.” Lafayette was supposed to have stopped, and spent the night, at Battey’s tavern, and indeed a Battey child was named Lafayette in honor of the general.

1948.1.1, Thomas Cranston

The cut of the coat or frock, with narrow sleeves and proportionally deep cuffs, follows men’s styles of the time, as seen in the Society’s ca.1755 portrait of Thomas Cranston by Joseph Blackburn (1948.1.1).

Still, the jacket is made of washable linen, and the length and fullness of the skirt suggests that this is more likely a linen frock worn before Battey was breeched, rather than a miniature frock coat. Breeching, or moving a boy from skirted garments to breeches and coats, typically took place between the ages of three and seven, and this frock have been saved to commemorate that event.

Back view, 1959.6.1

By the middle of the 18^th century, children’s clothes had grown less restrictive and more conducive to movement, play, and washing, than earlier garments had been. We can imagine a very young boy running around a farmhouse in Scituate in this frock, skirts flying; the stylish back is cut to take advantage of the stripes in forming a chevron, and the overall effect is graphically striking. Other frocks from this time are striped, and examples exist at Williamsburg of very similar, though made of  finer fabric, garments.

By the end of the century, many young boys were wearing small breeches or trousers and coats, or short jackets with button-on trousers, rather than frocks. We are lucky indeed to have this garment to help us understand the daily life of the past.

~KNH

New Policy! Cameras allowed starting July 1 at the RIHS Library!

Credit: BigTallGuy, from Flickr

New Policy! Cameras allowed starting July 1 at the RIHS Library!

The Rhode Island Historical Society has in its mission a kind of paradox. Our responsibilities are twofold: to PRESERVE the Collection, and to provide ACCESS to said incredible Collection.  These two goals sometimes appear to stand in direct opposition to each other, as with our policy that certain  items cannot be photocopied because of their age, fragility, or binding.

However, in the interest of increasing access and ease of research, we are instituting a new policy at the library.  Starting JULY 1st, 2011, we will allow researchers to bring cameras into the library.  Many materials in our collections are too fragile for a photocopying machine but can be photographed without damage.  Researchers will now be allowed, in certain circumstances, to take photographs of our materials with their own cameras to make research copies.

There are some limits, of course. Researchers wishing to use their personal cameras must be current Members of the Rhode Island Historical Society and must purchase a Camera Pass (good for one day). All materials to be photographed must be pre-approved.  And of course, in accordance with copyright law, just like our photocopy policy, photos taken of historical materials are for study purposes only, and may not be published or exhibited in print or online. For that, we have a Rights & Reproductions division. We welcome you to contact us for more details.

The Third Dimension

The visual splendor of James Cameron’s Avatar might seem to occupy the cutting edge of entertainment, but in fact 3D has a long history.  And on June 19th, you can get a taste of the early days of that history at an exciting event: The Third Dimension: Rhode Island in 3-D.

From 7:00 p.m. to 9:30 p.m. at the Aldrich House at 110 Benevolent Street, you can view stereoview images of Rhode Island—from black-and-white images taken in the 1890s to dramatic views of the 1955 Blackstone River flood—as few ever have the chance to see them: on the big screen in all their glory (3D glasses provided). Narration of the events will be provided by local historian Ned Connors.

Not only is this a chance to see a rare visual performance, it’s also a chance to help the Historical Society preserve Rhode Island’s heritage. All proceeds from the event will support our Graphics Inventory Project, an ongoing effort to catalog materials like photographs and stereoviews and make them available for use.  You can find out more about the project at its new blog.

Tickets are $75 and seating is limited. To reserve your seat please contact Natasha Brooks at the RIHS Library, by phone (401) 273-8107 x12, by email programs@rihs.org, or in person at the RIHS Library at 121 Hope Street, Providence, RI 02906.

You can get a sense of the stereoview effect with these Animated Stereoviews of Old Japan.

Westminster Stories

According to Florence Simister*, Westminster Street in Providence was named by residents of the street who eventually hoped to set up a town of the same name, separate from the “tyrannous rule of the men in the old part of Providence” on the other side of the river.

Needless to say, that plan didn’t work out, and this weekend you can find out more about the street at The Museum of Westminster Street outdoor exhibition between Dorrance and Union Streets on Westminster. Its creators describe it as “a diorama telling stories of people and buildings on two blocks of Westminster Street.”

And if the exhibition inspires an interest in digging deeper into the history of the street, the Library offers a number of great opportunities for that as well. In addition to plenty of images and maps that feature the street in its evolution through the years, you’ll also find collections documenting life on Westminster Street, including:

• William Oscar Cooke , who was a lumber dealer. When he started out in Providence sometime around 1850, Westminster Street was known as High Street.
• The sign of the “Bunch of Grapes” hung at 291 Westminster from 1891 to 1972 and advertised the Gladding’s department store.
• The Franklin Lyceum met at 62 Westminster, where members debated topics of moment and heard orations from the likes of Edgar Allen Poe and Ralph Waldo Emerson.

Find more Westminster connections through our online catalog or our website.

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* Florence Parker Simister, Streets of the City: An Anecdotal History of Providence. Providence: Mowbray, 1968. Pages 127-8.

Sanford Ross, pt. 1

The previous post offered a note on the Thanksgiving celebrations of 1812 in Rhode Island*. That it turns up in the pages of an almanac is not particularly unusual—almanacs were frequently used for that purpose, which is only natural, considering that almanacs are arranged chronologically. Nor is the customized interleaving done by this owner unusual. What makes this case particularly useful is that the almanac-diaries of a single person over the course of a fairly lengthy period of time (roughly 1806-22) are brought together in one place  and that their author signs his name (Sanford Ross).

A genealogical account** lists a Sanford Ross born on 22 March 1752 and who died on 22 April 1831. He had 11 children with his first wife, Hannah Briggs, and after her death in January of 1809, Sanford married Lydia Peck in November of the same year. Both events are recorded tersely in the diaries: January of 1809: “Hannah Ross died 4th of January half past Seven of the Clock evening” and then in November: “Married 6th November” in the margin beside the calendar. Among his 11 children with Hannah is one named William, who appears in the almanac entry for 9 January 1811:

William’s date of death is not recorded in the family Bible that lists the births and deaths of his siblings. The genealogical account does, however, mention a death notice of a William Sanford who died on a gunboat in 1813, within a year or two of  the night his father dreamed he was at home.

The image above offers a taste of the most typical concerns of the diary: Weather is far and away the most popular topic, but there are also references to things like “uncommond noises”, family members getting or leaving jobs, births, deaths, comings and goings of ships, openings of new shops, and always more weather. (The entry for 4 January will be the topic of a future blog post.)

Over the course of such entries, brief as they are, it’s possible to assemble a picture of their author. Weather, for instance, is only the beginning of Sanford’s interest in nature. The following selection hints at his interest in wildlife, as he notes  the arrival of swallows in April of 1812 not once, but twice:

(Hint: the second reference to the swallows is written vertically in the margin.)

And the bottom of the facing page is an example of the religious, political and financial issues that are frequent as well, as Sanford notes the passing of the Embargo act in April and the fact that he managed to rent half of his church pew for 7 shillings and 6 pence for the year (more information about the practice of buying pews and an example of a particularly nice pew at the website of the Old North Church in Boston). One of the entries below (6 January 1817) provides evidence that Ross was a shop owner of some kind, and the 1824 directory of Providence lists him as a grocer at 228 South Main.

A few more selections:

• Creative Spelling: 5 September 1813: “the Younited States Brigg Enterprize of 14 gun took the Brittish Brigg Boxer of 18 heavy guns”
• The 1814 almanac begins with a full-page tally of the ships of the British and American navies on Lake Ontario.
• 15 December 1814: [In large script] “This Day the Hartford Convention Meets In Hartford…Never forgit the mischef that was Intended by them”.
• 6 April 1815: “Horrid Masscre” followed by a description of the English murder of 7 American prisoners of war after the Treaty of Ghent ended the war. As an example of how importantly the War of 1812 figured into Sanford Ross’s life, the first interleaved leaf of the 1817 almanac opens by noting the beginning of the war in 1812 and its end in 1815.
• 6 January 1817: “This Day the Sun has Rose to clear the Ruff of the widdow Sheldons house & Shines in my Shop all Day.”
• 14 January 1817: “This Day and Night being the coldest that we have had for Several years this Evening a teamster froze to Death a going home from town to Smithfield, by Name James Mitchal Lindsey. Found the Next morning on the Road two miles from home…”
• 6 June 1817: “Mr Peleg Peckhams foot taken off.”
• 28 October 1817: Commenting on the repeal of an act sponsored by James B. Mason, which presumably was burdensome to retailers: “And Maide More Milde that Retailors may try to Live. Fair ye Well James. You have had them Under the hammer Long a Nuff.”
• At the end of the 1817 almanac: “A Receipt to make Spruce Beer”: “6 Gallons of warter and 2 qt of molasses put togeather & Stand in the Sun which will warm it a Nuff then Shake them well — then Put in 1 gill Essence of Spruce & Mix them well togeather — then put in 1 Large tea Spoonfull of Perlash and 1 cup full of Ginger Stir them well togeather when Setteld Put in 1/2 pint of Emptious[?] which wen Setteld will be fitt for Youse.”
• 18 January 1819: “this Day their was 4 Pirats hanged in Boston on Thirsday.”
• 5 July 1819: “A Commet maid its appearence about Nor. Nor West out of site a bout at 11 Clock in Evening and Rises a bout Day light. It plays Round the North Star.”
• 15 August 1819: “heard a Sermand prechd by a woman Mrs. Clarrissa Danforth. in the town house. Preachd from Ezeakel [33] chapter 11 Verse. Veary Good Discorse and Veary full.”
• 18 October 1822: “Whipping Day in town and cutting of Ears and Branding with the letter C as a Counterfitter of money.”

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*Thanksgiving was a sporadic holiday at the time: http://www.archives.gov/legislative/features/thanksgiving/

** Reading Room: CS 71 R825 1938. Ross Family: Sanford Ross Descendants. Copy of manuscript.

Happy Independence Day

Yes, it’s true that July 4th is the traditional day of celebrating the 13 American Colonies’ independence from Great Britain. But on 4 May 1776* Rhode Island became the first colony to separate themselves from the crown. The broadside declaration of Rhode Island’s independence featured here is one of only two known copies**:

(The full title is actually the slightly wordier: “An Act Repealing an Act Intituled, ‘An Act for the More Effectual Securing to His Majesty the Allegiance of His Subjects in this His Colony and Dominion of Rhode-Island and Providence Plantations;’ and Altering the Form of Commissions, of All Writs and Processes in the Courts, and of the Oaths Prescribed by Law.”)***

One aspect of the American Revolution that this document illustrates clearly is the practical (and often bureaucratic) realities of declaring independence: getting rid of a king means changing a lot of letterhead, or at least removing his name from a lot of documents and ceremonies. It is, after all, technically an act repealing an act.  And after the string of impassioned “whereas”-es  (“. . . confiscate our Property, and spread Fire, Sword and Desolation . . .”) the bulk of the document is all about changing the wording of oaths for civil servants.

This copy of the document also displays the shift from “colony” to “state” in a moment of transition. It was not until July 18th that the Rhode Island General Assembly voted to abandon the word “colony”****, and an early hand has written “State” over each mention of “Colony” in the “General Officers” and “Town Officers” paragraphs of the newly revised oaths:

Henry Ward, the General Assembly’s secretary, signed this copy (and also the Princeton copy), as evidence of its validity.

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* The day began (according to vol. VII, page 512 of Records of the Colony of Rhode Island) with a vote on procuring shovels for the colony’s military brigade.

** The other copy is in Princeton University’s Andre De Coppet Collection. This copy is signed but does not include the emendations of “Colony” to “State”. The original manuscript act is held by the Rhode Island State Archives.

***G1157 Broadsides 1776 No.6:  “An Act Repealing an Act . . .”, [Providence: John Carter, 1776].  Alden #661; Evans 15056; Winship p. 34.

**** Sydney James, Colonial Rhode Island, A History, New York: Scribners, 1975.