Dr. Joseph Warren’s Participation in the Christopher Seider Incident

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Date: February 26, 1770 “Last Thursday Morning [i.e. February 22nd] about 10 o ‘Clock, some Boys & Children set up a large wooden Head, with a Board faced with paper, on which was painted the figures of four of the Importers, who had entered into, and violated the Merchants agreement, in the middle of the […]

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Somebody Has Some ‘Splainin’ to Do – Mercy Otis Warren vs. Miss Mercy Scollay in The Royal American Magazine

by Samuel A. Forman In my biography of Joseph Warren, I suggest that his fiancée Miss Mercy Scollay may have been the author of an intriguing and ingenious poem that appeared anonymously in June 1774. Articles Which Female Vanity has Comprised as Necessaries was featured in Isaiah Thomas’ Royal American Magazine just as the Solemn […]

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Miss Mercy Scollay is John Singleton Copley’s ‘Lady in a Blue Dress’

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by Samuel A. Forman I believe that the sitter portrayed in John Singleton Copley’s mysterious Lady in a Blue Dress is Miss Mercy Scollay of Boston at age 22. The striking, full size portrait resides at the Terra Foundation Museum in Chicago.[i] In an age of visuals, I decided that an image of Miss Scollay […]

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Oppose the Vending of the Tea with Our Lives and Fortunes

Dates: October 23, November 2, and November 3, 1773 Author: Abiel Ruddock as secretary of the Boston North End Caucus “October 23, 1773.  Gibbons Sharp Moderator. Voted – That this body will oppose the vending any Tea, sent by the East India Company to any part of the Continent, with our lives and fortunes. Voted […]

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Be in Readiness to Exert Themselves in the Most Resolute Manner

Date: undated, probably November 28, 1773 Author: Attributed to Joseph Warren “A part of the tea shipped by the East-India Company is now arrived in this harbor, and we look upon ourselves bound to give you the earliest intimation of it; and we desire that you favor us with your company at Faneuil Hall, at […]

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Induce Measures Destructive of Our Constitutional Liberty

Authors:  Boston Committee of Correspondence, which included Joseph Warren “Boston, June 22d, 1773. Sir, The Committee of Correspondence of the Town of Boston, conformable to that Duty which they have hitherto endeavored to discharge with Fidelity, again address you with a very fortunate important Discovery; and cannot express their grateful Sentiments in having obtained the […]

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Publishing Educator Opines on Shared Late Colonial Printing Forms – Part II

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Author: Wayne McCarthy, Waltham Public Schools and Past Captain Commanding of the Lexington Minute Men Date: Jan-Feb 1773 Source: Massachusetts Spy, Vol. II, issue 104, suppl, January 29, 1773; Essex Gazette, Vol. V, Issue 136, pp. 1-2 suppl, February 9, 1773 Commentary:  Mr. McCarthy speculates, with respect to both political motivations and the mechanics of […]

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Publishing Educator Opines on Shared Late Colonial Printing Forms – Part I

Author: Wayne McCarthy, Waltham Public Schools and Past Captain Commanding of the Lexington Minute Men Date: Jan-Feb 1773 Source: Massachusetts Spy, Vol. II, issue 104, suppl, January 29, 1773; and Essex Gazette, Vol. V, Issue 136, pp. 1-2 suppl, February 9, 1773 Several authorities have taken note of the apparently identical printings of the Massachusetts’ […]

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Who Are These Impudent Women, Non-Consumers of British Goods?

Author: Joseph Warren signatory and possible co-author “Boston 31.st 1769. We the subscribers Inhabitants of the Town of Boston being desirous to concur with the Merchants and Traders of said Town in their late laudable Agreement not to import any of the Manufactures of Great Britain, do hereby faithfully promise and engage that we will […]

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Discovery of Shared Printing Plates Between Patriot Publishers

Date:  Jan-Feb 1773 The Massachusetts Spy, Vol. II, issue 104, suppl; January 29, 1773;  Essex Gazette, Vol. V, Issue 136, pp. 1-2 suppl, February 9, 1773;  and Massachusetts Gazette Extraordinary, Issue 3618, p. 1, February 4, 1773 – published the Massachusetts House of Representatives’ answer to Thomas Hutchinson’s New Year’s 1773 speech.  The first two […]

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