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WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 

 
WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 WARD L. MINER 
 
 DUKE UNIVERSITY PRESS Durham, North Carolina 1962 
 

 
 
 © 1962, Duke University Press 
 Library of Congress Catalogue Card number 62-148 
 Cambridge University Press, London N.W. 1, E 
 
 LH AE 
 
 Printed in the United States of America 3 
 by the Seeman Printery, Inc. Durham, N.C. 4s * 
 

 

 
 assistance of funds from a grant to 
 the Duke University Press by the Ford 
 Foundation. ' ' 
 
PREFACE 
 
 HERE ARE always mixed feelings when any scholar sits down 
 
 to write his preface, faced as he is with the galley proof of what 
 will soon turn into a printed book. Seeing the long sheets results in 
 sighs of mingled satisfaction and relief. Yet this very awareness of per- 
 spective prevents a too complacent satisfaction and relief. No matter 
 how individual one’s own research is, its existence depends on the help of 
 so many others. The “Note on Sources” at the conclusion of this book 
 is therefore, in so many ways, an extension of this preface, the citations 
 not only suggesting guide lines for the reader but also expressing gratitude 
 for what others have done. 
 
 First, I would like to express my appreciation for financial assistance. 
 I was able to travel to the appropriate libraries and secure microfilms, 
 photostats, and the like—in other words, do the basic research—under a 
 research grant from the American Philosophical Society. Later, a grant 
 from the Graduate Council of the University of Kansas made possible 
 the typing of a portion of the manuscript of this book. 
 
 For their many courtesies I want to indicate my gratitude to members 
 of the staffs of the New-York Historical Society, Manuscript Room of 
 the New York Public Library, National Archives, Hall of Records 
 of Maryland, Manuscript Division of the Library of Congress, Library of 
 the American Philosophical Society, Enoch Pratt Free Library, Library 
 Company of Philadelphia, Department of Records of the city of Phila- 
 delphia, Connecticut State Library, New Haven Colony Historical Society, 
 Henry E. Huntington Library, Massachusetts Historical Society, Yale 
 University Library, University of Pennsylvania Library, Vassar College 
 Library, Historical Society of Pennsylvania, Rhode Island Historical Socie- 
 ty, American Antiquarian Society, New London County Historical Society, 
 Maryland Historical Society, and John Carter Brown Library, Brown 
 University. Individuals I would like to name who have contributed much 
 include Clarence §. Brigham, Clarkson A. Collins, III, Lois V. Given, 
 Hope Goddard Iselin, Dwight C. Lyman, Fred Shelley, Neda Westlake, 
 and Lawrence C. Wroth. 
 
 For permission to quote from unpublished manuscript material in 
 their possession may I express my thanks to the following institutions: 
 American Antiquarian Society, Rhode Island Historical Society, American 
 Philosophical Society, Salem County Historical Society, Hall of Records of 
 
Vill PREFACE 
 
 Maryland, Maryland Historical Society, John Carter Brown Library of 
 Brown University, Historical Society of Pennsylvania, National Archives, 
 Providence Public Library, Library Company of Philadelphia, New-York 
 Historical Society, New York Public Library, and Yale University Li- 
 brary. The 1774 letter of John Foxcroft is unpublished Crown copyright 
 material in the Public Record Office, London, and has been reproduced 
 by permission of the Controller of H. M. Stationery Office. 
 
 I will deposit an annotated copy of this book in the John Carter 
 Brown Library, Brown University, where it may be consulted. 
 
 Words can never state the gratitude and the debt I owe for the 
 many patient hours so lovingly given by my wife, Thelma. 
 
 Feb. 4, 1962 
 Youngstown University 
 
Notes on sources will be found on pages 209 ff. 
 
 The index will be found on pages 215 ff. 
 

 
WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
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 ILLIAM GODDARD was not the most important of the 
 
 many printers who operated in the colonies after Stephen 
 Daye set up the Widow Glover’s press in Cambridge. Nor was he 
 unimportant. In the heyday of his career other printers published 
 more books than he did. James Parker started numerous maga- 
 zines; Goddard did not, perhaps because of his intimate knowledge 
 of Parker’s failures. Nor did Goddard occupy the public prominence 
 of Franklin, who to the end of his life regarded diplomacy and 
 public service as mere avocations compared to the not only primary, 
 but he vocation—printing. Yet the public contributions of William 
 Goddard are noteworthy and distinguished. John Peter Zenger 
 made, perhaps unwittingly, a special legacy to all succeeding printers 
 as a result of his famous trial in 1745; but freedom of the press as 
 a fundamental principle had no more staunch defender than William 
 Goddard. And he understood, believed in, and practiced the princi- 
 ple long before Baltimore mobs placed the Goddard press in 
 jeopardy. 
 
 After all has been said about what Goddard was not, there 
 remain the very positive qualities of his personality and the positive 
 contributions he made both to our printing and to our political his- 
 tory. Yet when these qualities and contributions have been pre- 
 sented, what stands out most about his career is—William Goddard, 
 newspaperman. In a period when a newspaper was subordinate 
 in the mind and purse of the average printer to the almanacs, 
 broadsides, pamphlets, and workaday ephemeral publications of 
 the colonial print shop, Goddard printed the almanacs, broadsides, 
 pamphlets, and other ephemera, but they were subordinate for 
 him to the regular publication of a newspaper. A careful perusal 
 of the published Franklin and Hall workbooks will show that the 
 financial success of Franklin was based not so much on the Penn- 
 sylvania Gazette, though that helped, as on Poor Richard, on the 
 
4 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 printing of the provincial assembly’s laws, on the wholesale business 
 in printing supplies that Franklin was so successful in conducting 
 among the printers of all the colonies, on his various partnerships, 
 and on the thousand and one items that made up the total output 
 of the colonial printing establishment. Another financially success- 
 ful contemporary was Isaiah Thomas, in later life a close friend of 
 Goddard. Yet, ironically when we look at the business of printing 
 in the twentieth century, Thomas made far more money from his 
 books—Bibles, spelling books, and books of all sorts—than from 
 his different newspapers. Today fortunes are made from news- 
 papers, and fortunes are spent publishing books. Only a little over 
 a hundred and fifty years ago we find the wealthy book publishers 
 Isaiah Thomas and Mathew Carey and the struggling newspaper- 
 man William Goddard. And the struggling is true in spite of his 
 twice being the owner of the newspaper with the largest circulation 
 in the colonies and in the new country. Once, at Philadelphia, 
 such a “mass-circulation” newspaper ended by Goddard’s going 
 through bankruptcy proceedings in the local courts; the other news- 
 paper, at Baltimore, ended by Goddard’s selling out and retiring to 
 live not just off those proceeds, however, but off the income and 
 properties owned by his recently married wife. And so we find 
 the newspaperman William Goddard well-nigh forgotten by later 
 generations while the Franklins, Thomases, and Careys continue 
 to attract both popular and scholarly attention. 
 
 Being a newspaperman in the 1760’s, 1770’s, and 1780’s was 
 much different from being one today. The closest parallel to the 
 newspapers of those days is the weekly paper often found in rural 
 areas of this country. Many of these weeklies are edited, written, 
 set up, and run through the presses under the immediate super- 
 vision of one man, who also acts as advertising and circulation 
 manager. And it was much like this for all the printers before 
 and just after the Revolution. Printer’s ink soiled the hands of 
 those men and women. Much is revealed of the lives of the 
 colonial printers when we note that Goddard’s son, William Giles 
 Goddard, was one of the first newspaper editors who had not been 
 trained in the composing room; he entered the newspaper business 
 from the editorial room. But he did not begin his journalistic 
 career until twenty years after his father had retired. Appropriately 
 I have without thinking used the word journalist to describe the 
 
CHAPTER I 5 
 
 son’s occupation and reserved the words printer and newspaperman 
 for the father. A useful distinction is thereby made between the 
 two activities. Today our thinking of journalism as a profession 
 and printing as a trade has succeeded only in making both aspects 
 of the newspaperman tawdry. The eighteenth century would have 
 been horrified at this attitude. Imagine that gravestone in the small 
 cemetery at Fifth and Arch Streets in Philadelphia reading Benjamin 
 Franklin, Journalist. 
 
 In 1928 Michael Kraus in Imntercolonial Aspects of American 
 Culture on the Eve of the Revolution stressed the unifying forces 
 in colonial society in contrast to the divisive forces conventionally 
 emphasized. Among these unifying elements are the colonial news- 
 papers and printers. Much has been said about how the newspapers 
 contributed to the “intercolonial” attitudes Kraus speaks of—in their 
 dissemination of news, in the editors’ clipping of articles from each 
 other (John Dickinson’s “Letters from a Pennsylvania Farmer” 
 first published in Goddard’s Pennsylvania Chronicle appeared in all 
 but three of the colonial newspapers), and in the selectivity, the 
 emphasis implied in the work with the scissors. But it is the second 
 of these two elements I should like to talk about here—the printer, 
 well illustrated by Franklin’s activities as a printer, long before he 
 became involved in public affairs. His apprenticeship and first 
 practice of his trade as a journeyman were in Boston. He worked 
 as a journeyman and as master of his own shop in Philadelphia. A 
 familiar passage in the Autobiography narrates his flight from 
 Boston. He first sought employment in New York at the shop of 
 the elder William Bradford, who referred him to the shop in Phila- 
 delphia of his son, Andrew Bradford. Even as early as the 1720’s 
 colonial printers and their journeymen thought it natural to move 
 from colony to colony in pursuit of their trade. And the workmen 
 in each shop knew much about the activities and personnel of the 
 other shops. After Franklin got his printing business well under 
 way, among his first actions was the financing of other printing 
 establishments throughout the colonies as far away as South Caro- 
 lina and later Jamaica. I have, in another connection, mentioned 
 the wholesale business for other printers that Franklin conducted. 
 One reason for his success in this was Philadelphia itself, its geo- 
 graphical location, its commercial enterprises. The central location 
 of Penn’s “green country town” among the original thirteen colonies 
 
6 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 is apparent from the most casual glance at a map. More important 
 to Franklin’s wholesale business in printing supplies was the role 
 of Philadelphia and vicinity in paper-making and in a smaller way 
 the making of the ingredients for printing ink. Appropriately 
 enough the first paper mill in the colonies was started in 1690 by 
 William Rittenhouse on a branch of the Wissahickon. Though mills 
 were established throughout the colonies, the mills of Philadelphia 
 and Germantown continued to produce most of the paper made on 
 this side of the Atlantic until early in the nineteenth century. 
 Lawrence C. Wroth in The Colonial Printer gives these figures for 
 1787: of a total of eighty or ninety mills in operation in all the 
 states forty-eight were in Pennsylvania alone. It was not very 
 difficult for Franklin with his keen business sense to step in as a 
 middleman and supply other printers with their much-needed paper. 
 Of course, we must add to the reasons for Franklin’s success as a 
 wholesaler his London connections, particularly his lifelong friend- 
 ship with William Strahan, one of the leading printers in London. 
 
 The career of William Goddard also illustrates the “inter- 
 colonial” contributions of the printers just in following their trade. 
 He started his apprenticeship as a printer in New Haven, after 
 growing up in New London. Before he had finished his training 
 he was working in New York. Goddard’s first printing establish- 
 ment was in Providence. Later, for about a year he worked in 
 New York with a sojourn in New Jersey long enough to print a 
 single issue of a newspaper (more properly treated as a broadside). 
 For several years he published a newspaper in Philadelphia. On a 
 small scale, while publishing the Pennsylvania Chronicle, he sold 
 paper to the printer John Holt in New York and perhaps to others. 
 He ended his activities as a printer by an almost twenty-year stay 
 in Baltimore. As a silent partner, though very much financially 
 involved, Goddard helped set up the first press in Alexandria, 
 Virginia. At various times he contemplated financing presses in 
 Norfolk, Virginia, and in Jamaica. This same pattern is evident in 
 the careers of many printers. Isaiah Thomas worked from the Caro- 
 linas to Nova Scotia before settling in Worcester. Another lesser 
 known example is Benjamin Mecom, the dapper, ne’er-do-well neph- 
 ew of Franklin. Mecom worked in several of the colonies (at one 
 time for Goddard in Philadelphia) and had his own shop for short 
 periods in places as separated as New Haven and Jamaica. God- 
 
CHAPTER I 7 
 
 dard’s seeming peripatetic career as a printer should not be thought 
 of as unusual in any sense. Practitioners of his trade thought of 
 themselves as printers first and New Yorkers or Virginians after- 
 wards. 
 
 And so we come to the career, the life, the personality of William 
 Goddard—in many ways typical of his period and his profession. 
 Like other colonial printers he moved around; yet unlike most 
 others it was a tempestuous moving around. Difficulties with the 
 postal system affected all the newspaper editors as well as Goddard; 
 however, he did not merely complain about the vagaries of the 
 colonial postmasters and postriders—he did something. Typical, 
 yes, untypical, yes; sometimes strong, sometimes weak; sometimes 
 great-minded, sometimes small-minded. All add up to a very 
 human William Goddard. 
 
«II - 
 
 HE antecedents of William Goddard are in no way unusual 
 for his time and place, both his paternal and maternal an- 
 cestors being from New England. Who the first Goddard was to 
 emigrate from England is somewhat in doubt, but probably it was 
 Giles Goddard (ca. 1648-ca. 1729) found in Boston and Brookline 
 by 1678. His son William (other records say that it was a brother 
 Joseph), born in 1678, married Miss Elizabeth Fairfield in 1697. 
 The son of William (or Joseph) was again named Giles, and this 
 Giles was the father of William, the subject of this biography. 
 Giles Goddard was born between 1703 and 1705. In 1725 he 
 was in the vicinity of New London, Connecticut. The first entry in 
 the parish records of the local Episcopal Church attests this: “Colony 
 Connecticott, June 6, 1725. Wee the subscribers doe oblige our- 
 selves to pay to the Rev. Mr James McSparran, or to his substitute, 
 he being Treasurer, the particular sums annexed to our names for 
 the building and erecting a Church for the service of Almighty God, 
 according to the Liturgie of the Church of England as by law 
 established.” Twelve names follow with sums ranging from £3 to 
 £50. The last is “Giles Goddard £5.” Giles was evidently not the 
 richest person in New London, but only a well-to-do citizen of 1725 
 could have afforded £5. Ten years later we find: “December 11th 
 1735, Doctor Giles Goddard of Groton in Connecut viz the Town 
 of Groton was married to Mrs Sarah updike at the House of her 
 Father Capt. Lowdowick Updike by Mr McSparran.” (Groton, it 
 might be explained, is just across the river Thames from New 
 London.) We can picture the young doctor, a confirmed Anglican 
 as his descendants to the present day have remained, getting himself 
 established in his profession in Groton and New London. By 1735 he 
 was successful enough in his practice to be able to put down the social 
 roots of marriage. There must have been a warm friendship for the 
 Reverend Mr. McSparran, by 1735 pastor at Narragansett, Rhode 
 
CHAPTER II 9 
 
 Island, for the Updikes to go to the trouble to secure his services for 
 the marriage ceremony in the home. 
 
 New London of this period was fortunate in having had an 
 industrious and careful diary keeper in the person of Joshua Hemp- 
 stead. The diary’s first entry mentioning Doctor Goddard is dated 
 March 26, 1735, and the last February 1, 1757, the day after Giles’s 
 death. Altogether there are fourteen references. Unfortunately 
 Hempstead is not the kind of diarist to characterize either his neigh- 
 bors or the events he mentions. Usually the entry will be a laconic 
 “T was up to Doctr Goddards in the middle of the Day,” the one 
 for October 17, 1754. 
 
 But several of the entries in the Hempstead diary do concern 
 the medical activities of Doctor Goddard. Where he got his training 
 we have no idea, but most likely he served his apprenticeship with 
 an older practitioner before hanging out his own shingle. The 
 medical treatment of those days can be seen: “I sent for Doctor 
 Goddard & he came & considered my Case and Says tis the Same 
 Distemper that hath of late prevailed among Children & Directs to 
 a drink of Strong Tea made of the bark of Sassafrax Roots boiled 
 with Lignum vitia Saw dust.” Sassafrass roots and sawdust—and 
 yet Hempstead got well. 
 
 We catch a glimpse of the personality of the doctor in the 
 Itinerarium of Doctor Alexander Hamilton, an Annapolis physician 
 who traveled to Portsmouth, New Hampshire, in 1744. “26 August 
 1744 New London I stayed att home [Duchand’s at the sign of the 
 Anchor] most of the forenoon and was invited to dine with Collector 
 Lechmere [Nicholas Lechmere, naval officer stationed at New Lon- 
 don], son of the surveyor att Boston. There was att table one Dr. 
 Goddard and an old maid whom they called Miss Katy, being a 
 great fat woman with a red face, as much like an old maid as a 
 frying pan. There sat by her a young, modest looking lady dressed 
 in black whom Mr. Lechmere called Miss Nansy, and next her, a 
 walnut coloured, thin woman, sluttishly dressed and very hard 
 favoured. These ladys went to meeting after dinner, and we three 
 sat drinking of punch and telling of droll storys.” The picture of 
 the two doctors and the naval officer drinking punch and telling 
 droll stories (that the ladies were not to hear) is a pleasant one. 
 We may be sure the punch was potent. 
 
 Probably not too long after his marriage Giles Goddard moved 
 
10 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 across the river from Groton to New London. Hempstead speaks 
 of doing some surveying at Groton for him on March 26, 1735. 
 The marriage record in December of the same year reveals him still 
 in Groton. All later references in the diary imply residence in 
 New London. We know that he lived finally on Bradley Street 
 in a house originally built by Jonathan Gardiner, later buying it, for 
 in 1743 he sold part of this lot to Charles Jeffery. 
 
 In 1752 he became involved in a lawsuit with Richard Durfey. 
 What the suit was about is now impossible to tell. Under the May 
 proceedings of the Connecticut Colony Assembly there is this sum- 
 mary remark: “On the petition of Richard Durfey of New London, 
 vs. Giles Goddard of New London, on file: The question was put, 
 whether anything should be granted on the said petition: Resolved 
 by this Assembly in the negative. Cost allowed respondent is £10 
 10s. 8d. old tenour. Ex. granted July 21st, 1752.” Like all colonial 
 legal matters this took a long time to be settled. More than two 
 years later Hempstead writes: “I was att home foren[oon], & in 
 Town in the aftern[oon] att Doctor Goddards to settle the Dif- 
 ferance between him & Capt. Durfey & Compleated it with the 
 assistance of Justice Perkins & I Recd of Ms Goddard 4os.” Let 
 us hope that the affair was compleated. 
 
 By the time the dispute with Captain Durfey was settled to the 
 satisfaction of Joshua Hempstead if not of Goddard, the doctor was 
 already partially incapacitated by gout, which was soon to force him 
 to his bed and to his death, January 31, 1757. “Doctor Giles 
 Goddard Died yesterday morning aged between 50 & 60. he hath 
 been decriped [decrepit] with the Gout &c Several years & of late 
 Confined to his house & Bed.” The widow and two children were 
 left with an estate evaluated at £780, a considerable sum for 1757. 
 Thus the affable doctor suffered the fate of so many eighteenth- 
 century drinkers of strong punch and tellers of droll stories—gout. 
 The dinner session with Doctor Hamilton was obviously not the 
 only such convivial bout that found Giles Goddard an active partici- 
 pant. 
 
 In 1635 a physician named Gysbert op Dyck emigrated from 
 Wesel, Germany, to Lloyd’s Neck, Long Island. Shortly his medical 
 practice was shoved into the background, and we find him in 1638 
 employed by the Dutch as Commander of Fort Hope, situated at 
 what is today Hartford. In 1643 in New Amsterdam he married 
 
CHAPTER II II 
 
 Katherine Smith, whose family was prominent among the early 
 settlers of Rhode Island. Her grandfather, Richard Smith, owned 
 on the west side of Narragansett Bay 30,000 acres, called Co- 
 cumscussuc. A son of Gysbert, born in 1646 and named Lodowick, 
 in 1664 moved from New Amsterdam to Kingston, Rhode Island, 
 anglicizing his surname to Updike. Somewhat later he married 
 Abigail Newton (1654-1745). (One of Lodowick’s descendants 
 was Daniel Berkeley Updike, the famous printer of Merrymount 
 Press.) Lodowick died about 1737, leaving one son and five 
 daughters. The son, Daniel, later served for several years (1731- 
 32, 1743-57) as attorney-general of the colony of Rhode Island. Ac- 
 cording to a descendant, Wilkins Updike, “Daniel was educated 
 in his father’s house, by an able French instructor [probably Daniel 
 Vernon] in the Greek, Latin and French languages, and his sisters, 
 in the Latin and French.” Such an education bespeaks a household 
 with financial means and intellectual interests far beyond the average. 
 One of the five sisters, Esther, on June 29, 1720, married Doctor 
 Thomas Fosdick, like Giles Goddard, of New London. 
 
 Sarah, another of the five sisters, was born, probably not too 
 long after 1700, at Cocumscussuc. Isaiah Thomas says of her: 
 “She received a good education, acquired an acquaintance with 
 several branches of useful and polite learning.” In her youth she is 
 alleged to have spent some time in Boston. Probably Sarah met 
 Giles during visits to her sister Esther and therefore did not come as 
 a total stranger to New London after her marriage on December 11, 
 1735. As the well-educated wife of a local physician she must have 
 contributed a good deal to the little seaport. But her duties as a 
 colonial housewife who must bear children went on apace. Her 
 first child, Catherine, died at the age of two months on January 15, 
 1736/7. The next child, Mary Katherine, was born June 16, 1738 
 (frequently the date is given as 1736, but that is evidently a confusion 
 with the other Catherine), while the family may have been still 
 living in Groton. Two years later the family was in New London, 
 where William was born October 20, 1740. Another child is 
 recorded as having died (September 19, 1742) though no age or sex 
 is mentioned. To have half of the children live to adulthood was 
 in those days a reasonable average. 
 
 Though we can readily verify the date of William Goddard’s 
 birth, we have no further specific record of him until 1755, but our 
 
12 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 imaginations can be of some help to us in filling in the fifteen years. 
 We have seen that the father regularly practiced his medical profes- 
 sion in the community, had prospered, and enjoyed the amenities 
 of comfortable, perhaps even luxurious, living. The mother had 
 had an education possessed by only a few of the local seagoing 
 citizenry. After 1742 she was able to devote her energies to her 
 family uninterrupted by childbearing. She herself probably taught 
 Mary Katherine and William to read and write, to cipher (living in 
 a seaport community would have shown the necessity for this), and 
 to enjoy the beauties of Shakespeare and of Pope, Swift, and the 
 other eighteenth-century writers later quoted so frequently by the 
 printer. More than likely William attended a dame’s school in 
 New London or its vicinity. Unfortunately we do not know where 
 he went or for how long this formal education lasted. We only 
 know that years later William mentioned reading Latin authors 
 and learning Roman history at school. But outside of school hours 
 undoubtedly the young boy and his sister played with the neighbor- 
 ing children in the long sunny days of summer and found all kinds 
 of pleasure in the winter snow and the ice of the Thames River. 
 And the profession of the father would have given the children an 
 acquaintance with adult townspeople. Surely they frequently heard 
 stories of sea voyages on the New England triangular route to the 
 West Indies, to Africa, and thence back to the home port, New 
 London. Many an evening the convivial doctor and other men 
 must have finished their Teneriffe and Madeira and rejoined the 
 family in front of the fireplace as a guest recounted his experiences 
 storming Louisburg. The vicissitudes of colonial New England 
 found their way into that household, but the amenities of comforta- 
 ble living, of social pleasures, of aesthetic satisfactions would have 
 done much to ameliorate the lives of the Goddards. 
 
 In 1755 the round of play on the docks, studies alongside his 
 sister, and hearing each Sunday the sermons of the Reverend Samuel 
 Seabury were interrupted for William. His father may have al- 
 ready been forced to be not quite so active in his practice and his 
 mother to take over an increased proportion of the family responsi- 
 bilities. Sending William out of the family circle to apprentice 
 himself to the printing trade would have been favorably regarded by 
 Giles Goddard; in fact, we can recognize his active participation in 
 the choice of the shop in which William was to work. As postmaster 
 
CHAPTER II 13 
 
 of New London the father would have had correspondence with and 
 perhaps have met James Parker, then postmaster in New Haven 
 and owner of a press there. Thus it is not surprising to find young 
 William sent to serve as a printer’s apprentice in New Haven. 
 We may add another surmise about William’s apprenticeship. 
 Likely a family in the financial circumstances of the Goddards had 
 in mind from the very beginning that their only son should have 
 his own establishment. Possibly discreet inquiries were made by 
 the parents about the cost of a press, of fonts of type, and of the 
 other paraphernalia necessary for the maintenance of such a business. 
 
 James Parker, in whose shops William was to work as an ap- 
 prentice until he was twenty-one years old, was born in 1714 in 
 Woodbridge, New Jersey. He learned his trade in the print shop of 
 William Bradford in New York. In 1742 Benjamin Franklin 
 became a silent partner in the Parker enterprises, and thereafter 
 the two corresponded regularly until Parker’s death in 1770. Parker’s 
 affairs prospered after the financial support of Franklin was infused 
 into his business. In 1743 he became public printer in New York 
 replacing his former mentor, William Bradford, and started a news- 
 paper, the New-York Weekly Post-Boy. In the 1750’s he became 
 postmaster of Woodbridge, New Jersey, and New Haven, where 
 John Holt served as his deputy. Under Franklin he was also 
 comptroller-general of the entire colonial postal system. He was 
 at times public printer to the colony of New Jersey and printer to 
 Yale College. During much of the 1750’s and-1760’s Parker’s 
 attention was taken up by printing establishments in Woodbridge 
 and Burlington, New Jersey. At these plants Parker tried his hand 
 at magazine publishing, none of his ventures lasting more than a 
 few months. He was a good printer for his day, better than 
 William Bradford and probably better than Franklin. He was 
 aware, as few colonial printers were, that there is such a thing as 
 typographical excellence and tried, within his limitations, to aim at 
 that excellence. After the death of William Parks in Williamsburg 
 in 1750 the typography and presswork of Parker may well have been 
 the best in the colonies. Goddard was therefore fortunate in serving 
 his apprenticeship under such a master. But it must frequently have 
 been a sore trial to get along with Parker, since he was querulous 
 and petulant. In his letters to Franklin he is always complaining 
 about financial problems and the activities of his associates. Yet 
 
14 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 Franklin must have respected him, for at the time of setting up the 
 partnership of Franklin and Hall, Parker was called in to appraise the 
 shop as a basis for the financial agreement making possible Franklin’s 
 early retirement from the printing business. 
 
 John Holt, in 1755 manager of the New Haven shop, was a 
 much different person from Parker. Born in Williamsburg, Virginia, 
 in 1721, he started his career as a merchant and was at first reasonably 
 successful. He married in 1749 Elizabeth Hunter, the sister of 
 William Hunter, printer in Williamsburg and with Franklin joint 
 postmaster-general of the colonies. Probably in the shop of his 
 brother-in-law Holt learned the printing trade. Though he was at 
 one time mayor of Williamsburg, ‘business failures overwhelmed 
 him, and in 1754 he was in New York working for Parker, who soon 
 sent him off to New Haven. Later, in 1762, he rented Parker’s 
 New York plant and published the New-York Gazette, or, Weekly 
 Post-Boy himself. Holt was active in various anti-British causes, 
 beginning in the mid-1760’s with the Sons of Liberty and their 
 attacks on the Stamp Act. He was therefore one of the pre-Revolu- 
 tionary “radicals,” and Parker worried over this a good deal. 
 During the Revolution Holt had to leave New York in front of the 
 British army. For a time he printed in New Haven, then in Kings- 
 ton, New York, and finally in Poughkeepsie, where he remained 
 from 1778 until his return to New York in November, 1783. 
 Within a few months he died there, leaving his widow to carry on 
 his business. Holt was much interested in the postal system and 
 wrote attacks on its inefficiencies and waste, proposing various re- 
 forms. In person he seems to have been affable, perhaps only in 
 ~ contrast to the petulant Parker, though it must be admitted Holt’s 
 accounting would have made anybody complain. He suffered many 
 misfortunes, losing his entire printing apparatus more than once to 
 the British. Yet he was always able in some fashion to pull through 
 and keep his business going. His devotion to the revolutionary 
 cause was sincere, and he sacrificed much because of his beliefs. He 
 was no Hugh Gaines, turning from one side to the other as the 
 wind seemed to blow. Sometimes tactless and lacking in finesse, 
 he fought manfully for what he believed. 
 
 In July, 1755, William Goddard started his apprenticeship in 
 Parker’s New Haven shop. The printing equipment had been 
 originally bought by Franklin from Strahan in London for the 
 
CHAPTER II 105 
 
 use of his nephew James Franklin, Jr., then in Newport. James, 
 whose father had introduced Benjamin to the printing trade in 
 Boston, preferred to stay in Newport with his mother, and so the 
 press was offered to another nephew, Benjamin Mecom, who chose 
 at that point to remain in Antigua. As a result, Franklin at the end 
 of 1754 persuaded Parker to purchase the setup. It was therefore 
 on relatively new and unused type that Goddard started his training. 
 The shop was a busy one. The Connecticut Gazette had been begun 
 April 12, 1755, before William started to work in the shop. Through 
 the help of Ezra Stiles the printing for Yale College was done in 
 the shop, and presumably the faculty worried about textual accuracy 
 even if not the appearance of the text on the pages. Much of this 
 work, of course, was in Latin, and William’s early training from 
 his mother and school came in very handy. William probably never 
 had time to associate with Yale College youths of his own age, who 
 then, even more than now, would have scorned contact with a being 
 as low in the social scale as an apprentice. No, he would have been 
 kept busy in the shop being janitor, inking the printing forms with 
 ink balls as the printer made his impressions, delivering the weekly 
 newspaper to the homes in the community, and occasionally being 
 allowed to use his own composing stick. In this shop he saw a post 
 office in operation, though not much of Holt’s or Parker’s time was 
 taken up by postal work. 
 
 In connection with this postal work we have our earliest record 
 of Goddard in this shop. Many years after he had retired from 
 active printing and was living in Rhode Island Goddard reminisced 
 to Isaiah Thomas: “After Defeat of Braddock, July 9, 1755, and the 
 assemblage of an army at Lake St. Sacrament, now Lake George, 
 where, Sept. 30 [Sept. 8], Sr. Wm. Johnson gained a victory over 
 Baron Deskeau & his Regulars & Savages (taking the Baron Prison’r 
 Sir Wm. having only Provincials, under his Command) much 
 Business was done at the New-Haven P. Office and many Posts 
 established to the army &c. &c. under the Direction of Franklin, 
 Parker, &c. At 15 I was sent with a Rider from New-Haven to 
 Middletown & Hartford, thence to N. London, and round by 
 Seaboard to N. H. to estimate the Expense.... In 1758, I went to 
 N. York & Woodbridge to assist in the offices there. ... When I 
 went to New-York in 1758 the American Company of Commedians, 
 under the management of David Douglas, Esq. a Gent. of honour 
 
16 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 & Talents (who married the Widow Hallam) performed in a Sail- 
 Loft on Cruger’s Dock! Douglas was afterwards King’s Printer 
 in Jamaica, a Master in Chancery, a Magistrate, &c patronized by 
 his Countryman Sir Basil Keith. Douglas made a Fortune.” With- 
 in a few months Parker and Holt had enough confidence in their 
 fifteen-year-old apprentice to send him on this postal surveying trip 
 through the different parts of Connecticut. 
 
 Parker’s moving of his apprentice to New York in 1758 placed 
 Goddard in a larger printing shop. Here he assisted in seeing 
 through the press (no doubt he regularly used the composing stick 
 now) almanacs and books. Just as New Haven had been the center 
 for postal activity in Connecticut in 1755, New York was the center 
 for the entire colonial postal system under the crown, Parker being 
 comptroller and secretary after 1756. In this shop, under the 
 management of William Weyman, there would have been three or 
 four apprentices and two or three journeymen printers, giving the 
 young neophyte more associates than in New Haven. Goddard’s 
 letter reveals that New York had another advantage for him. He 
 developed a love for the theater, a love not too difficult to arouse 
 from someone already appreciative of literary qualities. There is 
 a pleasure in the picture of the eighteen-year-old apprentice sitting 
 or perhaps even standing in the sail-loft watching Douglas perform 
 in a Shakespearean play. By this time Goddard’s status in the shop 
 must have been much like that of a journeyman except for pay, be- 
 cause leisure evenings were not the lot of the usual apprentice. 
 
 In October, 1761, the apprenticeship ended on Goddard’s twenty- 
 first birthday. The full wages of a journeyman printer would now 
 be his after six years of laborious training. His first job in this newly 
 acquired status lasted only a few months because he surely was 
 already planning for his own shop. His employer for these months, 
 Samuel Farley, son of the proprietor of the Bristol Journal, had 
 arrived in New York in 1760. Early in 1762 (the first issue of the 
 American Chronicle is dated March 20) he felt able to launch a 
 newspaper on his own and secured the services of two journeymen, 
 Charles Crouch (later to publish his own newspaper in Charleston, 
 South Carolina) and William Goddard. On July 8, 1762, the print- 
 ing shop was almost destroyed by fire; after struggling with two 
 more issues on July 17 and 22, Farley left for Georgia, where he 
 
CHAPTER II 17 
 
 became a lawyer. About this time, and perhaps the fire was the 
 immediate impelling cause, Goddard moved the scene of his activities 
 
 to Providence, there to start his own printing establishment and his 
 own newspaper. 
 
eIIl- 
 
 ROVIDENCE, Rhode Island, in 1762 was far from the me- 
 
 tropolis we think of today. Most of the town’s 3,500 to 4,000 
 inhabitants lived only a short distance from what is now Memorial 
 and Market squares over the Providence River. The original 
 settlement plotted out in 1636 by Roger Williams had been on the 
 east side of the river at the bottom of “the Hill.” By 1762 homes 
 had been built several blocks north and south along the present 
 Main and Benefit streets. The lovely houses with their Georgian 
 facades we associate so much with the area immediately south of 
 Brown University were mostly to come later, between 1780 and 
 1820, though one of the most attractive is the Joseph Brown house 
 on South Main Street built as early as 1774. At the same time 
 Goddard was setting up his press and arranging his type the towns- 
 people were welcoming a new addition to their public buildings—the 
 Court-House completed in 1762, now called the Old State House. 
 The first issue of the Providence Gazette in its colophon located the 
 new printing shop as “opposite the Court-House.” The building 
 of the Court-House marked a definite stage in the race for political 
 and commercial supremacy between Newport and Providence. In 
 the latter seventeenth century Newport had passed Providence in 
 size and importance. The colony government was situated in New- 
 port, and most of the governors had come from this island com- 
 munity. A century later Providence was struggling its way back into 
 the dominant position. Much of the commercial success of Provi- 
 dence in the days before, during, and after the Revolution was based 
 on the mercantile activities of the four Brown brothers, particularly 
 Moses Brown. Political leadership was provided by Stephen 
 Hopkins, who had been governor as early as 1755 and later was to 
 occupy this position several years as well as to sign the Declaration 
 of Independence. Providence as a community had not matured to 
 the point it would by 1800, but the beginnings of that maturity were 
 
CHAPTER III 19 
 
 evident in 1762. Yet this potential for growth did not prevent the 
 town from being raw and crude not only in its appearance but in its 
 attitudes. Gracious living was to come later, though it was not far 
 away. While Goddard was still in Providence, his paper published 
 on April 28, 1764, the act incorporating the College of Rhode Island. 
 Within a few years Providence was able to bulldoze the legislature 
 into moving the institution from Warren to its present location, 
 starting it towards its fame as Brown University. But in 1762 such 
 plans were still only the daydreams of a few. A stroller in the 
 streets would have had his shoes dirtied by the mud under foot and 
 his nostrils filled with the stench of uncollected refuse. The town’s 
 hogreeve probably still had a fair amount of business rounding up 
 stray pigs and keeping the alleys free of them. Of course, many of 
 the townspeople were aware that ameliorizing amenities could do 
 much for the beginning-to-be prosperous community. And that is 
 one reason why so many of them, including Stephen Hopkins, en- 
 couraged the young printer to set up his press. 
 
 William Goddard did Providence’s first printing and started her 
 first newspaper, but he was not the first printer to dwell in her 
 confines. That distinction belongs to a seventeenth-century London 
 printer, Gregory Dexter (ca. 1610-ca. 1700). He printed a couple 
 of Milton’s political pamphlets and was associated with the most 
 belligerent of the Puritans, at one time being called up before Laud 
 on account of a Puritan pamphlet he had helped see through the 
 press. In the late 1630’s and early 1640’s he was especially active 
 as a printer to various New England divines. John Cotton and 
 John Eliot both had tracts appear from his press. In 1643 he 
 printed for Roger Williams A Key into the Language of America 
 and began the friendship that was to last so long. The next year 
 Roger Williams continued his quarrel with John Cotton in the 
 famous Bloudy Tenent. Probably the printing of this pamphlet, 
 which would not have pleased the members of Long Parliament 
 much more than it did the Reverend John Cotton, caused Dexter to 
 emigrate to Rhode Island in that year. For the rest of his life 
 Dexter was active in the affairs of Providence, being town clerk 
 from 1648 to 1655. In the latter year he was ordained as minister 
 of the First Baptist Church in Providence and more or less retired 
 from other duties thereafter. He never followed the profession of 
 printer in Providence; whether because of disinclination or the lack 
 
20 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 of opportunity in the struggling colony we cannot tell today. Tradi- 
 tion has it that in 1646 and occasionally thereafter the printers in 
 Cambridge called upon him for expert assistance since he would 
 have known more about all aspects of printing than Stephen Daye 
 or any other person then in the colonies. Isaiah Thomas states 
 that Dexter printed an almanac for Providence in 1644. Though no 
 such almanac has ever come to light, possibly such a one was run 
 off at Cambridge under his direction. An interesting footnote to 
 the career of Gregory Dexter is provided by his daughter Abigail 
 Dexter, who married James Angell, the great-grandfather of the 
 wife of Goddard, and by his granddaughter, Mary Dexter, who 
 married John Angell, grandfather of William’s wife. 
 
 In Providence and in other parts of Rhode Island there were in 
 the 1760’s many relatives of the young printer, particularly on his 
 mother’s side of the family. These relatives and friends were 
 numerous enough that in spite of his working there only three years 
 Goddard afterwards always thought of Providence as his home, 
 eventually finding not only a wife there but retirement as well. 
 For example, among these relatives within Providence was his 
 cousin Captain John Updike, who only two years before had given 
 up a seafaring life, married the local Miss Ann Crawford, and 
 settled down to lead a convivial existence at his house on Towne 
 Street and to earn a living as a merchant. While captain of a boat 
 at sea, he flew the flag of the first of the Browns to attain mercantile 
 prominence, Obadiah Brown. The former apprentice had an entree 
 into the drawing rooms of some of the “best” families of Providence. 
 No more would there be the life of the poor apprentice and journey- 
 man in New York. 
 
 To get started in his own printing shop required more than 
 energy and willingness to work hard; money was needed. This 
 came from the mother, Sarah Goddard, and she transferred her 
 home from New London to Providence at the same time. Tradition 
 has it that she supplied £300 to finance the new establishment. 
 
 This money would have gone for the purchase of several fonts 
 of type and at least one press. For £120 (which Parker called too 
 high a price) Goddard bought these from Thomas Green, who had 
 taken over the Parker shop at New Haven. Even supplies of paper 
 would have to be arranged for, either from England or from one of 
 the colonial mills. The stationery and various legal forms which 
 
CHAPTER III 21 
 
 every print shop sold would have come from England or Holland, 
 the colonial paper not being of good enough quality. Also from 
 England was ordered a supply of books, the usual business sideline 
 of most printers. 
 
 Although the son provided the energy and the technical know- 
 how and the mother the necessary capital, something else was needed 
 —encouragement and prospective patronage from the citizens of 
 Providence. Led by Stephen Hopkins, many of the town’s stalwarts 
 no doubt assured William that he need not fear on this score. They 
 were aware of the utility, convenience, and prestige that a press would 
 give to the community. Hopkins recognized the value a Providence 
 press would be not only in the town’s struggle with Newport but in 
 his own political rivalry with Samuel Ward of the town at the foot 
 of Narragansett Bay. 
 
 Possibly in late July and definitely in latter August the new 
 printing establishment was a going operation at its location across 
 the street from the Court-House. Sarah Goddard must have been 
 proud as her son turned out in August a handbill announcing the 
 storming of Morro Castle by the British, a playbill for the local 
 theater before it was banned by a law passed that summer, and a 
 prospectus for a forthcoming newspaper. More from sheer exuber- 
 ance and pleasure than from necessity the sister Mary Katherine 
 started to spend her time in the shop instead of at the occupations 
 usually considered proper for an eighteenth-century woman of 
 twenty-four, even though that century was generous in its ideas of 
 the proper and fitting for a woman. In a letter, long since lost, to 
 Isaiah Thomas Goddard said he thought these first fugitive printings 
 were in June. More likely not until the end of July did Goddard 
 start getting his printing shop organized, and not until August was 
 he doing any actual printing. The broadside on the fall of Morro 
 Castle can be dated fairly closely since on the twenty-fifth of August 
 the Newport Mercury issued a supplement concerning the event of 
 August 14. Probably it was the next day that Goddard. got out his 
 handbill, one means of showing the people of Providence that they 
 no longer had to be dependent upon the Mercury. On August 25 
 the Rhode Island Assembly voted a ban on theaters. Within very 
 few days this ban would have been effective, so the playbill for 
 Douglas’s company could have been in this same last week of 
 August. When Goddard was in New York four years earlier, he 
 
22 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 had seen the same company, Hallam’s Virginia Comedians, perform 
 in the sail-loft. The manager of this troupe, David Douglas, was, 
 no doubt, in the Parker print shop frequently to arrange the printing 
 of the company’s playbills. The two young men must have enjoyed 
 talking together after the business of the day was completed. The 
 printing of the playbills served to the mutual advantage of both 
 men. Douglas’s company would then be able to publicize its activi- 
 ties much more effectively; Goddard would have business for his 
 new print shop as well as a bit of free advertising when the readers 
 of the playbill saw his colophon, printed in the shop of William 
 Goddard. 
 
 The Rhode Island Historical Society possesses a copy of the new 
 shop’s next production. We are therefore no longer conjecturing 
 dates but can say from the printed date that this busy last week of 
 August was culminated on the thirty-first by a prospectus for a news- 
 paper to be called the Providence Gazette or Country Journal, whose 
 first appearance was promised for October 20, 1762, Goddard’s 
 twenty-second birthday. Several of the characteristics that we associ- 
 ate with Goddard are present in this proclamation, and its tone and 
 language are more appropriate, as is so frequently true of his writings, 
 to a proclamation than a prospectus. Even from the beginning of 
 his career as a newspaperman Goddard was neither humble nor given 
 to hiding his light beneath a bushel. 
 
 Printing-Office, Providence, August 31, 1762 
 To the Publick. 
 
 As the Colony of Rhode-Island from its first Institution to this present 
 Time, has been remarkable for maintaining the Spirit of true British 
 Liberty, by which Means, it has frequently prov’d a Refuge and Asylum 
 for Strangers, who, fond of enjoying all the Privileges and Advantages of 
 their Mother Country, prefer’d this Colony before many others for their 
 friendly Indulgence to Strangers of every Denomination of Christians 
 that chose to settle among them, by which judicious Conduct, they are 
 become a flourishing People, and in which the Town of Providence 
 (being the first settled Place in the Colony) has no inconsiderable Share; 
 to the Inhabitants of which, I in a more particular Manner address my- 
 self, who, at the Request of many Gentlemen, have, at a very considerable 
 Expence, procur’d a complete Assortment of Printing Materials, with 
 which I purpose to carry on the Printing Business in this Town; provided 
 I meet with Encouragement adequate to the Trouble and Expence of 
 the Undertaking: And as it is universally acknowledged a Printer is much 
 
CHAPTER III 23 
 
 wanted in this Place, very considerable Sums being annually sent into 
 other Governments for Printing, to the _Impoverishment of this, whereas, 
 if that useful Branch of Business was well establish’d here, it would be 
 an Addition to its flourishing State, and keep its ready Cash circulating 
 at Home, it is not doubted but every Well-wisher to the Town, will 
 contribute towards so laudable an Undertaking, as far as the Execution of 
 it shall merit the Approbation of the Publick: And I take this Method to 
 solicit the Favour of the Inhabitants of this Colony; and from the same 
 generous Disposition they have shewn to young Beginners of other Oc- 
 cupations, I flatter myself I shall find Encouragement answerable to my 
 Expectations. And I beg Leave to assure the Publick, that (as far as I 
 am engaged in their Service) I shall use my utmost Endeavours to serve 
 them with Fidelity and Integrity; and if by my Assiduity and Care, I 
 shall be so happy as to obtain their Esteem, by an impartial Conduct, I 
 shall think my Time well bestow’d. I am determined to avoid entering 
 into the Schemes of any Party, tending either to religious or political 
 Controversy, so far as it might prevent my acting with the strictest Justice. 
 
 As every Branch of useful Knowledge, both of a religious and civil 
 Nature, is abundantly diffus’d by Means of the Freedom of the Press; I 
 hope it will induce Gentlemen of Learning and Ingenuity to contribute 
 a few of their leisure Hours in writing some public-spirited Essays, for 
 the Cause of Virtue, displaying it in beautiful Colours, and painting Vice 
 in all its odious Deformity, which will render their Efforts beneficial to 
 the latest Posterity; by which Method they will soon perceive, the 
 Utility of a Printing Press: For I verily believe there is not another Town 
 in New-England, of its Extent in Trade and Commerce, that remains 
 vacant of so necessary and useful a Calling. All these Considerations 
 give me great Reason to hope, that not only the Gentlemen of Providence, 
 but all the adjacent Towns, will, with a kind and good-natur’d Reception, 
 assist 
 
 THE PRINTER. 
 
 Gentlemen and Ladies, 
 
 As soon as possible after my Affairs are in some Measure settled, and 
 I am establish’d in my Business, I purpose to print a Weekly News-Paper, 
 under the Title of the PROVIDENCE GAZETTE, or COUNTRY JOURNAL, to 
 be publish’d every Wednesday Morning, and to contain every Thing re- 
 markable, both Foreign and Domestic; for which Purpose, I have 
 establish’d an extensive Correspondence, and shall receive not only the 
 London Magazines and Prints, but every News-Paper printed upon the 
 Continent of America, which can’t fail of rendering the Provi- 
 dence Gazette, as complete as any Performance of the Kind. ‘The 
 Price will be only SEVEN SHILLINGs Lawful Money, per Annum, or 
 equivalent in Currency—and altho’ several judicious Men have done 
 worthily towards so useful a Design, in a neighbouring Government, whose 
 
24 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 Performances have obtain’d a general Approbation, nevertheless it must 
 be allowed that something of that Nature is very much wanted here, 
 where so many and various Branches of Business are carried on, more 
 especially that in a mercantile Way; I hope no one will imagine I mean 
 to lessen the Esteem justly due to others, or be guilty of Vanity, in at- 
 tempting to make a public Appearance in that Manner, so necessary at 
 this Juncture, when His Majesty’s Arms are engaged in a just and glorious 
 War against two of the most perfidious Nations in Europe; and I am 
 persuaded every worthy and public-spirited Gentleman will promote the 
 Circulation of it, as the Design is calculated (in a peculiar Manner) for 
 the Interest of this Town, and all its respective Neighbourhoods. It is 
 intended the Paper shall make its first Appearance on Wednesday the 
 Twentieth of October, in Case a sufficient Number of Subscribers shall 
 offer—Subscriptions are taken in by HEenry Pacet, Esq; SAMUEL 
 Cuace, Esq; Postmaster, BENonr Pearce, Esq; Mr. BEnyAmMIn West, 
 Mr. Knicut Dexter, Mr. EBENEZER THompson, Mr. JosEPH 
 LAWRENCE, and by the Publick’s 
 
 Devoted Humble Servant, 
 William Goddard. 
 
 Among the things that strike us on reading this prospectus, the 
 young printer’s first extended published piece of writing, is the 
 clever play on Providence’s rivalry with Newport. Newport is 
 never named, but none of the contemporary readers could miss the 
 implications of Providence’s “being the first settled Place in the 
 Colony,” of the “other Governments,” and of the necessity of keep- 
 ing ready cash at home. Nor would the town’s inhabitants have 
 missed the appeal to their local pride when they read, “there is not 
 another Town in New-England, of its Extent in Trade and Com- 
 merce, that remains vacant of so necessary and useful a Calling.” 
 Goddard wanted to impress on his readers that printing was “neces- 
 sary and useful” and also “laudable.” He was, even at this stage 
 of his career, conscious of the social role and importance of a printer 
 in any community. Not for nothing does he within the first clause 
 speak of the “Spirit of true British Liberty.” The second paragraph 
 opens with the reminder to its readers that, “every Branch of use- 
 ful Knowledge, both of a religious and civil Nature, is abundantly 
 diffus’d by Means of the Freedom of the Press.” For thirty years 
 Goddard supported freedom of the press energetically, vociferously, 
 and fearlessly. Another principle basic to his concept of the press 
 is seen in his statement, “I am determined to avoid entering into 
 
CHAPTER III 25 
 
 the Schemes of any Party, tending either to religious or political 
 Controversy, so far as it might prevent my acting with the strictest 
 Justice.’ Two words should be particularly noticed, determined 
 and party. His determination to follow this principle was later to 
 cause him much financial grief. In his later activities we shall see 
 that the word party has for Goddard extremely opprobrious con- 
 notations; when he uses it, it is not necessary to qualify it by any 
 describing or defining adjective. 
 
 Whether Goddard liked it or not, his paper was a mouthpiece 
 of the Providence “party,” headed by Stephen Hopkins, in its strug- 
 gle with the Newport “party,” headed by Samuel Ward. Yet in all 
 justice we must admit that Goddard did not hesitate to print cor- 
 respondence by members of the Ward faction whenever any of its 
 members took the trouble of writing an article for the Providence 
 paper. But the natural interests of Goddard and his potential 
 readers lay in the city at the head of the bay. After all, it was to 
 break the monopoly in Rhode Island of the Newport Mercury that 
 the Providence Gazette was established. Printing had been done in 
 Newport since 1727, when James Franklin had opened a shop there 
 after he had left Boston following a succession of difficulties with 
 the local authorities, the first of which is narrated for us in Ben- 
 jamin’s Autobiography. In 1735 James died, and his widow Ann 
 took over the running of the shop, a practice quite common in the 
 colonies not only for print shops, but for taverns, stores, and almost 
 all kinds of businesses. The “Widow Franklin,” as she called 
 herself in her publications, trained her son James as a printer, and 
 in 1748 the firm became Ann and James Franklin. In 1758 they 
 started the Newport Mercury, but James suddenly died in 1762, 
 shortly before the first appearance of the Providence Gazette, leav- 
 ing the Widow Franklin to run the newspaper and printing business 
 alone. A few months before her death in latter 1763 she took into 
 partnership Samuel Hall, who continued the business in his name 
 after Ann’s death. Curiously, for a short time in 1763 there were 
 two print shops in the colonies named Franklin and Hall, one in 
 Newport and the more famous one in Philadelphia. The Newport 
 Mercury was by no means the best-edited newspaper in the colonies. 
 Its appearance was stodgy and its local items under the date-line 
 Newport were matter-of-fact to the point of dulness. None of its 
 anonymous correspondents could match the writing ability of 
 
26 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 Stephen Hopkins, who was to contribute frequently to the Provi- 
 dence Gazette. From the point of view of a Providence citizen the 
 Newport paper was unsatisfactory; rare was the occasion when an 
 item from Providence appeared. Not much more frequent were 
 advertisements from Providence merchants, even though they had 
 no other outlet. The energetic circulation campaign Goddard put 
 on undoubtedly gave the Gazette a larger number of subscribers 
 than the Mercury, but the Widow Franklin and later Hall were 
 able to make a reasonable financial success of their venture from 
 their monopoly of the colony’s government printing, a monopoly 
 Goddard tried to break but could not. 
 
 Goddard was true to his promise in the prospectus and the first 
 number of the Providence Gazette and Country Journal (the or 
 had become and) appeared on October 20, 1762. Before we look 
 at this issue, we might do well to see how much labor was involved 
 in the putting out of a weekly newspaper by a colonial printer. No 
 more authoritative source for this can we find than printers them- 
 selves. In 1907 members of a committee of the Providence typo- 
 graphical union had this to say about their 1762 predecessor’s 
 paper: “The Gazette was a three-column folio, 8x14 inches, re- 
 quiring the setting of about 22,000 ems for the first issue. This 
 amount was lessened thereafter by about one-quarter, the standing 
 advertisements filling about one of the pages. Probably four full 
 days of each week were consumed by one printer on the composition 
 and press work for the paper. An average operator would set the 
 entire matter for the Gazette on a linotype in less than four hours. 
 The hand press used in those days could print about 200 papers an 
 hour. The forms were inked by leather balls and the paper was 
 fed into the press twice before both sides were printed.” Though 
 Goddard was a skilful craftsman, the equipment of his shop was not 
 much different from that brought over in July, 1638, by the 
 Reverend Jose Glover for the Cambridge shop of Stephen Daye. 
 William must have welcomed the assistance of his sister Mary 
 Katherine. 
 
 Most of the first page of the first issue is taken up by an opening 
 address “To the Publick” signed by William Goddard. In this 
 address he spoke of the “utility and advantages” of the printing 
 business in a “mercantile colony” and flattered his readers by saying 
 that their support of the newspaper showed their “publick-spirited- 
 
CHAPTER III 257 
 
 
 
 ness.” Referring to the Seven Years’ War then going on between 
 France and England and involving other countries as well, he as- 
 sured his readers, “Every Thing that relates to the Honour and 
 Interest of our Country, and the Humiliation of our Enemies, must 
 be peculiarly interesting; and as such, they shall be carefully in- 
 serted in this Paper.” Also the paper should be “as entertaining and 
 as generally useful as possible.” The utility was to be taken care 
 of by an “extensive Correspondence” not only from foreign countries 
 but from all “extensive Settlements on this Continent.” Entertain- 
 ment would rely on extracts from literary works and on essays by 
 public-minded writers, to whom the printer appealed for contribu- 
 tions. The weekly appearance of the paper was to be changed from 
 Wednesday to Saturday (a date rigorously adhered to thereafter). 
 The conclusion was, as in the prospectus, a listing of various people 
 with whom subscriptions could be left. 
 
 The bottom quarter of the first page consists of a long article, 
 which is continued onto the next page, entitled “The Planting and 
 Growth of Providence.” The historical account ended with a “to 
 be continued,” and it was—on January 19, 1765. This unsigned 
 contribution to local history has been identified as from the pen of 
 Stephen Hopkins. The over two-year lapse between instalments 
 seems inexplicable, but Hopkins’s interest in the new paper is evi- 
 dent. That such an avowedly local history should have been written 
 in 1762 reveals the pride that the townspeople were taking in the 
 expansion of the once placid village from its original site at the 
 bottom of “the Hill.” One result of the appearance of this history 
 was the young editor’s receiving, either in 1762 or during the later 
 instalments in early 1765, several letters from Massachusetts (ob- 
 viously the Gazette circulated there) “inquiring how much he re- 
 ceived for it, and containing many other remarks insulting to the 
 editor, the author, and the colony.” When Goddard told this 
 anecdote in 1817 to his neighbor Judge Samuel Eddy, there must 
 have been many a chuckle over memories of the intense rivalry be- 
 tween Massachusetts and Rhode Island and the former’s fear of the 
 commercial ambitions of the port at the head of Narragansett Bay. 
 Newport was not the only city in New England to be alarmed at 
 Providence in the 1760’s. No, thé neophyte editor did not need to be 
 ashamed of the influence and prestige of his paper as he proudly 
 wrote his colophon at the bottom of page four: “Providence in New 
 
28 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 England: Printed by William Goddard, opposite the Court-House; 
 by whom Advertisements are taken in, and all Manner of Printing 
 Work performed with Care and Expedition.” 
 
 In the second issue, dated Saturday, October 30, the print shop’s 
 activities had expanded enough that there was the advertisement: 
 “A variety of Books and Stationery, to be sold cheap by the Printer 
 hereof,—With all sorts of Blanks used in this Colony, neatly printed, 
 —Also New-York Almanacks, for the Year 1763.” The supply of 
 books was still small and the book business must not have yet repre- 
 sented much of a challenge to the already established bookshop of 
 Mr. Oliphant, named among those taking in subscriptions in the 
 first issue. Of more immediate importance, both to Goddard and to 
 the community, were the “all sorts of Blanks.” The Brown brothers 
 must have visited the new shop frequently to secure printed invoices, 
 indentures for apprentices, bills of sale, mortgages, property liens, 
 rental agreements, and the many forms used in their mercantile 
 operations. The almanacs were another major item of any colonial 
 print shop or bookstore. Not for long would Goddard depend on 
 a supply from Parker’s shop in New York. Even though the high 
 tides of the harbors of Providence and New York differ usually only 
 by five minutes, he was aware that his customers wanted almanacs 
 for their own harbor, not for New York nor even Newport. 
 
 In this same second issue on page four is an anonymous letter 
 possibly written by Goddard himself. Not only for business reasons 
 but from principle, he would frequently remind his readers of the 
 importance of printing to a community and to its culture. So the 
 signature “A Countryman” could well be a pseudonym for the pen 
 of the young editor as he addressed: 
 
 To the Printer of the PRovipENCE GaAzETTE, and CouNTRY 
 JOURNAL: 
 
 SIR, 
 
 I am one of your Country Subscribers, and although I have no 
 Learning myself, more than what I obtained by my own Industry, with- 
 out Instruction, I value it in others—There is generally too much 
 Reflection cast on Country People for being illiterate and aukward; but 
 if the Authors of such Reflections had any Candour, they would make 
 all proper Allowances for narrow Circumstances, the constant Attendance 
 which we and our Children are obliged to give in the Execution of our 
 laborious Callings, the dispersed Manner of our Living, and the Want 
 of Schools. It is as impracticable under these Circumstances to become 
 
CHAPTER III 29 
 
 learned, or acquainted with the Fashions of the World, which is called 
 being polite, as a Merchant’s Clerk, or a Printer, to become an able 
 General of an Army, or an expert Seaman; all these Cases requiring 
 Leisure, Instruction, and Experience. Printing is the greatest Means of 
 promoting Learning that was ever invented; and I hope that the setting 
 up of that Business near us, may contribute to our Instruction, and be one 
 Means of improving the rising Generation, and of wiping away the Odium 
 cast on us, of being ignorant, rude, and unpolished. 
 Smithfield, 
 Oct. 25, 1762. 
 
 Your Well-wisher, 
 
 A CouNTRYMAN. 
 
 Printing was not just a means of earning a living for Goddard; he 
 was intensely proud of the cultural role of the printing craft. Four 
 weeks later, November 27, “A Countryman” from Gloucester talked 
 on the same theme, this time ending his contribution by a poem whose 
 rimed couplets and iambic pentameter again laud the wonders of the 
 printing art. Whether signing his praises of his profession from 
 Smithfield or Gloucester, Goddard shows the love of his trade which 
 made him take enough pleasure in its techniques to be a master of 
 typography. 
 
 The business of the shop is well shown by an advertisement 
 Goddard inserted November 6, 1762. The books he had ordered 
 from London during the summer had finally arrived, and Mr. 
 Oliphant had a full-blown rival for the book trade of Providence. 
 The reading tastes of a colonial community ran to sermons and 
 theology even in such a secular settlement as this. But, unlike 
 Boston, Providence read more secular than religious books, even if 
 the printer thought it expedient to start his list with the latter. We 
 wonder how sales of Law’s Serious Call to the Unconverted 
 compared with those for Ovid’s Art of Love or with those for that 
 eighteenth-century tear-jerker subtitled The Life and Adventures of 
 a Lap Dog. 
 
 Lately imported from LONDON, and to be sold cheap for ready 
 Money, by WiLL1AM Gopparp, at the Printing-Office near the Court- 
 House. A Variety of Books, Stationery, &c. &.—Among which are, 
 DoppErRIncE’s Family Expositor—and Rise and Progress of Religion 
 in the Soul.—Jenk’s Meditations—Detham’s Astro and Physico The- 
 ology —Whole Duty of Man.—Watt’s Miscellanies, Sermons, Psalms, 
 Hymns, and Lyric Poems.—Romaine’s Discourses.—Law’s Serious Call 
 
30 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 to the Unconverted.—Religious Courtship—yYoung’s Night Thoughts. 
 —Pomphret’s Poems.—The Universal and Female Spectators,— Guard- 
 ian,—Adventurer,—Tatler, and Rambler.—The celebrated Histories of 
 Pamela, Clarissa, and Sir Charles Grandison—Nuptial Dialogues.— 
 Matrimonial Preceptor—Conduct of a married Life——Admonitions 
 from the Dead.—Seneca’s Morals. Adventures of ‘Telemachus.— 
 History of Charles XII. of Sweden.—Adventures of Roderic Random. 
 —The Histories of Tom Jones, Joseph Andrews, Fortunate Country 
 Maid, and Two Orphans.—The Devil on Crutches.—Ovid’s Art of 
 Love.—Pompey the Little; or the Life and Adventures of a Lap Dog. 
 —Grey’s Love Letters——History of Jemmy and Jenny Jessamy.— 
 Bayley’s Dictionary.—Preceptor—Salmon’s Grammar, and Gazetteer. 
 —yYoung Man’s Companion.—Hay’s Interest Tables—Complete Jury- 
 man.—School-Master’s Assistant——Wilson’s Epitome.—Mariner’s Com- 
 pass and Kalendar.—Bibles ‘Testaments, Spelling Books, Psalters.— 
 With a Variety of small Histories and Pamplets, and a few select Plays. 
 
 STATIONARY. Account Books.—Pocket-Books.—Writing Paper 
 of all Sorts.—Sealing-Wax.—Wafers.—Pencils and Steel Cases——Ivory 
 Folders.—Magnets.—Playing Cards—Small Scales and Weights.— 
 Scales and Dividers, &.—Also, a few elegant Pictures, viz. of His Majes- 
 ty King George III. and his Royal Consort Queen Charlotte: the great 
 Mr. Pitt, and the immortal General Wolfe, &c. 
 
 BLANKS. Policies of Insurance, Portage Bills, Bills of Lading 
 and Sale. Letters of Attorney, Administration Bonds, common Bonds, 
 Deeds, Writs, and Executions; and all Kinds of Blanks used in this 
 Colony, neatly printed, and sold as cheap as at any Printing-Office in 
 New-England, or elsewhere; either Wholesale or Retail. 
 
 In early December Goddard was able to supply the market for 
 an almanac “calculated for meridian of Providence,” as the title page 
 of his first one expressed it. For the calculations of the sunrises 
 and sunsets, the phases of the moon, and the tides he secured the 
 services of Benjamin West, a self-taught astronomer and mathe- 
 matician. For the next forty years West, either under his own 
 name or that of Isaac Bickerstaff, was to be employed in annual 
 almanacs from Providence to Halifax. So popularly associated 
 with almanacs was the name of Isaac Bickerstaff that the pseudonym 
 was continued by various almanac-makers until 1881. It is hard 
 for us today to realize the role of the almanac in the colonial house- 
 hold. Various almanac wars attest to how important it was to the 
 printer as a business, Goddard himself getting into more than one 
 such affair. Frequently the almanacs were printed with blank leaves 
 alternating with the printed, making possible the keeping of a 
 
CHAPTER III 31 
 
 
 
 household diary. Perhaps we can understand why printers fought 
 over almanacs if we remember that almost the entire population of 
 the colonies was rural and maritime, not necessarily living on the 
 sea, but near enough to be affected by its sights, sounds, and smells. 
 
 No matter how profitable the almanac was in its annual season 
 the principal week-by-week chore of the Providence print shop was 
 the publication of the Gazette. For Goddard the work involved in 
 this publishing was as much editing as printing. Today staffs of 
 correspondents and editorial writers contribute material to feed into 
 the finished paper we read. Then there was no such person as a 
 professional correspondent or editorial writer. In our sense of the 
 words there were really no news stories or editorials at all. To 
 collect the material for his newspaper, the colonial editor depended 
 upon his own subscriptions to various London papers and those from 
 other colonies. With scissors in hand, he would go through these 
 papers looking for whatever seemed to him worthy of inclusion in 
 his own paper. That is why Goddard emphasizes his “extensive 
 correspondence.” Other sources for items for the newspaper were 
 reports brought in by sea captains of vessels just returned from 
 some foreign port. Also, there were the essays commenting on 
 affairs written by anonymous correspondents, including the editor 
 himself. Finally, there was in each issue a date-line Providence, 
 where could be found whatever local news the editor deemed signifi- 
 cant, a list of vessels entering and leaving the local harbor for the 
 previous week, and frequently a report of a debate in Parliament as 
 brought in by the latest boat. But if all sources failed because of the 
 indisposition of the weather or of the postrider, then the editor was 
 forced to fall back on his own ingenuity. Such a situation is seen in 
 the issue of January 15, 1763. In the upper left-hand corner under 
 the flag we find: “As the Severity of the Season prevents a 
 regular Intercourse with our Correspondents in the neighbouring 
 Provinces, we imagine the following Story, which is not only enter- 
 taining, but moral and edifying, will be pleasing to all our Readers; 
 even to those who may have seen it before.” This apology prefaces 
 “The Mercy of Affliction:—An Eastern Story,” which covered 
 three-fourths of the first page. The winter storms made the paper 
 temporarily emphasize entertainment instead of either enlighten- 
 ment or persuasion. 
 
 A brief advertisement inserted in the same issue started off one 
 
32 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 of those newspaper arguments the eighteenth century was so fond 
 of. This notice stated: “Very good Encouragement will be given to 
 any Person who understands Fencing, Dancing, and the Violin, who 
 will come and set up a School in the Town of Providence.” This 
 was too much for one correspondent, A. L. V., whose righteous 
 indignation was roused to a fever pitch. The next week Philander 
 replied to A. L. V., and so it went. A rousing dispute was doubtless 
 a good prod for lagging circulation, and Goddard must have been 
 delighted at the abusiveness of his disputants over the virtues and 
 vices of dancing. Even today we can enjoy the horror of A. L. V. 
 as he says that the setting up of a dancing school would require the 
 town to institute a “public Stew or Brothel, . . . so that when Strangers 
 come here, they may know where to go and be entertained for their 
 Money.” ‘To this correspondent a dancing school “may have the 
 same Tendency, as if a Man that was over careful of his Wife, 
 would give another good Encouragement to lodge with her, and 
 keep her warm in his Absence.” Such a school would “excite Idle- 
 ness, Lewdness, and Debauchery.” Goddard made his own comment 
 by repeating the original advertisement immediately under the 
 outburst of A Lover of Virtue. 
 
 Another advertisement, though not productive of follow-up 
 letters, still must have provided entertaining gossip for the readers. 
 Jonathan Staples inserted this notice January 29, 1763: “Whereas 
 my Wife, Freelove Staples, hath eloped from me, and hath refused 
 to live with me: These are therefore to forbid all Persons from 
 keeping her, or her Child, thinking to have pay of me, for I will not 
 pay any Thing for their keeping: And I also forbid all Persons from 
 trading with, or trusting my Wife Freelove, on my Account, as I 
 will not answer any Debts of her contracting.” But Freelove was 
 not to be denied her pleasures by such a notice. A year and a half 
 later, May 19, 1764, Jonathan again warned the public about the 
 activities of Freelove, who “thro’ the Advice and Persuasion of 
 some evil-minded Persons . . . hath been deluded to elope from my 
 Bed and Board, without any Cause, and to carry off her Child with 
 her.” After this was the usual statement about whatever debts 
 Freelove might acquire. 
 
 At the May, 1763, session of the Rhode Island colonial assembly 
 a resolution was passed requesting the printers at Newport and 
 Providence to send in their terms for printing the “Colony’s Busi- 
 
CHAPTER III 33 
 
 
 
 ness,” and promising “that he will do it for the least, shall have the 
 Business, and if equal, the Printer at Newport shall have the 
 Preferance.” Within a few days Goddard must have written his 
 letter to Josias Lyndon, clerk of the assembly. Unfortunately the 
 first page of this letter is missing, but the two pages left tell us a 
 good deal about the financial struggles of the twenty-two-year-old 
 printer. 
 
 The Printer at Newport having the Preference, and a great Advantage 
 of me, lays me under an absolute Necessity to lower the Prices of Printing 
 the Acts, &c. otherwise I can have no Pretensions to the Business; at the 
 same Time I must declare that what is now given is much less than 
 would be charged in many other Parts of America.—I have inform’d 
 myself what the Government has heretofore paid for the several Services 
 in printing and if I am employ’d by the Government I engage to print 
 the Acts of Assembly at Thirteen Pounds Nineteen Shillings per Sheet, 
 and for small Proclamations, (which are charg’d £10 at Newport) 
 Seven Pounds Nineteen and Sixpence, and every Thing else in proportion. 
 —The above Prices are as low as the Business will possibly admit of, so as 
 to make the least Advantage; and if the other printer will do it cheaper, I 
 am positive he can’t gain a Farthing for his Trouble;—and will only 
 have this Reflection that he has prostituted his Business for the Gratifica- 
 tion of his Advocates in that Cause, without those Persons contribute 
 towards the Payment of any Deficiencies; which must be the Case if he 
 performs the work cheaper than for what I have offered—Permit me 
 also to inform you that without any Solicitation from me, I was apply’d 
 to for my Proposals at what Rate I would print the last Emission of money 
 issued in this Colony; I accordingly deliver’d in my Proposals to the 
 Committee and fully expected to have had the Jobb, as my Price happen’d 
 to be a good Deal less than the Colony had paid for many years before, 
 but my Offer was only made Use of to reduce the Price of the Printer at 
 Newport, and [I] was deprived of the Work, which every reasonable 
 Man must allow I ought in Justice to have had—And I think this 
 Affair of the Money a proper Specimen of my Prices compar’d with what 
 is charg’d and has been charged at N. Port.—lI hope you will excuse the. 
 Freedom I have taken in sending you this long Epistle; to which I shall 
 only add, that I should be glad of your Friendship, and am (in Haste) 
 respectfully, Sir, Your very Humble & most 
 Obedient Servant 
 
 This matter of printing the government laws after each session 
 of the assembly was very important for every colonial printer, who 
 could usually depend on a fair living if he had no other business 
 than the public printing. Almost invariably the colony capital 
 
34 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 determines where the printer sets up his press. Until the Revolu- 
 tionary War few printers managed to keep their heads above water 
 for long without this pecuniary assistance. The colonial assemblies 
 would sometimes guarantee a printer his livelihood if he would locate 
 where the laws could conveniently be printed. An example of this 
 is the £1000 (colony currency—about £175 sterling) offered by the 
 government of South Carolina in May, 1731, to the printer who 
 would locate in Charleston. In the race which followed, three 
 printers arrived as claimants, one subsidized by Franklin, his first 
 attempt at a silent partnership. 
 
 Though no £1000 was being offered in Rhode Island, still liveli- 
 hoods were involved. We should therefore not be surprised at 
 Goddard’s trying his best to get this business away from Newport, 
 and we may well doubt the “in Haste” of his closing sentence. He 
 must have worked very carefully over the proposed prices and even 
 the phrases of the letter itself. To find the assembly playing one 
 printer against the other to force down their prices must have irked 
 the very souls of Goddard and his Newport competitors. Only 
 necessity, to use a term from the letter, would have compelled the 
 Providence printer to indulge in price cutting to get his finger into 
 the public pie. In 1762 Providence was not yet prosperous enough 
 to support a printer without the public business; in fact, Boston, 
 New York, and Philadelphia were the only cities in the colonies that 
 did. 
 
 Unfortunately Goddard’s letter, and doubtless other attempts, 
 was unsuccessful. The public printing remained in Newport until 
 the occupation of that place by the British during the Revolution and 
 the resultant commercial and political decline in favor of Providence. 
 We can see Goddard’s failure graphically if we compare the total of 
 £6 125. 6d. that he received from the assembly during the three years 
 he was in Providence with the £1786 19s. 11%4d. that Ann Franklin 
 and Samuel Hall received during the same period. And three 
 pounds out of Goddard’s receipts were for one item, the printing 
 in December, 1764, of the pamphlet on the Stamp Act by Governor 
 Stephen Hopkins. The reason for the young printer’s having in 
 1765 to leave Providence for other parts is apparent from this 
 failure. The financial woes of William Goddard were now be- 
 
 ginning. 
 
CHAPTER III 35 
 
 However, by the first part of 1763 the print shop’s activities were 
 many and varied. Every Saturday the Providence Gazette was seen 
 through the press. An almanac had been published the preceding 
 December, and Goddard was pushing its sales through a vigorous 
 advertising campaign in the columns of his own paper. A complete 
 line of various legal and business forms had been printed and was 
 available to the shop’s customers. Broadsides, such as Governor 
 Samuel Ward’s proclamation appointing November 18, 1762, as a 
 day of Thanksgiving, were issuing frequently from the shop. (God- 
 dard was paid six shillings for printing one hundred copies of this 
 proclamation.) Also pamphlets were appearing with the imprint: 
 “Providence: Printed by William Goddard.” 
 
 Perhaps as good a way as any of visualizing the press’s activities 
 is to look at the pamphlets put out in one year, 1763, remembering 
 that probably much less than half of the shop’s output has survived 
 or been identified by modern scholars. Isaac Backus of Middle- 
 borough had a sermon printed in February and Benjamin Lord of 
 Norwich had three released at different times during the year. 
 Joseph Bolles of New London published a pamphlet defending tax 
 support of ministers. The president of the College of New Jersey, 
 Jonathan Dickinson, is represented on the year’s list by a discussion 
 of infant baptism, a reprint of the original edition published in 
 Boston in 1746. Apparently Goddard did not mind disturbing the 
 theological tenets of the Rhode Island Baptists. The turbulent 
 financial debate then going on in Rhode Island found “T. R. A Coo- 
 per” having a four-page defense of the debtors’ position printed 
 on April 6, 1763. This undoubtedly partial listing of a year’s 
 pamphlet output of Goddard’s press reveals something of the 
 printer’s belief in and practice of the principle of freedom of the 
 press. Providence’s largest congregation was the Baptist, though 
 the community’s traditional policy of religious freedom made for 
 the presence of many other denominations. Both Newport and 
 Providence were dominated by the ship-owning merchants of the 
 two ports. Yet we find the authors on this list include Connecticut 
 Congregationalists, a New Jersey Presbyterian, and a representative 
 of the minority point of view in the currency dispute (at least it 
 was a minority in the Rhode Island Assembly). However, it must 
 not be thought that Goddard printed everything that came into his 
 
 shop, even when accompanied by a payment for printing. He was 
 
36 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 carefully following the principles laid down in the prospectus for 
 his newspaper. In spite of his financial problems he had the courage 
 to print this notice in the Providence Gazette of February 19, 1763: 
 “The Authors of the Pieces signed PuitacarHus and REFoRMADO 
 are desired to send for their Copies and Money, as their Perform- 
 ances cannot be inserted in this Paper, consistent, with our own 
 Interest or the Pusiic Goop.” No doubt the “interest” of the 
 printer influenced strongly this rejection slip, but the “public good” 
 was also important. 
 
 Through the newspaper we can see that Providence was now 
 large enough for its citizens to need new and more expanded 
 services. No longer should Boston be depended upon; there were 
 enough people to justify the presence of an increased number of 
 tradesmen. Some local booster, perhaps Stephen Hopkins or one 
 of the Browns, contributed this unsigned advertisement to the 
 Gazette of February 19, 1763: “The following Tradesmen are much 
 wanted in the Town of PROVIDENCE, namely, a BRAZIER, a 
 POTTER, a STOCKING-WEAVER, and a CLOCK and 
 WATCH-MAKER.—It is not doubted but each would find ample 
 Encouragement, as there is a large adjacent Country to be supplied 
 with Articles and Work in the Way of those Trades, and none 
 of these Businesses carried on within thirty Miles [the distance 
 to Newport], and that of a POTTER not nearer than BOSTON: 
 Besides the great Sums of Money sent abroad for those Articles, 
 sufficiently demonstrate that each of such Tradesmen would meet 
 with full Employ; and moreover have the Satisfaction of living 
 in a populous and flourishing Sea Port.” The circulation of God- 
 dard’s newspaper throughout all New England would have brought 
 this notice to the attention of qualified applicants. The printer was 
 making himself indispensable to the community even though in 
 return he was not finding the financial support he had hoped for 
 when he borrowed three hundred pounds from his mother. 
 
 The first of Goddard’s several moves in Providence occurred 
 in March, 1763. His original location had been “opposite the Court- 
 House” on what is now North Main Street. His move was to the 
 “House of Henry Paget, Esq; near the Great-Bridge.” The “great 
 bridge” is now the site of Memorial and Market squares in the 
 center of present-day Providence. On March 12 Goddard advertised 
 books for sale from this new location. Four months later he moved 
 
CHAPTER III 37 
 
 next door to what were probably larger quarters. His colophon of 
 July 9 states that his printing office was “just removed to the Store 
 of Judge Jencks, near the Great Brince, and [the newspaper] 
 published at his Book Shop, just above it, at the Sign of SHakEs- 
 PEARE’s Head.” The business in books, patent medicines, and the 
 like had grown enough to require separate quarters. Sarah and Mary 
 Katherine must have been frequently assisting William in the two 
 departments of his business in these days. 
 
 The Shakespeare’s Head sign mentioned by Goddard was asso- 
 ciated with the Providence Gazette for many years. (The house 
 at 21 Meeting Street, now known as “Shakespear’s Head,” however, 
 was never occupied by Goddard, but by his friend and successor, 
 John Carter.) In 1898 an article speaks of “persons still living” 
 who remembered the sign. It was placed on top of an eight- or ten- 
 foot pole, was of full size, carved out of wood “fancifully painted,” 
 and was possibly the work of John Bower. Goddard knew the 
 virtues of advertising. Perhaps he chose this particular sign re- 
 membering his first journeyman job on the American Chronicle, 
 whose colophon read: “New York; Printed by Samuel Farley, at 
 Shakespear’s-Head, on the New-dock.” 
 
 The expanding business caused Goddard to advertise on June 18, 
 1763, for an apprentice, “about 13 or 14 years of Age, who can read 
 well, and write a tolerable Hand.” Six months later he requested a 
 journeyman printer to work at both “Case and Press,” as well as 
 another apprentice. There would have been no necessity for God- 
 dard’s advertising in any other paper besides his own since the 
 journeymen in all the print shops in the colonies would eventually 
 see the advertisement through the newspaper exchanges of the day. 
 
 The respect, both personal and professional, with which Provi- 
 dence viewed the young printer in its midst was made concrete by a 
 resolution passed by the Providence Library Company (founded 
 1753) on September 5, 1763. “It is voted that Mr. William God- 
 dard Printer in Consideration of his eminent usefulness to this 
 Part of the Colony by introducing and carrying on amongst us the 
 ingenious and noble Business of Printing shall have free Liberty 
 to use the Books belonging to the Library.” 
 
 A glance at the contents of a typical issue should help the reader 
 visualize the kind of newspaper the Providence Gazette and its 
 contemporaries were. One number will do as well as any, and I 
 
38 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 have picked at random that of November 19, 1763. All the first 
 page and half the second is occupied by London news from the 
 London Gazette. The heading on this long article reads: “On 
 Tuesday the 8th Inst. Capt. Blake, arrived at Boston, in 6 Weeks 
 from London, by whom we have the following fresh Intelligence, 
 taken from the English News-Papers.” On the second page, after 
 the London dispatch, there is a column headed, “From the South- 
 Carolina Gazette, we have the following Advices.” After this there 
 are some miscellaneous items under the date-line, “Boston, Novem- 
 ber 14.” Then under “Providence, November 19” there is a state- 
 ment about the new navigation acts, followed by: “The Western 
 Mails not arriving till 4 o’Clock Saturday Afternoon, obliges us to 
 omit sundry Articles of Intelligence, till our Next; but they afford us 
 nothing very interesting.” Below this there is an advertisement for 
 West's Almanack for 1764, which had been published the preceding 
 Wednesday. (The frequency of Wednesday as a publishing date 
 makes us suspect that during the first three days of each week the 
 shop was busy with pamphlets, broadsides, etc., but during the last 
 three days the newspaper occupied the attention of the printer and 
 his assistants.) On page three was a poem by the “late celebrated 
 Mr. Thompson, author of the Seasons.” The next item was headed, 
 “A most surprising anecdote from Voltaire, of the man with the 
 iron mask.” In the second column we find an “Extract from the 
 King of Prussia’s Campains,” recounting an incident of the 1742 
 campaign in Silesia. The third column of this page is taken up by 
 various notices and advertisements. First is a notice from the local 
 customs official about certain boat regulations. Then a store is 
 advertised for let. William Brown states his desire to have his 
 stolen horse recovered. Goddard himself advertises requesting his 
 subscribers to pay for their papers. (Eighteenth-century newspapers 
 are filled with similar notices.) A listing follows concerning the 
 past week’s activities of the local customs house. Given are inward 
 entries, outward entries, and the vessels cleared for departure. Page 
 four starts with a clipping from the Pennsylvania Gazette giving a 
 message of the Assembly to the Governor. The Collector of the 
 Port of New London has a notice. The advertisements, occupying 
 most of the rest of the page, are from John Birkett with a house 
 for sale, from Nicholas Cooke wanting his customers to settle their 
 shipping debts to him, three men wanting to buy ten or twelve 
 
CHAPTER III 39 
 
 horses, the Furnace-Unity Bridge lottery giving notice of a drawing, 
 Nathan Giles seeking to collect some of his past due bills, Smith and 
 Sabin seeking the same thing, and the Estate of Benjamin Hunt 
 trying to find out his creditors. The content of this issue ends by a 
 table of the high tides at Providence for the ensuing week. 
 
 The fierce competition for the almanac trade can be recognized 
 by an advertisement on December 31, 1763: “WEST’S NEW- 
 ENGLAND ALMANACK, for 1764, inferior to none in Goodness, 
 and much cheaper than AMES’S ORACLE, may be had of the 
 Printer hereof.” A good many Rhode Islanders had not yet been 
 broken of their habit of buying an almanac from Boston; Goddard 
 was appealing to their sense of thrift. 
 
 The cultural activities of the community are represented by the 
 printing on April 28, 1764, of the Act of Incorporation of the Col- 
 lege of Rhode Island, covering all of page one and most of page two. 
 On May 12, 1764, the town council advertised two children to be 
 bound out. One was a six-year-old girl and the other a five-year-old 
 boy. The interested reader was referred to Ephriam Bowen for 
 additional information. Almost the entire issue of June 23, 1764, 
 is taken up by the publication of the latest Navigation Acts, better 
 known as the Sugar Acts. The community was expanding its cultural 
 opportunities; it was still following certain medieval practices; it 
 was on the threshold of the struggle with England. Even then 
 the community was “not an island entire of itself.” Busy with its 
 petty affairs, busy setting up a humane tradition, Providence could 
 not confine its interests to either the petty or the humane but must 
 feel the pinch of the measures taken by Parliament in London against 
 all the colonies. 
 
 Of more immediate concern to the printer was his supply of 
 paper. Just about every colonial printer had his troubles getting 
 sufficient newsprint. Many had, like William Bradford in Phila- 
 delphia, helped finance a mill upon whose output they would have 
 first call. Goddard was only following this tradition when he con- 
 tributed his share to the establishment of a paper mill near Provi- 
 dence. On August 4, 1764, the partners advertised: “Ready Money 
 will be given for any Quantity of clean Linen RAGS, and old Sail- 
 Cloth, by JONATHAN OLNEY, JOHN WATERMAN, JONA- 
 THAN BALLAU, or the Printer of this Paper.” This advertise- 
 ment preceded the actual operation of the mill, which did not turn 
 
40 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 out paper until early in 1765. West’s Almanack for 1765, printed in 
 November, 1764, contained this notice from the four partners about 
 the proposed mill: 
 
 As the present embarrassed Situation of the Trade of these Northern 
 Colonies, renders it utterly impossible for us to pay for the large Quanti- 
 ties of Goods that are annually imported from Great-Britain, without 
 reducing ourselves to the State of Slaves and Beggars, it is reasonable to 
 suppose, that every Attempt to lessen the Demand for such Goods, by 
 establishing Manufactories amongst ourselves, for the making those Things 
 which are really beneficial, must meet with the Approbation and En- 
 couragement of all who wish well to this Country—Amongst many 
 laudable Endeavours in the different Provinces, for the Purpose afore- 
 said, a spirited Effort is now actually making in the Town of Providence, 
 for carrying on a Paper Manufactory, a spacious Mill being already built, 
 and will be speedily set to work, which, if it can obtain a proper Supply 
 of Linen Rags, old Sail Cloth, and Junk, those being the principal 
 Articles necessary for making that useful Commodity, it’s Utility to this 
 Part of the Country will be soon demonstrated by a Saving of some 
 Thousand Dollars, that are annually sunk to us in the Pockets of the 
 European Merchants. 
 
 As Wroth has pointed out, New England printers were more 
 dependent upon English and Dutch sources than were the printers 
 of the middle colonies. In writing this appeal for rags, Goddard 
 tried to exploit the nascent feelings of patriotism and local pride. 
 Though he left Providence before he could get much advantage 
 from having his own source of paper, regular advertisements for 
 rags began to appear in the Providence Gazette when it was revived 
 in 1766 by Sarah Goddard. A typical appeal is in the issue of 
 August 23, 1766, which includes the prices to be paid: “. . . for Rags 
 finer than Oznabrigs, Two Coppers (3s Old Ten.) per Pound, and 
 Fifteen Shillings, Lawful Money, (20 1. Old Ten.) per Hundred;— 
 and for Rags that are coarser than Oznabrigs, one Copper (18d. Old 
 Ten.) per Pound.—For old Junk, half a Dollar per Hundred. (The 
 above Articles will be taken in Pay for the Providence Gazette, if 
 brought when Payments should be made, in lieu of Cash.)” 
 
 Characteristic of the career of William Goddard are his many 
 quarrels. He seemed incapable of being in any place for long with- 
 out getting into some kind of bitter and tempestuous argument. 
 In assessing the temperament of Goddard, we must not too quickly 
 call him pugnacious and belligerent. His feuds were with competing 
 
CHAPTER III AI 
 
 printers of newspapers and almanacs, with people whose principles 
 and attitudes he distrusted. We must remember also that in the 
 eighteenth century many of the ablest writers carried on literary 
 disputes, which rarely disturbed their personal equilibrium or 
 friendships. Goddard’s favorite reading, judging from the number 
 of allusions in his writings, was Pope and Swift, both of whom were 
 active in the literary and political disputes of their day. Though 
 Goddard did not possess the poise to prevent his professional dis- 
 putes from encroaching on his personal life, still he must have been 
 influenced by the attitudes towards disputation shown by the Queen 
 Anne literary giants. 
 
 And so what we have to tell now is merely the first of many 
 arguments for Goddard. It started with the printer’s worry that 
 legitimate news was being withheld from his readers. On August 
 4, 1764, appeared, under the Providence date-line, a letter dated 
 August first from “A Countryman”: “As the Secretary of this 
 Colony, in divers Instances, has prov’d himself so totally void of 
 Honor and Integrity, that nothing conducive to the Public Emolu- 
 ment can be expected from him; I therefore send you a Copy of an 
 Act of the General Assembly, pass’d at Newport, Yesterday, which 
 I desire you to insert in your next Paper, that the Public may be 
 duly advised of the Matters therein contain’d.” Not surprisingly 
 Henry Ward, the Colony Secretary, objected to being called “totally 
 void of Honor and Integrity” and rushed into print in the Newport 
 Mercury for August 13. The following Saturday, the eighteenth, 
 Goddard devoted almost all of page three of his paper to his defense 
 against Ward’s charges, this time attaching his name without the 
 disguise of a pseudonym. 
 
 The dispute rested here and the two opponents remained silent. 
 Samuel Hall, the printer of the Newport Mercury, had kept his 
 name out of this quarrel, but Goddard did not permit him to remain 
 in such Olympian perspective. Some months later when the Provi- 
 dence paper was publishing attacks on the Stamp Act and the 
 Newport paper was printing defenses, Goddard stuck the following 
 alleged advertisement in the Gazette of January 19, 1765, as his 
 contribution to the peace of mind of Mr. Hall and his fellow 
 Newporters: 
 
 Published last Week, and sold by Mr. S$. Hatt, at his Printing-Office 
 in Newport, a PIECE entitled, 
 
42 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 Modern Eloquence, 
 or 
 The Phrase in Fashion: 
 Being an Essay on genteel Compliment; and contains a Specimen of 
 polite Address, in every Branch, even from calling a Gentleman Dog, up 
 to giving the Lye, or throwing a Brick-bat:—Recommended, in particular, 
 to the Gentlemen and Ladies of the Town of Newport, as a Means to 
 
 embellish their Conversations, and adorn their Manners against the next 
 GENERAL ELECTION. 
 
 By Moses Turn-Spit, Hypercritick. 
 
 No Crab more active in the dirty Dance, 
 
 Downward to climb, and backward to advance. 
 Dunciap. 
 
 Pope need not have been too ashamed at the prowess of his disciple 
 in the art of invective. Samuel Hall made no attempt at reply 
 even though the Stamp Act controversy continued for several months. 
 The struggle of the young printer to make a decent livelihood 
 for himself, his mother, and his sister continued. One of his at- 
 tempts to help things along was the acquiring of the local post- 
 mastership, announced October 6, 1764, in the Gazette. Though 
 his father had been postmaster of New London and as an apprentice 
 he had worked in printing shops where a post office was located, this 
 was Goddard’s first actual position in the postal system. Long after 
 he had left Providence, he continued to hold the position through 
 the aid of substitutes. Finally, on February 11, 1769, over four years 
 later, it was announced that John Cole had succeeded to the post. 
 But taking part in disputes with the Newport printer and the 
 colony secretary, being postmaster, and running the newspaper and 
 printing office did not take up all Goddard’s time. Unfortunately 
 we know almost nothing today about his social activities during this 
 period. It is therefore a pleasure to find among the deservedly 
 prized possessions of the Rhode Island Historical Society a broadside 
 whose contents suggest the convivial pleasantries of an early autumn 
 evening. The broadside is printed, but in what looks like God- 
 dard’s hand there is, “To Miss Sally Kennicutt.” Sarah Goddard 
 would have had an active part in the preparations for the social 
 
 affair for which Goddard printed: 
 
CHAPTER III 43 
 
 
 
 Providence, (Tuesday Morning) 
 September 25, 1764. 
 Madam, 
 
 As t[he] Close of this Day is de[vo]ted to social Mirth and Gaity, and 
 the Ladies being esteem’d the only real Promoters of it,—I take the 
 Libe[rt]y to request you to make one at a Petticoat Frisk, to be held 
 in the Afternoon, at Mrs. Goddard’s, where your Company will greatly 
 brighten the Felicity of the Evening, and be very agreebale to all, and 
 in a particular Manner to one, who will think it an Honor to wait on you 
 there, and is, with the utmost Respect, 
 
 Your very humble, 
 and most obedient Servant, 
 WiLiiamM Gopparb. 
 P, S. The present lowering Sky, it is hoped will be no Discouragement to 
 You,—for You may be assured of a pleasant Afternoon, should the Sun 
 be obscured in Darkness, while the Ladies chearful Presence united, can 
 supply that Want of its hidden Rays. 
 
 Not every social evening in Providence would the young bloods 
 of the town be squiring Sally Kennicutts to dances, no matter what 
 happened to Sally’s petticoats. The bachelor editor of the local 
 newspaper would have had a good many evenings out on the town. 
 An advertisement in the December 29, 1764, Gazette reveals some 
 of the public entertainment available for the citizens of Providence. 
 “Tuke Thurston, (Who for many Years past has kept a noted House 
 of Entertainment near the Great Bridge in Providence) . . . begs 
 Leave to signify to all those who have a true Relish for that chearing 
 and delicious Fluid call’d Puncu, compos’d of genuine Materials, that 
 they may be always gratified by repairing to his Fountain, with such 
 as will stand the Test of repeated Trials, and where a Specimen, 
 however capacious, will, on the Firsr Catt, be exhibited:—And 
 such as prefer the all-animating Juice of the Grape, may, at the same 
 Place, find a Source suitable for the Gratification of the nicest 
 Palates. These admirable Liquors, exhilarating the Spirits and 
 creating a good Appetite, a true Criterion of Health, may be ac 
 companied with many Dishes of high Renown.” 
 
 For those who preferred drinks other than the “genuine Ma- 
 terials” of Luke’s punch, James Tweedy, Junior, advertised his wares 
 on May 11,1765. At his location “Opposite the Church” he distilled 
 and sold “Anniseed, Cinnamon, Clove, Doctor Stevens’s, and Orange 
 Cordials, with many others.” He also sold “Choice old Madeira, 
 
44 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 Lisbon, Sherry, Teneriffe, Fyal, and Sweet Wines, Nantz Brandy, 
 Rum and Molasses.” 
 
 During the latter part of 1764 reports reached the colonies of 
 the discussion going on in Parliament and in the British cabinet 
 concerning ways to increase tax revenue. The Stamp Act debate 
 was starting. The pseudonymous letters in the columns of the 
 Providence Gazette were increasingly political. Goddard showed 
 his attitude quite early by the full and sympathetic coverage he gave 
 the activities of John Wilkes and his writings in the North Briton. 
 One of the most influential of the pamphlets against the Stamp Act 
 was written by Stephen Hopkins and printed by Goddard, who 
 announced its publication December 22, 1764. The title page of 
 this pamphlet has frequently been reproduced because of its graceful 
 appearance. It was a page that Goddard was never to improve 
 upon; indeed it would be hard to do so. 
 
 Hopkins’s pamphlet, Te Rights of Colonies Examined, was read 
 by many throughout all the colonies and in England. As would be 
 expected, it aroused an answer, which answer drew forth defenses, 
 attacks, and so on for many months and columns of the Gazette. 
 The most prominent of the answers was one entitled A Letter from 
 a Gentleman at Halifax, Samuel Hall of Newport being the printer. 
 This placed the two newspapers in opposite camps, even though 
 each editor would probably have preferred to have had both sides 
 represented in his own paper. But those attacking the Stamp Act 
 sent their letters to Goddard, and those defending to the Newport 
 Mercury. In part this tendency reflected the attitudes of the two 
 editors, since Goddard made no bones about his own opposition and 
 continued to fight the Stamp Act long after he had left Providence. 
 As late as April 6, 1765, we find him announcing a two-page post- 
 script to be published two days later when “a Piece sent us by the 
 ingenious Author of the Vindication of the Pamphlet, entitled, The 
 Rights of Colonies examined, will be laid before the Public.” Almost 
 every issue in February and March had had something on Hopkins’s 
 publication or on the Stamp Act itself. Undoubtedly many of these 
 comments were written by Stephen Hopkins, then in the prime of 
 his career. 
 
 Vigorous as the discussion over the merits of the Stamp Act 
 was, and attractive as the attitude of the Providence Gazette’s owner 
 was to most of his readers, Goddard’s financial difficulties remained 
 
CHAPTER III 45 
 
 unsolved. Hopkins tried to do his bit for the paper by reviving his 
 history of Providence, one part of which he had written for the 
 first issue of the Gazette. This first article was reprinted January 12, 
 1765. Later, chapters were added to “An Historical Account of the 
 Planting and Growth of Providence” in the issues of January 19, 
 February 2, 9, 16, March 16, and 30. Goddard prefaced the re- 
 printed first chapter by a lengthy appeal to the people of Providence 
 and vicinity for increased support for his paper. He opened this 
 appeal by a statement of the importance of the art of printing, “held 
 in the highest Veneration and Esteem by the most knowing and 
 civiliz’d Nations of the Universe.” The British nation has been 
 most especially aware of the benefits derived from printing, “the 
 very Basis and Bulwark of its Constitution.” A similar attitude is 
 to be found among the British American subjects, including the 
 colony of Rhode Island. Because their forefathers contributed so 
 much to liberty, religion, and learning, the colony’s present in- 
 habitants “of all People under the Sun, ought to manifest their 
 Regard for, and exert themselves to promote the Printine Business 
 amongst them: This they have at present an Opportunity of doing, 
 and it is hoped there will never be Room hereafter to say, that the 
 noble Art of Printing failed in this flourishing Part of New Eng- 
 land, thro’ Lack of proper Encouragement, when, at the same Time, 
 it was increasing to the Honor and Advantage of many other Parts 
 of far less Magnitude.” Getting down to the particular situation of 
 the Providence Gazette, Goddard complained, “The Number of its 
 Benefactors [euphemism for paying subscribers] is inadequate to 
 the inconceivable Expences attending its Publication.” Continuing, 
 he stated an ideal for a newspaper which affected him throughout 
 his entire career, “The Ambition of the Publisher to gratify the 
 Public, will always prompt him to aim at keeping pace in the Im- 
 provement of his Paper, with the Encouragement it receives, till it 
 shall be found, not only (what it is at present) a Weekly Register or 
 Journal of the most important Intelligence, and other interesting 
 Matters, but a Magazine or Repository of the most valuable Treas- 
 ures and Curiosities in Literature, selected from the Writings of the 
 most celebrated Authors.” After making some explanatory apologies 
 for the interuption to the history of Providence, Goddard concluded 
 his essay, “N. B. The Friends to this Paper, in Town and Country, 
 it is hoped will exert themselves in procuring Subscriptions.” 
 
46 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 What is most informative of Goddard’s intentions is the expressed 
 hope to make his newspaper not only a “Weekly Register or Journal” 
 but a “Magazine or Repository.” It has usually been assumed too 
 easily that the only reason why magazines so consistently failed in 
 colonial America was a basic lack of interest in magazines themselves, 
 though it is true that more often than not the so-called magazine 
 of this period was only a monthly version of the weekly newspaper. 
 Therefore the blurring of what we think of as the function of a 
 newspaper with that of a magazine may have had much to do with 
 the inadequate subscription lists for the “magazines” of Bradford, 
 Franklin, and Parker. Today we smile condescendingly at the 
 colonial newspaper’s columns filled with letters signed “Pro Bono 
 Publico” and “Philopatriae,” but these pseudonymous letters followed 
 logically from Goddard’s expressed ideal to combine news and en- 
 tertainment. In the same issue, January 12, 1765, that carried on 
 page one this statement by the editor, Goddard could with pride 
 say in another context, “As we attribute, in a great Measure, the 
 Approbation this Paper hath gain’d to the interesting Matters sent 
 us by some Ingenious Friends, we therefore beg Leave to present 
 them with our sincere Thanks, and, at the same Time, repeat our 
 Sollicitations for the Continuance of their Favors.” And Goddard 
 knew that his readers would comprehend the reasons for his pride. 
 
 A last move within Providence was announced March 16, 1765, 
 when it was stated the post office and printing office would be moved 
 on March 19 to a house opposite Nathan Angell’s, “near the Sign of 
 the Golden-Eagle.” Next week’s colophon placed the business “next 
 Door below Knight Dexter’s, Esq.” Later Goddard was to spend 
 the last years of his life across the street from this location on North 
 Main Street. 
 
 Finally in the issue of May 4, 1765, Goddard had to announce 
 the suspension for six months of the Providence Gazette with the 
 next issue. As he put it, “His Hopsrs have vastly exceeded his 
 Success.” In spite of the disappearance for the time being of 
 the Gazette from the scene the printing shop was to continue its 
 business. Providence was still to have its press, though not its 
 newspaper. The announcement did not say this, but later events make 
 it clear that William left the community shortly after the last issue 
 of May 11, and the shop’s operations were continued by his mother 
 
CHAPTER III 47 
 
 Sarah Goddard and his sister Mary Katherine, by now a skilled 
 printer in her own right. 
 
 It must have been with considerable sympathy that Goddard set 
 up the type in his last issue for a notice by his neighbor, Knight 
 Dexter. It, at least, provides an ironic commentary on the whole 
 situation. “Knicut Dexter, returns his Thanks to such of his 
 Customers as have honorably paid him, and should be glad of a 
 Continuance of their Favors.—But as for Those who remain deaf 
 to his friendly Sollicitations, they are just reminded of the near 
 Approach of June Court, which may, by their Neglect, both affect 
 their Breeches Pockets and animal Spirits, between which, ’tis said, 
 there is a very strong Sympathy.” The flavor of the language is so 
 much that of Goddard that the writing hand of the newspaperman 
 may be suspected. 
 
IV - 
 
 HE first person to whom Goddard turned for new employ- 
 
 ment was quite naturally his old master, James Parker. Parker 
 referred him to John Holt, who was then operating a print shop 
 in New York on his own, though in typical colonial fashion still 
 involved in settling his accounts with his former partner, Parker. 
 Goddard knew his own worth and did not hesitate to demand of 
 Holt, never the best of printers, much more than a job as a journey- 
 man in the shop. At first Holt demurred, but his desire to publish 
 a newspaper made him reconsider. Holt was not sure whether 
 Parker might not want to return to New York from Woodbridge, 
 New Jersey, and personally run his own newspaper. Holt’s having 
 a capable newspaperman such as Goddard in his shop would do much 
 to make Parker hesitate in setting up a competing journal. So after 
 a couple of interviews Holt agreed to Goddard’s proposals and 
 accepted him as a silent partner in his shop. This agreement was 
 reached probably by the middle of the summer of 1765. 
 
 Goddard’s interests during the next year and a half kept him 
 frequently on the go between New York and Providence. In 
 Providence the print shop continued its operations under the super- 
 vision of Sarah Goddard. The Gazette did not appear, but a supply 
 of printed forms had to be maintained. West’s Almanack for 1766 
 was gotten out in September in time for book-peddlers to carry 
 samples on their first swing around in the fall of 1765. The re- 
 corded imprints whose dates can be verified of the second half of 
 this year include a sixty-page theological pamphlet, probably original- 
 ly asermon, by Timothy Allen, dated July 1, 1765. On the fifteenth 
 of this same month a broadside offering three dollars reward for the 
 return of a stolen horse was issued for Job Manchester. Another 
 sermon by Timothy Allen, this time running to forty-eight pages, 
 was released with the date September 1, 1765. This, together with 
 the almanac, bore the imprint Sarah and William Goddard instead 
 
CHAPTER IV 49 
 
 of just William’s name. Business was not booming for the Provi- 
 dence shop; nor was it at a standstill. 
 
 The business activities of Goddard may have been limited to 
 Providence and New York, but his political interests were broadening. 
 During most of this period he took not merely an active but a leading 
 role in the fight of the colonies against the Stamp Act. And it was 
 not as a Rhode Islander or a New Yorker that Goddard spoke and 
 wrote in his three publications during the fall and winter of 1765 
 and 1766, but as “a British-American.” We have already seen his 
 activities alongside Stephen Hopkins in the early months of 1765. 
 More than likely during these frantic days of the feud over The 
 Rights of Colonies Examined Goddard became an active member of 
 the Providence Sons of Liberty. As late as March 24, 1766, the 
 name of “William Goddard Printer” occurs on a committee to cor- 
 respond with the Sons of Liberty at Boston and “in the several 
 Colonies on the Continent.” Such activities would have found a 
 sympathetic ear in his partner John Holt, one of the most active 
 patriots in New York City. 
 
 The first of the three publications was a Providence Gazette 
 Extraordinary dated August 24, 1765, and headed, “Vox Populi, Vox 
 Dei.” The lead article, whose virulent tone against the hated Stamp 
 Act suggests the pen of either Hopkins or Goddard himself, covers 
 all of page one and ends on the second page with the signature 
 “Colonus.” On the second page are resolutions passed at a Provi- 
 dence town meeting on August 13, 1765, attacking the Stamp Act. 
 Extracts are then given from a speech in Parliament by Mr. Barre, 
 who criticized the same act and also praised the spirit of New Eng- 
 land. On the third page are accounts of events in New Haven and 
 Boston in the struggle against this law. On page four under a 
 Providence date-line Goddard announced that Augustus Johnston, 
 recently appointed distributor of stamps for Rhode Island Colony, 
 would not undertake his office. (A week later Johnston accepted the 
 inevitable and formally resigned his commission.) The best para- 
 graph of this page-long diatribe, which started with the Johnston 
 resignation, is this: “Able Jockies give it as their Opinion, that the 
 American Horses are of too mettlesome a Breed to stand still under 
 the Operation of Branding, and that whoever should attempt to 
 apply a hot S to their Buttocks, would be in no small Danger from 
 their hind Legs: For saith one wittily, Sure none but Asses will 
 
50 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 stand still to be branded. NWHowever the said Jockies will not aver 
 that the few Asses here will give much Trouble to the Branding 
 Company.” Crude yet effective, heavy-handed yet biting—God- 
 dard’s invective almost always featured these qualities. The con- 
 cluding paragraphs of Goddard’s article tell indirectly about his own 
 activities. The paper mill “about a Mile and an Half from this 
 Town” is “just finished” and “in a few Days will be set to work.” 
 The Providence Gazette “will be resumed as soon as the PAPER- 
 MILL gets to Work; provided the Printer can obtain a proper Num- 
 ber of Subscribers.” Further on the same four partners—Olney, 
 Waterman, Ballau (here spelled Belleau), and Goddard—advertised 
 for linen rags. Other printers mentioned who would pay for rags 
 are Timothy Green of New London and Thomas Green in Hart- 
 ford. These two members of the ubiquitous Green family were 
 seeing to it that they got in their bid for the product of the new 
 mill. The brief colophon at the bottom of the page merely reads, 
 “Printed by S. and W. Goddard.” 
 
 After seeing this special number of the Gazette through the 
 press, Goddard returned to New York and within a month involved 
 himself in his most spectacular blow at the Stamp Act. The name 
 of William Goddard was not associated with this broadside, but now 
 it can be stated without any qualifications that he was completely 
 responsible for the Constitutional Courant of September 21, 1765. 
 For our account of this affair we can do no better than use Goddard’s 
 own narration of the events as he gave them in a letter to Isaiah 
 Thomas: 
 
 During the great alarm and stagnation of business, occasioned by the 
 British stamp-act being passed into a law, to be in operation here, I went 
 from Providence to New-York, and assisted Mr. Holt. He showed me 
 several elegantly written and highly spirited essays, against the unjust 
 tax, which no printer in New-York dared to publish. I volunteered my 
 services, went to Woodbridge, and obtained leave to use the apparatus 
 there at pleasure, where I planned a newspaper with this title. 
 
 The 
 Constitutional [Join or die.] Courant. 
 Ve snake cut into thirteen parts, with initials in each. \ 
 emblemating the thirteen colonies, in the centre of the title 
 
 Containing matters interesting to liberty, but no wise repugnant to 
 loyalty. 
 Then followed an address from the editor, Andrew Marvel, men- 
 
CHAPTER IV ia 
 
 tioning the prudent fears of New-York editors, who declined printing the 
 subjoined, awakening performances, lest they and their families should be 
 ruined by the hand of power, &c. observing that I had no family and no 
 such apprehensions, and having competent knowledge of the printing 
 business, I was determined to devote my time and talents to promote 
 the welfare of my devoted country, in opposition to the alarming 
 strides of power, &c., and, intimating if No. I was well received, 
 other numbers would follow. The paper was completed ending thus: 
 “Printed by Andrew Marvel, at the sign of the bribe refused, Constitu- 
 tion Hill, North-America.” I sent them by a confidential agent to New- 
 York. Thousands were rapidly sold. It excited much alarm in the 
 government. A council was called at the fort, but nothing could be done 
 with the petty Junius, who was, in a great degree, the sole depository 
 of his own secret. When troubles were overpast, by the repeal of the 
 odious law, this paper was noticed in the Annual Register, and Andrew 
 Marvel’s address published, the editor of that work observing, that it was 
 the most significant paper that made its appearance during the troubles 
 in North-America. When one of the council at New-York demanded 
 of the hawker Lawrence Sweeney, “where that incendiary paper was 
 published,” he could obtain no other reply than “at Peter Hassenclaver’s 
 Iron works, may it please your honor.” Peter Hassenclaver, a German 
 of wealth, carried on extensive iron works, well known in New-Jersey. 
 Frequently afterwards, daring writings appeared with this imprint— 
 “Printed at Peter Hassenclaver’s Iron works.” 
 
 A reading today of the Constitutional Courant makes us wonder 
 why this particular piece of propaganda seemed more inflammatory 
 to its readers, including the British officials in the colonies, than 
 innumerable similar attacks. In many ways the Providence Gazette 
 Extraordinary a month before reads better than the Courant, but the 
 taunting flag and colophon apparently made up for what the 
 articles themselves seem to lack. In other words, good editing gave 
 the Courant its real impact. 
 
 As Goddard says in his account, the furor created was immense. 
 The highest praise of all was given by the pirated copies reprinted 
 throughout the colonies. Albert Matthews identifies three different 
 variants of the Courant, only one of which would have been printed 
 on the Woodbridge press. It was quickly suspected by the authori- 
 ties that James Parker was responsible for the single-issue newspaper, 
 but nothing was ever done about it. Why the authorities were so 
 seemingly lax is shown by a remark made in a letter from Cad- 
 
 wallader Colden, Royal Governor of New York, to Benjamin 
 
52 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 Franklin, then in London. Colden believed Parker to be the printer, 
 but he went on to say, “The Gentlemen of the Council think it 
 prudent at this time to delay the makeing more particular Enquiry 
 least it should be the occasion of raising the mob, which it is thought 
 proper by all means to avoid.” Whether the questioning of Law- 
 rence Sweeney, the hawker of the Courant on the streets of New 
 York, was before or after this letter was written, still the Council 
 got nowhere with the carefully instructed Sweeney and neither 
 Parker nor Goddard was ever questioned. 
 
 The intensity of Goddard’s dislike of the Stamp Act, a feeling 
 shared by most of his fellow colonial printers because of the heavy 
 duties on paper, can be seen in a letter he wrote to Parker three 
 months later, December 13, in which he told the older printer about 
 the events taking place in New York involving the Stamp Act. Gov- 
 ernor Colden had been placed in an impasse, and to the sanguine 
 Goddard, “This I hope will cause the Destruction of the Stamps.” 
 
 The activities of Goddard and the Providence patriots continued 
 during the winter of 1765-1766. Public meetings were held, such 
 as one after which Goddard printed an anonymous pamphlet (at- 
 tributed to John Aplin), A Discourse Addressed to the Sons of Liber- 
 ty, At a solemn Assembly, near Liberty-Tree, in Providence, 
 February 14, 1766. Many such meetings under similar liberty-trees 
 with similar speeches were held in all the colonies. 
 
 Now that the repeal of the Stamp Act was being debated in 
 Parliament, Goddard could turn his attention to his own personal 
 problems. He was much too independent a person ever to feel 
 comfortable as a silent partner, no matter how much responsibility 
 Holt gave him in the production of the New-York Gazette. There- 
 fore he put his mind to trying to reactivate his Providence shop. 
 Goddard liked Providence and always preferred to live there in 
 spite of his frequent moves away from it. The Extraordinary of 
 August 24, 1765, was more a piece of propaganda than anything 
 else, though remarks were made about reviving the Providence 
 Gazette. But in March of the following year he could be more 
 specific. Though news of the repeal of the Stamp Act on March 18 
 did not reach the colonies until April 26, he did not need to worry 
 for the moment over the unenforced taxes. The operation of the 
 paper mill near Providence assured him of a constant supply of 
 newsprint. All that was needed was a constant supply of customers, 
 
CHAPTER IV 53 
 
 and this deficiency Goddard set out to remedy by the Providence 
 Gazette Extraordinary and Supplement of March 12, 1766. 
 
 In spite of the various imprints already issued from the press 
 of Sarah and William Goddard the newspaper had beneath its flag, 
 “Printed and published by William Goddard.” Goddard also used 
 his own name as he advertised for “two or three Journeymen 
 Printers, who are willing to be employed at the Westward.” Sarah 
 Goddard used hers at the bottom of a notice on the same page 
 requesting “the Assistance of those Gentlemen and Ladies, to whom 
 I have the Honor of being known, . . . in this Colony and other 
 Parts of New-England, towards the Establishment of the Provi- 
 dence Gazette.” Though William was making a sincere attempt 
 to revive his business in Providence, he was by no means committing 
 himself. 
 
 Most of the space in this number of the Gazette is taken up by 
 the usual pseudonymous letters, this time congratulatory in tone 
 and warning the readers that just because they are winning the 
 good fight over the Stamp Act they should not relax their watch 
 over their liberties or the possible encroachments of Parliament. 
 One of the longest of such epistolary essays is signed Colonus, 
 as in the issue of August 24 of the preceding year. The resolutions 
 passed by the Stamp Act Congress are given im toto. For our interest 
 the most important item is the “Proposals for reviving the Provi- 
 dence Gazette, &c.” which occupied the entirety of page one. 
 
 After reminding his readers that he had started the Gazette 
 “without engaging such a Number of Subscribers as would defray 
 the weekly Expence thereof,” Goddard cites the “present depressed 
 Situation of North-America” as a cause for the discontinuance of the 
 newspaper. He says that while he was away from Providence he 
 received a letter from “a Number of Gentlemen who had been his 
 former Readers” asking him to revive the paper. Because of his 
 family connections in Providence, the friendships he has made, and 
 the “fair Usage” of the townspeople, he will now try to reactivate 
 the paper. He agrees to publish a paper every Saturday containing 
 the “public News,” “moral Pieces from the best Writers,” and 
 occasional “Pieces of Wit and Humour.” But, in order to ac- 
 complish this goal, he must have in five weeks a minimum of eight 
 hundred subscribers at seven shillings a year each. The final two 
 paragraphs are an appeal for rags for the paper mill. He con- 
 
54 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 cludes this appeal by gallantly addressing the “unmarried Ladies,” 
 who, “af they will be pleased to distinguish to him such Pieces of the 
 Linen as were Parts of their inner Garments, he will cause it to be 
 wrought into the finest Paper, so that it may be returned to them in 
 Letters, from kind Correspondents who are abroad—And they may 
 rest assured, that Vows recorded on so fair a Foundation, are under 
 the Care of the kind Genius who presides over chaste Wedlock, 
 and can never be broken.” 
 
 Apparently the letter written by “a Number of Gentlemen” in 
 Providence is the one given on page 57 of The Partnership, a pam- 
 phlet written and published by Goddard in 1770. Because this 
 letter so well shows the necessity felt by the leaders of the com- 
 munty, it is worth presenting in full: 
 
 Sir, 
 
 The particular esteem and friendship which we have for you, makes 
 us regret your absence; but when we consider the loss of you as a printer, 
 we cannot but expostulate with you on that subject. 
 
 We have been, and still are of opinion, that this town, regarding it 
 in its situation, and the various lights in which a man of business might 
 view it, would afford a very comfortable prospect to a young man of your 
 occupation, in his settlement among us. 
 
 You may be assured, that from the knowledge we have of your ex- 
 pertness in the printing-business, we should prefer you, as our printer, 
 to any other person; exclusive of the other favourable impressions you 
 have made upon us, during the course of your residence here. 
 
 We very much deplore the discontinuance of a public paper, in this 
 town, especially at a time when that machine is become necessary for the 
 retention of our rights, by explaining to the people the nature of them, 
 and sounding an alarm when they are in danger—We make no doubt 
 but a suitable number of good subscribers might be procured, and no 
 press. in America could more ae be furnished with stock, as the paper- 
 mill is got to work. 
 
 In this situation of the town, with respect to the printing-business, 
 we should be much obliged to you for a declaration of your intent, in 
 regard to the reviving your business here, to the end, that if you should 
 altogether decline it (which we hope will not be the case) we might be 
 free to make application to some other printer, which, in such case, we 
 shall do in justice to ourselves. 
 
 The foregoing letter is agreeable to the sentiments of all the gentle- 
 men of the town, with whom we have conversed on the subject, although 
 signed only by Sir, 
 
 Your most obedient and humble servants, 
 
CHAPTER IV 55 
 
 
 
 Daniel Jenckes, John Cole, 8. Downer, Nathan Angell, John Updike, 
 Nicholas Brown, Hayward Smith, Ebenezer Thompson, John Jenckes, 
 James Angell, Moses Brown, Job Smith, Jonathan Ballau, Joseph 
 Lawrence, John Nash, James Arnold, John Brown, Joseph Brown, 
 Samuel Nightingale, jun. Joseph Russel. 
 
 How did Goddard arrive at the figure of eight hundred sub- 
 scribers? In 1766 there were probably not many more than three 
 or four newspapers in all the colonies with this much circulation, 
 and those would have been in Boston, New York, and Philadelphia. 
 This number was not a mere figure of speech to Goddard because 
 he did not revive the paper at the end of five weeks; in fact, when 
 it was finally revived, it was under the actual as well as nominal 
 direction of Sarah Goddard not William. Before this we have 
 pointed out the failure of the Providence shop to get the colony 
 printing. (It took a revolution before Goddard’s successor, John 
 Carter, was able to take the public printing away from Newport.) 
 William, had calculated his figure on the basis that there would be 
 no government work. The newspaper must carry itself, not just 
 be a prestige item whose losses could be subsidized from other 
 sources. How about the advertising revenue? As today, the space 
 rates were determined by the circulation. If it had eight hundred 
 circulation, the newspaper could justify an increase in its advertising 
 rates, but apparently not before. Publishers of today worry about 
 a “break-even” point in their book sales and circulation. Eight 
 hundred was a break-even point for a colonial newspaper of 1766. 
 
 Of additional interest are the remarks about the paper mill. We 
 have Goddard’s flat statement that “he has a Part” in it. The 
 business horizon of the young, but no longer fledgling, printer was 
 expanding. Also, there is said about this mill that “Paper of every 
 Sort . . . has been produced from it.” Judging from this statement, 
 the ones made the preceding August, and the undated remarks in 
 the joint letter, we can deduce that Rhode Island’s first paper mill 
 commenced its operations during the fall of 1765. 
 
 By June, 1766, Goddard had given up on the possibility of re- 
 opening the Providence shop and was in Philadelphia looking over 
 the prospects there. Later he described his own situation: “At this 
 time [June, 1766] I had a very complete office in Providence, in 
 the colony of Rhode-Island, under the superintendence of Mrs. 
 Sarah Goddard, my Mother, and was in company with a gentleman 
 
56 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 of credit [John Holt] in the city of New-York. My inducement 
 to leave Providence was the earnest invitation of Messrs. Parker 
 and Holt, who wished to see me employed on a more extensive 
 theatre [at this point Goddard conveniently forgot his own letter 
 to Parker requesting aid in securing employment], and offered to 
 take me into partnership with them, without removing my materials 
 from Providence, or advancing a shilling [this was undoubtedly 
 true]; but, unfortunately, after I had been a little time in New-York, 
 a dispute arose between my two friends, which gave me great pain, 
 and made my situation disagreeable, one insisting that I should join 
 him, in opposition to the other, unless he would submit to particular 
 terms proposed. I laboured incessantly to prevent an open rupture, 
 and a news-paper controversy, and happily succeeded, preserving the 
 good-will of both. I afterwards joined one of them, by consent of 
 the other, till I could find a more advantageous situation, which I 
 soon after had a prospect of in Philadelphia.” It is questionable 
 that Goddard’s labors to “prevent an open rupture” between Parker 
 and Holt were incessant, but it is true that he did preserve the 
 friendship of both men. He was Holt’s partner and printed the 
 Constitutional Courant on Parker’s Woodbridge press. 
 
 The story of William Goddard in Philadelphia is another chap- 
 ter; however, we must pause a while to see the activities of his 
 mother and sister in Providence. Even more than William, Sarah 
 Goddard loved the community where her son had opened the 
 town’s first printing establishment. She was determined to main- 
 tain the business not only because of her affection for her neighbors 
 but because of her tremendous reverence for the “mystick art of 
 printing,” as a poem in the March 16, 1765, Gazette had called it. 
 During the early summer of 1766, when William had given up on 
 Providence and was sounding out Philadelphia, she was organizing 
 Sarah Goddard and Company. The “Company” consisted of Mary 
 Katherine, an active workman in the shop; Samuel Inslee (later to 
 print Parker’s New York paper after the latter’s death), brought in 
 some time during the summer or fall; and a few journeymen and 
 apprentices. It was not a big shop, but it was busy and succeeded 
 in bringing out shortly a 204-page volume. Appropriately this 
 imprint of Sarah Goddard and Company was the Letters of the 
 Right Honourable Lady M-y W-y M-e, announced as “just pub- 
 lished” on September 5, 1767. Sarah was paying her respects to 
 
CHAPTER IV 57 
 
 that better-known bluestocking Lady Mary Wortley Montague by 
 means of this first American printing of the Letters. 
 
 More important to the firm’s financial well-being was the 
 revival of the Providence Gazette on August 9, 1766. The usual 
 notice “To the Public” on page one apologized for not appearing 
 “at the Time limited in the Providence Gazette Extraordinary.” 
 The number of subscribers obtained by the March appeal was 
 “inadequate,” but Sarah was going ahead anyway. The rest of 
 this notice is adapted from the one which appeared in the first 
 number of the Gazette almost four years before. 
 
 The next week’s issue, August 15, featured a long letter from 
 William, date-lined New York, July 20, 1766. After congratulating 
 his fellow countrymen on the repeal of the Stamp Act, he connected 
 the Providence Gazette with this struggle by expressing its devotion 
 to the “Preservation of Liberty.’ He commented on the attempt 
 to revive the paper five months before. He admitted he had not 
 obtained the minimum eight hundred subscribers, “but though I 
 cannot reasonably expect to make any adequate Advantage of my 
 Printing-Materials, (which cost me near £300, Szerling,) where they 
 are, yet I could not be persuaded to take them away; rather choosing, 
 at all Events, to leave them for the Benefit of my Friends, where 
 they are, in the Hands of my Mother, Mrs. Sarah Goddard.... I 
 have lately sent her as Assistant [probably Samuel Inslee], to 
 enable her to carry on the Business more extensively.” 
 
 The pleasure and satisfaction Sarah Goddard got from operating 
 the printing establishment comes out not only in such books as that 
 by Lady Montague but in the tradition of entertainment started by 
 William and continued by his mother in the columns of the Gazette. 
 One example of entertainment printed August 30 reveals Sarah’s 
 appreciation of earthy wit, and the heroic couplets of “The Dis- 
 tressed Maid” provide pleasure to today’s readers as well as those 
 of two centuries ago. 
 
 Of all the experience, how vast the amount, 
 
 Since fifteen long winters I fairly can count; 
 
 Was ever poor damsel so sadly betray’d, 
 
 For to live to these years, and still be a maid. 
 
 Ye heroes triumphant, by land or by sea, 
 
 Sworn votries to love, yet unmindful of me; 
 
 You can storm a strong fort, or can form a blockade, 
 
58 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 Yet ye stand by like dastards; and see me a maid. 
 
 Ye lawyers so just, who with slippery tongue, 
 
 Who do what you please, or with nght or with wrong; 
 Can it be or by law or by equity said, 
 
 That a charming young girl ought to die an old maid. 
 Ye learned physicians, whose excellent skill, 
 
 Can save, or demolish, can cure, or can kill; 
 
 To a poor forlorn damsel contribute your aid, 
 
 Who is sick, very sick of remaining a maid. 
 
 You fops I invoke not to list to my song, 
 
 Who answer no end, and to no sex belong. 
 
 Ye echoe’s of echoe’s and shadows of shades, 
 
 For if I had you,—I might still be a maid. 
 
 The business of the shop went on apace. On September 20 the 
 Gazette requested “a sober, industrious Person, who understands the 
 Business of Papermaking.” The paper mill demanded skilled 
 workmen, and the four partners found it necessary to advertise for 
 their services. Another activity of the shop is shown by the issue of 
 October 11. The Providence Gazette would accept in lieu of money 
 for its subscriptions “good tann’d Sheep-Skins, fit for Bookbinding.” 
 Colonial print shops concerned themselves with the covers of books 
 as well as the contents. 
 
 By the end of 1766 William was in Philadelphia preparing him- 
 self and securing the necessary printing equipment for his new 
 venture. His mother busied herself supervising the Providence 
 shop and editing the weekly issues of the Gazette. Mary Katherine 
 had the sleeves of her dress rolled up and wore a goodly sized apron 
 as she used her own printer’s stick in the composition of the paper. 
 The members of the Goddard family were all busy, each in his own 
 sphere. 
 
“Ve 
 
 
 
 HE scene of William Goddard’s activities now shifts to Phila- 
 
 delphia. Penn’s “green country town” was in 1766 the largest 
 city in all the colonies. Though it did not have Boston’s fishing 
 industry, it did have a much larger trade with Britain, the West 
 Indies, and the other colonies than did the older settlement. Its 
 population, approximately 30,000, had surpassed Boston’s for several 
 years. Not only was its trade vigorous, but its commercial basis was 
 variegated, auguring well for the future. In spite of British restric- 
 tion iron was smelted in the vicinity and many of the local citizens 
 had financial interests in the small iron furnaces scattered between 
 the Delaware and Susquehanna rivers. Another active force in 
 Philadelphia’s prosperity was, and is, the richness of the farm lands 
 of Lancaster County and the Cumberland Valley, only a few years 
 before opened up for settlement. Contributing to this agricultural 
 well-being were the farming abilities of the Pennsylvania German 
 settlers. In the Palatine their forebears had learned how to rotate 
 crops and how to conserve the soil while reaping the benefits of each 
 harvest. The products of these hard-working German farmers were 
 going into or through Philadelphia, just as during the winter of 
 1777-1778 the soldiers of Washington’s army watched the bulging 
 wagons of food pass by their Valley Forge encampment on the way 
 to the British army in Philadelphia. 
 
 Inevitably an expanding, prosperous community suffered many 
 growing pains. Quarrels were sometimes bitter over the location of 
 street lamps, the marketplace, and its “shambles.” There were 
 acrimonious debates on the subject of what should happen to the 
 overhead arch where Arch Street today reaches Front Street. All 
 these and many more subjects of local interest could be expected to 
 fill the columns of a newspaper and provide the necessary fuels for 
 the heat of an extensive circulation. But Philadelphia was more 
 than an economic center; it was also a political center. As yet it 
 
 “\. 
 ~~ 
 
60 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 
 
 had not become the capital of the colonies, even figuratively, but it 
 was very much the political capital of the province of Pennsylvania. 
 And this colony’s politics eventually thoroughly enmeshed Goddard, 
 causing both his success and his failure. 
 
 The distinguishing feature of Pennsylvania’s political life in the 
 1760’s was the existence of two parties, proprietary and antipro- 
 prietary. The colony was still under the proprietary control of the 
 descendants of William Penn. The irritations produced by this 
 control were many, and matters were not helped by the seeming 
 arrogance of certain members of the Penn family. Some of the dis- 
 pute originates in the inevitable pattern of the ins forming one 
 party and the outs forming another. Whatever the causes, the 
 presence of the two parties, unorganized though they were, was 
 obvious to all observers. The struggle between the two was most 
 intense in the provincial assembly, which was frequently chafing 
 under the reins of the governor’s veto power over its actions. With- 
 in the assembly the proprietary forces were led by such men as 
 James Wilson and John Dickinson. The antiproprietary party 
 found its leadership in Joseph Galloway, Thomas Wharton, and 
 Benjamin Franklin. Franklin was in England during most of the 
 1760’s and could participate only through his correspondence with 
 various members of the assembly. Franklin’s son, William, was very 
 sympathetic to Galloway and Wharton in spite of his position as 
 royal governor of New Jersey and having, as a result, to be 
 secretive in his efforts in their behalf. Possibly William Franklin 
 had dreams of becoming governor of Pennsylvania were it made 
 into a royal colony. 
 
 We have already seen the vigor and intensity with which God- 
 dard had participated in the Stamp Act struggle of 1765. This 
 same struggle had, of course, gone on in all the colonies. In 
 Philadelphia, as in the other colonial capitals, the newspapers had 
 been active in their opposition to the potential duties, many of which 
 directly affected the livelihood of the colonial printer. Among 
 those who had expressed themselves in favor of the Stamp Act 
 was Joseph Galloway. Under the pseudonym of Americanus he 
 had in Bradford’s Pennsylvania Journal of August 29, 1765, de- 
 fended the legal right (Galloway was one of the most prominent 
 members of the Philadelphia bar) of Parliament to tax the colonists. 
 Who Americanus was did not long remain a secret, and many 
 
CHAPTER V 61 
 
 vituperations were cast at the writer’s head. Typical of these was a 
 broadside issued, probably from the press of William Bradford, in 
 early 1766. This broadside, called “A Receipt to Make a Speech,” 
 is stated with not very subtle irony to be by J—— G——, Esquire, 
 patently Joseph Galloway to any Philadelphia reader. The alleged 
 author of the “receipt” goes on to give his formula for making a 
 speech sound pretentious and say nothing. The satire is obvious 
 enough to be almost abusive. Whether Bradford printed this on 
 order or for himself is not important since his dislike of Galloway 
 is apparent either way. Though Hall and Sellers were not as vocal 
 in their opposition to Galloway, still Galloway and Wharton found 
 it more and more difficult to insert articles into Franklin’s old 
 newspaper. 
 
 David Hall, in a letter to William Strahan on June 12, 1767, 
 dated the beginning of Galloway’s dissatisfaction back to late Sep- 
 tember, 1764. At that time Galloway had told Hall he wanted 
 to insert a yet-unwritten article, and John Dickinson, who was con- 
 testing Galloway’s seat in the Pennsylvania Assembly, came to Hall 
 about the article. The election was only a few days off; in fact, it 
 was to occur just one day after the next appearance of the Gazette. 
 If Dickinson was to reply to Galloway before the election, he would 
 have to do it in the same issue in which Galloway’s article would 
 appear. Therefore he requested permission to see Galloway’s 
 article before publication, so that he could make whatever rejoinder 
 seemed appropriate. This Hall agreed to. Later when Galloway 
 brought in his article, Hall told him of the conversation with Dick- 
 inson. Galloway refused to allow his opponent to see the article. 
 “Then I [Hall] told him, I did not think I could print it; upon 
 which he grew very angry, told me, I was a Partial Printer, that I 
 had used him very ill, and that he would complain to Mr Franklin.” 
 (Franklin was still a partner in 1764.) Goddard was later to give 
 accounts of the reactions of Galloway when frustrated that sound 
 very much like Hall’s narrative. 
 
 As part of this picture we cannot ignore the absence of Benjamin 
 Franklin; in fact, his absence affected the circumstances of Goddard 
 in Philadelphia more than his possible presence. Franklin had been 
 the colony of Pennsylvania representative, in effect representative of 
 the provincial assembly, in England since 1757. Except for a less 
 than two-year period in the early 1760’s he had been away from 
 
62 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 
 
 the colonies for almost ten years and was not to return until 1775. 
 During his absence he received regularly the Philadelphia news- 
 papers and many letters from his friends and family. However, 
 Franklin had somewhat lost contact with what was going on in the 
 colonies at this time, and his reputation had been severely tarnished 
 for many colonists by his actions after the Stamp Act was passed by 
 Parliament and before its repeal. As representative of Pennsylvania 
 he had fought against the act’s passage. Once Parliament passed 
 the act, Franklin seemingly had no idea of the intensity of the 
 colonial opposition and committed the faux pas of securing the posi- 
 tion of customs collector for several of his friends, most of whom 
 were compelled to resign their offices under considerable public 
 pressure and permanent embarrassment to their prestige. So badly 
 was Franklin regarded as a result that William Franklin and Joseph 
 Galloway thought it necessary to rehabilitate his reputation. They 
 were much annoyed in this attempt to find the columns of the two 
 Philadelphia newspapers almost closed to them. And so they wel- 
 comed the opportunity when an experienced printer and newspaper 
 publisher came into town to look over the situation. 
 
 When Goddard printed the first number of the Providence 
 Gazette, he was establishing his business in a community which had 
 had no printing shop previously, let alone a newspaper. He had 
 the citizens of Providence behind him even though they were 
 reluctant to part with their seven shillings for annual subscriptions. 
 Philadelphia was quite different. Two newspapers had for many 
 years shared the public’s trade. Though the Franklin and Hall 
 shop was the more active of the two, being the largest in all the 
 colonies, Bradford had managed to get along. Franklin had retired 
 from active participation in 1748 but had continued to draw out 
 generous returns from his partnership. In early 1766 it was an- 
 nounced in the Pennsylvania Gazette that the old partnership of 
 Franklin and Hall had expired and was to be replaced by the firm 
 of Hall and Sellers. Sitting in Holt’s printing shop, Goddard must 
 have welcomed this news when he read it. Franklin had been a 
 good, even imaginative printer and was always a fierce competitor 
 for any business. David Hall, though competent, lacked Franklin’s 
 imagination and keen business sense. Bradford could be called 
 adequate as a printer and not much more. One of his chief con- 
 tributions to the printing business was a dogged persistence, which 
 
CHAPTER V 63 
 
 
 
 gave him some of the official printing from Pennsylvania and New 
 Jersey, though the Franklin and Hall shop had the lion’s share. 
 And so all in all it must have looked like a very good opportunity 
 for a skilled experienced printer to exploit. 
 
 In March, 1766, Goddard had tried to revive the Providence 
 Gazette. By June this attempt seemed to have failed, and Goddard 
 paid his first visit to Philadelphia. He had read the Franklin and 
 Hall announcement, but also he had procured a letter of introduc- 
 tion to Governor Franklin, probably from Parker though Goddard 
 does not name him. Goddard sought out the governor in Phila- 
 delphia, gave him the letter, and indicated his availability as a 
 printer. The younger Franklin “semed transported with the in- 
 formation” and immediately sent the printer on to Joseph Galloway, 
 who received him “with great joy.” Afterwards (in The Partner- 
 ship, the 1770 pamphlet in which Goddard reveals so much about his 
 first years in Philadelphia), Goddard, with some bitterness, described 
 his reception by Galloway in these terms: “He acquainted me that 
 he had long determined to have a press that would ‘faithfully serve 
 the public) that all the printers of the public papers here were 
 villains and scoundrels, entirely under the dominion of a party, who 
 monopolized the press, greatly to the prejudice of the province, and 
 to the injury of his character, &c. He said he was extremely pleased 
 that I came so opportunely, . . . and [he] would secure me the 
 government?’s printing business, which, he assured me, was always at 
 his command, . . . and many other great and important advantages, 
 besides cash whenever it was necessary, if I would admit him as a 
 partner.” No wonder the young printer thought his future lay in 
 Philadelphia not Providence. 
 
 Shortly after this interview Goddard returned to Providence to 
 make the necessary arrangements with his mother and sister for the 
 running of the print shop and paper mill there. Some elzevir type 
 was sent from Providence to Philadelphia and orders were sent to 
 England for type to replace this. Most of the type for the new shop 
 was ordered from William Strahan in London by Galloway. 
 
 The second issue of the revived Providence Gazette had a letter 
 from Goddard dated New York, July 20, 1766. This letter, re- 
 ferred to in Chapter IV, contained this remark, somewhat cryptic 
 to the Providence readers, as a postscript: “In my present Situation, 
 I have much greater Prospects of increasing my Fortune, than I 
 
64 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 have ever had before.” Doubtless most of those who read this “N.B.” 
 thought that the young Goddard was suffering from a case of sour 
 grapes and was talking big to cover up his own failures. Yet even 
 the most skeptical observer, had he known both the Providence situa- 
 tion and the Philadelphia prospects, could not have thought the case 
 overstated. 
 
 In his shuttling back and forth between Providence and New 
 York Goddard may have missed seeing some articles in the Pennsyl- 
 vania Journal, which would have forecast for him not such pleasant 
 prospects. It is, of course, impossible to say now whether Goddard 
 knew Galloway’s attitudes towards the Stamp Act and whether 
 Galloway knew about Goddard’s activities concerning the same act. 
 Several things fall into place if we assume mutual ignorance; how- 
 ever, the ease with which each man could have found out about the 
 other’s past makes us hesitate in making such an assumption. View- 
 ing the situation from the character of the two men, we are tempted 
 to conclude that the shrewd, cautious Galloway may have had the 
 benefit of this knowledge but not the impulsive Goddard. Perhaps 
 Galloway’s awareness may help explain why he set such importance 
 in having financial control over Goddard. No matter what the 
 extent of each one’s knowledge, their mutual roles would have 
 seemed appropriate, even if expediency was primary and not just 
 secondary. Anyway, William Bradford was still rankled by the 
 Americanus article of August, 1765, though it had appeared in his 
 own paper—possibly this fact intensified the irritation. Finally, 
 Bradford through some means, perhaps through his postmastership 
 of Philadelphia, got his hands on a copy of a letter from Galloway to 
 Benjamin Franklin, dated September 20, 1765. In this letter Gallo- 
 way stated with apparent pride that he was Americanus and de- 
 nounced the disorders against the Stamp Act. His expressed hope in 
 September, 1765, that the colonists would submit to the law (repealed 
 March 18, 1766) must have made many a Philadelphian smile at the 
 haughty lawyer when they read the letter in Bradford’s Journal of 
 September 11, 1766. The original Americanus article was also 
 reprinted in this same issue so that no reader could possibly miss 
 the point. Galloway’s election as speaker of the Pennsylvania As- 
 sembly less than a month later must have greatly irked the op- 
 ponents of the Stamp Act. 
 
 The next week’s issue, September 18, of the Pennsylvania Journal 
 
CHAPTER V 65 
 
 
 
 returned to the attack with an unsigned two-page essay in a supple- 
 ment. Three individuals were named as collaborators in a con- 
 spiracy to foist the Stamp Act upon the colonists. These three were 
 Joseph Galloway; John Hughes, a friend of Franklin’s who had been 
 named Stamp Act Collector for Philadelphia; and Benjamin Frank- 
 lin, who “is generally believed to have had a principal hand in 
 promoting the Stamp Act.” This theme was played upon again for 
 the opening two and a half pages of the September 25 Journal. 
 So vigorous was the campaign against Galloway and Franklin 
 (Hughes was regarded as a mere chattel in their hands) that a proper 
 metaphor to describe this preparation for the arrival of Goddard in 
 Philadelphia would not be the stage was set but rather the trap door 
 was poised open for its victim. 
 
 In November Goddard came to Philadelphia to open up his 
 printing business. Prospects seemed glowing for the twenty-six-year- 
 old printer. Though on a modest scale, the Providence shop was 
 functioning adequately, the Providence Gazette was appearing regu- 
 larly, and the Providence paper mill was beginning to be a source 
 of regular profits. In Philadelphia Goddard was assured by Gallo- 
 way that his election as Speaker of the Assembly meant the public 
 printing was under his control and would be delegated to the new 
 shop. The factor which had led to his failure in Providence was to 
 be remedied in Philadelphia. Everything seemed auspicious. 
 
 Among the first things to be settled was the partnership agree- 
 ment. Galloway introduced Goddard to his close friend Thomas 
 Wharton saying that the Quaker merchant would become a third 
 partner and lend his prestige, influence, and money to the business. 
 Wharton greeted Goddard in true Quaker fashion, “Friend God- 
 dard, I bid thee welcome.” A discussion ensued about the actual 
 articles of agreement, which were signed the first of December. 
 At first Galloway and Wharton demanded a third each of the 
 profits for their shares as a return for financing the new shop, but 
 finally permitted Goddard to retain half the profits because neither 
 financier wanted his connection known publicly. The agreement, 
 preserved for us in The Partnership, provided that the expenses and 
 proceeds of the new shop were to be divided into four parts, Goddard 
 receiving two. It was explicitly stated that the printer was to 
 manage the shop “without making any charge for his trouble, ex- 
 perience or knowledge.” (No wonder Goddard later commented, 
 
66 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 “Thus I purchased the Assembly’s printing work.”) The agree- 
 ment was for fifteen years, beginning January 1, 1767. During this 
 time the partners were to make “reason and justice the standard and 
 rule of their conduct towards each other.” William Goddard was 
 “to keep a free press.” The agreement concluded “that in case 
 Benjamin Franklin, Esq; on his return to Pennsylvania, should in- 
 cline to become a partner in the business aforesaid, that he shall be 
 admitted as such, and in that case that the shares . . . shall be as 
 follows, to wit, Two ninths thereof shall belong to Joseph Galloway, 
 two ninths thereof to Thomas Wharton, two ninths thereof to Ben- 
 jamin Franklin, Esq; and three ninths thereof to William Goddard.” 
 Even though Galloway and Wharton seemed most interested in 
 securing a newspaper in whose columns they could regularly con- 
 tribute, they were taking no chances on missing any possible profits 
 or losing the economic contro] of the business. Goddard himself 
 was verbally assured that he was not to worry about money and 
 not to stint himself in securing good and sufficient equipment. Be- 
 cause the shop was to be in the name of William Goddard, all the 
 charges resulting from this generous credit were in one name. And 
 this was true even when Galloway himself wrote to Strahan in 
 London and ordered a supply of type to be sent to Goddard. 
 
 The first dispute among the three partners was over what was 
 then called entrance money, the down payment necessary to make 
 effective an annual subscription for a newspaper. Goddard proposed 
 that one half the annual charge of ten shillings be required. Gallo- 
 way and Wharton objected and forced the printer to yield with the 
 result that no entrance money was required for the soon-to-be-pub- 
 lished newspaper. Because of this the more subscriptions came in 
 for the paper the more the paper began to go into debt. 
 
 During all this time William Franklin had been busy behind 
 the scenes doing his bit to help get the business started. In particular 
 he made the arrangements for the location of the shop. The 
 governor told about his own activities in a letter to his father, dated 
 November 13, 1766. After describing the refusals of Hall to print 
 any of the articles given to him, he continued: 
 
 The Consequence is that your Friends (who would have set up a 
 Press above a year ago, but that they did not know but you might chuse 
 to be concern’d in the Printing Business on your Return) have at length 
 engaged one Goddard, who served his Apprenticeship with Mr. Parker, 
 
CHAPTER V 67 
 
 to set up a Printing Office in Philadelphia & publish a Newspaper. Mr. 
 Galloway, & Mr. Thos. Wharton, for his encouragement, have entered 
 into Partnership with him & have agreed to advance what Money may be 
 necessary. But as their Motive for doing this is not merely for the Sake 
 of Profit, but principally to have a Press henceforth as open & safe to 
 them, as Hall’s & Bradford’s are to the other Party, they have put it into 
 their Agreement as I understand, that when you return you shall have 
 it in your Power to be concern’d, if you chuse it, in the Place of one of 
 them. The young Man has brought several good Founts of Letters 
 with him, but his Press he was obliged to leave with his Mother, who 
 carries on the Business at Providence. ‘They therefore desired me to ask 
 my Mother to lend them the old Press which Parker used here, & they 
 would either buy it of you, or pay you what you thought reasonable for 
 the Hire. My Mother told me she had no objection to my letting them 
 have it, but she did not chuse to do it of herself, lest Mr. Hall might be 
 displeased with her for it. At the same Time she said that she should 
 be glad that the Printer would take the old House in which it was, as it 
 stood empty & had not brought in any Rent for a great while. I ac- 
 cordingly let them have the Press, & they have agreed with my Mother 
 to take your old House in Market Street. There is a new Mahogany 
 Press there, which they seem Desirous to purchase if you incline to part 
 with it, but I suppose they will write to you on the subject. What I 
 have done is for the best, & I hope it will prove agreeable to you. There 
 is, indeed, really a Necessity for their having a Press of their own, while 
 their publick Affairs continue in their present critical situation, for it is 
 with great Difficulty they can get Hall or Bradford to consent to print 
 any Thing for them, & when they do some of the Proprietary Party are 
 sure to have it communicated to them before it is published. Hugh 
 Roberts, and many more of your old Friends, have determined to en- 
 courage the new Printer all in their Power, & to go about the several 
 Wards to get subscriptions to the News-paper. The Members of As- 
 sembly will do the same in their respective Counties, & let him have all 
 the Publick Work. So that I am in hopes that by the Time you return 
 they will lay the Foundation of a very valuable Business, worth your 
 while to be concerned in, if you should think it proper or convenient. 
 But I am likewise in hopes that when you do return you will have some- 
 thing far better worth your Acceptance than that can possibly be made. 
 However, as all Things in this Life are uncertain, it may not perhaps 
 be amiss for you to have it in your Power to engage in this Affair. 
 
 I am, Honoured Sir, 
 
 Your dutiful Son 
 
 Wm. Franklin 
 
 By December 23, 1766, Goddard was ready to announce the 
 forthcoming appearance of the Pennsylvania Chronicle and Universal 
 
68 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 Advertiser in advertisements in both the Pennsylvania Gazette and 
 Journal. Sarah Goddard must have been proud when she reprinted 
 this notice in the Providence Gazette of January 24, 1767. The 
 advertisement was immediately run off by Goddard as a broadside, 
 the back of which he used as a type specimen sheet. The announce- 
 ment, “Proposals,” said that the first number was to “be given gratis” 
 as an inducement for subscribers. Three principles were to guide 
 the new paper: secrecy, freedom, and impartiality. (The last must 
 have semed like utter hypocrisy to David Hall and William Brad- 
 ford.) Goddard tried his best to put himself on good relations with 
 his competitors in Philadelphia by stating his paper would give “the 
 freshest Accounts of Such Occurrences as shall happen between 
 Thursday and Monday.” Both the Gazette and the Journal ap- 
 peared on Thursdays, and Goddard was trying to imply that the 
 Monday appearance of the Chronicle would merely supplement, 
 not supplant, the two existing papers. The subscription and ad- 
 vertising rates were to be those already prevailing in Philadelphia. 
 
 From the extensive credit at his use and his own lofty ideas 
 Goddard planned the setup of the Chronicle on the largest scale 
 yet attempted by any newspaper printed in the colonies. The page 
 was a large folio with four columns instead of the customary three. 
 This scale of printing cost him an additional £200 a year for paper 
 but fitted into his grandiose schemes. Modeling his plans upon the 
 London Chronicle, Goddard tried to make his Chronicle the paper 
 of his dreams. His goal was a paper that its readers would want to 
 preserve in bound annual volumes in their libraries. Like a learned 
 quarterly of today the pages were numbered consecutively from issue 
 to issue. When a year was elapsed, the numbers could then be bound 
 with an index to the whole. Each issue was to be dated for a full 
 week, i.e., July 1 to July 8 instead of merely July 8. (Subsequent 
 references give only the second of these two dates.) Goddard ap- 
 proached his goals near enough that the Chronicle was undoubtedly 
 the best newspaper Philadelphia and perhaps the colonies had ever 
 had. 
 
 The editorial plans were not the only ones to be made; the 
 business of the newspaper must be set going. The publisher had 
 promised that Philadelphia subscribers would have the paper de- 
 livered to their doorstep. Carriers therefore had to be hired. The 
 postal system being what it was, Goddard had to employ his own 
 
CHAPTER V 69 
 
 
 
 riders for points outside Philadelphia. The bill of one of these 
 riders, John Borrows, shows how much this cost Goddard. Borrows 
 wanted £95, Pennsylvania currency, for carrying the Chronicle the 
 sixty miles to New Brunswick, New Jersey, from January 27, 1767, 
 to June 27, 1770, and the thirty miles to Trenton from June 27, 
 1770, to November 20, 1774. (That the Chronicle had ceased 
 publication nine months before November seems not to have bothered 
 Borrows, though it is quite possible he could not read what some 
 one else had written for him.) The securing of subscriptions had 
 also to be tended to, since the members of the Pennsylvania As- 
 sembly referred to by William Franklin were not as energetic as 
 the governor thought they would be. The editor carefully organized 
 part-time subscription agents. An advertisement in the August 17, 
 1767, Chronicle reveals how extensive this system was. All thirteen 
 of the colonies are represented; the West Indies and Canada have 
 agents; and even in London a coffee house would take in subscrip- 
 tions. A summary tabulation of the numbers of these agents shows 
 both the extent and thoroughness of this organization: 
 
 Canada 2 (Halifax and Quebec) 
 New England II 
 New York 6 
 New Jersey 7) 
 Pennsylvania 18 
 Delaware 4 
 Maryland 8 
 Wa.vo.€., N.C. Ga. 5 
 West Indies 5 
 London I 
 Total 77 
 
 Probably the entire network of agents was not in operation by the 
 date of the opening issue, but there was enough activity for the 
 Chronicle to start with seven hundred subscribers and soon pass the 
 thousand mark in circulation. Goddard was not only a good news- 
 paper editor but a good circulation manager. 
 
 After all this fanfare the first number of the Pennsylvania 
 Chronicle appeared January 26, 1767. The clean-cut appearance of 
 its pages made the competing Gazette and Journal seem particularly 
 sloppy in their editing. The notice “To the Public” was brief but 
 
7O WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 quite confident in its tone. The actor David Douglas, who that 
 same evening appeared at the New Theatre in Southwark in Mourn- 
 ing Bride and High Life Below Stairs, must have given his heartiest 
 congratulations late that night when the actor and the printer ad- 
 journed to an oyster bar for mutual toasts and felicitations. Indeed 
 the affairs of the shop were going forward so well that by the second 
 issue Goddard was advertising for both a journeyman printer and an 
 apprentice. 
 
 But not everybody was so pleased at the paper’s immediate suc- 
 cess, and particularly unhappy was David Hall. The day after the 
 Chronicle first appeared Hall wrote bitterly to Franklin in London. 
 Hall pointed out that the new printing office occupied quarters owned 
 by Franklin and even used a press belonging to him. To add fuel 
 to Hall’s fire, the subscription agents had freely used the name of 
 William Franklin in their appeals. Hall also smelled the hands of 
 Galloway and Wharton. (Common gossip in Philadelphia was 
 surprisingly accurate.) He said that some people reported Ben- 
 jamin Franklin to be “a Partner in the House; but this, I will never 
 allow my self to believe, having still, as I always had, the highest 
 Opinion of your Honour, and know, that you will never forget that 
 Clause of our Agreement, by which, tho’ you are not absolutely 
 prohibited from being any farther concerned in the Printing Business 
 in this Place, yet so much is plainly implied.” For a couple of 
 paragraphs more Hall continued to attack the behavior of Governor 
 Franklin. 
 
 Franklin, by this time informed by the letter from his son and 
 another from Galloway about what was going on, replied on April 
 14 to Hall. He defended himself from the charges at some length: 
 
 You are right in believing that I am not a Partner in Mr Goddard’s 
 Printing-House. It was set on foot without my Knowledge or Participa- 
 tion, and the first Notice I had of it was by reading the Advertisement in 
 your Paper. I had indeed by the same Conveyance a Letter offering me 
 a Share in it, which I declin’d accepting before my Return, not only 
 because I did not well know the Person, but because I did not care 
 to be again concerned in Business, unless on settling my Affairs when I 
 got Home it should appear necessary for the Support of my Family. 
 Indeed I had not the least Idea of any Agreement between you and I, 
 either express’d or imply’d, as you say, in any of its Articles, by which I 
 was “prohibited from being any further concern’d in the Printing Busi- 
 ness in Philadelphia, after the Expiration of our Partnership.” I have not 
 
CHAPTER V 71 
 
 a Copy of our Articles with me here; but I am confident that if you 
 examine them you will find this a Mistake. I could not possibly foresee 
 18 years beforehand, that I should at the End of that Term be so rich 
 as to live without Business. And if this did not happen, it would be 
 obliging myself to the hard Alternative of Starving or Banishment, since 
 Threescore is rather too late an Age to think of going ‘Prentice to learn 
 anew Trade, and I have no other! This I say, not to justify my engag- 
 ing with Mr Goddard, for I have not done it. And I hope I shall have 
 no Occasion to do it. I know there must be a very great Sum due to me 
 from our Customers, and I hope much more of it will be recovered by 
 you for me than you seem to apprehend. When that is got in, I suppose 
 I can use it in such a Manner, as that with my Office and the few Rents 
 I have, my Circumstances will be sufficiently affluent, especially as I am 
 not inclin’d to much Expence. In this Case I have no purpose of being 
 again concern’d in Printing. But I may lose my Office, I may 
 receive much less of my Debts than I hope for, I may find myself 
 going behind-hand, and I am sure you would take no Pleasure in 
 seeing me ruin’d, or oblig’d at my time of Life to quit my Country, 
 Friends & Connections, to get my Bread in a strange Place, especially 
 as my not following my Business could not hinder others from interfering 
 with you. I am in short, so far from conceiving it possible that I should 
 make such an Agreement tho’ forgotten, that, on the contrary I believe 
 such an Agreement was never made by any Man in his Senses. 
 
 Though this reply did not make Hall content, he had to accept it 
 with as much grace as he could muster. 
 
 The perturbations of Hall are found in his correspondence during 
 this year with William Strahan, under whom he had served his ap- 
 prenticeship and by whom he had been recommended to Franklin. 
 On January 31, five days after the Chronicle had first appeared, Hall 
 told Strahan he would appreciate “your being punctual in sending the 
 News Papers by every Opportunity, and getting your acquaintances 
 at Bristol, Liverpool &c in England; and likewise . . . Dublin, 
 Belfast, Cork, London Derry &c. If you have any Correspondence 
 in these places, will be more wanted now than ever.” Two months 
 later, March 31, Hall repeated this request for additional foreign 
 correspondence, adding a request for exclusives, “And I must repeat 
 my Request, that you will write no Political Letters, or Letters of 
 News, to any One but my self.” Franklin’s former partner was 
 really worried about the new competition, which he realized was 
 no mere flash in the pan. On April 30 Hall again complained to 
 Strahan, this time stressing the nefarious activities of Governor 
 
72 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 Franklin and his friends. “I must be crushed in order to make 
 Way for another, who, they think, will be more condescending, 
 and will implicitly obey their Commands; all under the Pretence of 
 preserving the Liberty of the Press.” Goddard’s “Proposals” ob- 
 viously had a very hollow ring in the ears of his fellow Philadelphia 
 printers. 
 
 On May 26 Hall, feeling not quite so “crushed” because he had 
 picked up that portion of the public printing at the disposal of 
 Governor Penn, not the assembly, wrote to his old master about 
 one who within a few years figures prominently in Goddard’s career 
 in Philadelphia. “. .. Town [Benjamin Towne] had been down to 
 Maryland, to see if there was any Opening for him there, on the 
 Decease of Green the Printer in that Province, but that he had re- 
 turned without Success. I also informed you, that he was gone to 
 work with Goddard on great Wages [apparently Goddard paid his 
 journeymen the highest wages in Philadelphia], as he said, but that 
 his going to him was no Disappointment to me, as I never had 
 any real Occasion for him, all the Time he worked with me, and 
 if it had not been to serve him, I would not have employed him at 
 all; and that I understood since he went away, that he had been 
 with Mr Galloway, on his Return from Maryland, before I saw 
 him.” Though this is getting ahead of our story, the interview 
 between Towne and Galloway does substantiate the charges later 
 made by Goddard against Towne. 
 
 Oblivious to the petulant worries of David Hall, Goddard was 
 busy with the multifarious activities of his shop and his newspaper, 
 whose circulation was steadily climbing to its position as largest in 
 all the colonies. Though polemics and controversy were the life- 
 blood of this large circulation, Goddard did not forget that he was 
 entertaining his readers as well as instructing them. For example, 
 in the February 9 issue under the Philadelphia date-line he printed 
 this item: “About a Fortnight ago, the Wife of an old Gentleman 
 of this City, who is now upwards of 84 Years of Age, took her Flight 
 from this World to the World of Spirits, and her Husband af- 
 fectionately followed her to the Grave, on Crutches;—since which, 
 he has had the Resolution to take into his Arms, by Marriage, a 
 young vigorous Nymph of Twenty-five, who kindly consented to 
 supply the Place of the deceased Matron. May they enjoy all 
 possible nuptial Felicities!” 
 
CHAPTER V 73 
 
 
 
 But such light pieces could not prevent the Chronicle from 
 doing its work for the antiproprietary party. Among the goals of 
 this group had been the rehabilitation of the reputation of the long- 
 absent Franklin. This Goddard set out to do by reprinting various 
 articles originally inserted in London newspapers by Franklin under 
 different pseudonyms. The public was to be shown that, even 
 though it had been unaware, the colony’s representative had been 
 busy promoting its affairs. 
 
 Accordingly, in the third number of the Chronicle, February 9, 
 an essay signed “A Lover of Justice” set out to defend Franklin 
 against the charges made several months earlier in Bradford’s 
 Journal. This article ended by a note from the editor saying that 
 later issues of the Chronicle would reprint articles Franklin had 
 written. A week later the first of these articles was featured on 
 page one and prefaced by this sentence: “Agreeable to our Promise, 
 we now lay before our Readers three of the Pieces wrote and pub- 
 lished by Dr. Franklin, in Defence of North-America, and in Answer 
 to the Writers who stiled themselves Tom Huinr and Vinpex 
 Partriak, extracted from several English News-Papers sent us by a 
 Correspondent.” This campaign to restore the damaged reputation 
 of the doctor continued at intervals until June 9, 1769, by which 
 time twenty-four different Franklin items had been published. There 
 is, of course, no way of determining the effectiveness of this campaign 
 since succeeding events restored Franklin’s prestige among his fellow 
 countrymen before his return to Philadelphia in May, 1775. How- 
 ever, the Chronicle campaign must have contributed something to 
 the popularity enjoyed by Dr. Franklin when he again was in the 
 colonies. 
 
 William Bradford was not the kind of man to whine about 
 Goddard’s success behind his back. Instead he boldly went into the 
 attack in the columns of his Journal, and for several weeks Phila- 
 delphians had a real newspaper battle in their midst. While the 
 battle was going on, Goddard in the Chronicle of April 13 traced its 
 origin back to the defense of Franklin by “A Lover of Justice” 
 on February 9. Various replies to this article were printed during the 
 next few weeks in the Journal and the Gazette, but as yet nobody had 
 to use dashes for the names he was calling his intended victims. 
 However, dashes were soon to be the order of the day. A pre- 
 monition of the language and events to come is seen in the March 9 
 
74 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 Chronicle. As a good reporter, Goddard was becoming aware of 
 the gossip going on though he still seemed unaware how the strug- 
 gles of 1765 provided the real background for his own difficulties 
 and Bradford’s bitterness. Aware and yet unaware, Goddard with 
 typical vehemence wrote: “As some few Persons, in this City, have 
 taken the Liberty to asperse and vilify the Printer of this Paper, a 
 Stranger to them, behind his Back, and have had the great Resolu- 
 tion to whisper a Threat that he should be roughly handled, for the 
 Freedom of his Publications, that is, for daring to maintain the 
 Liberty of the Press, he thinks proper just to Aint to those heroic 
 Calumniators, that such Behaviour only becomes Assassins;—and as 
 to Gentlemen, who may conceive a Dislike to some of the Pieces in 
 his Paper, he has no Doubt but sey will judge with Candour of the 
 Printer, and always pursue a more honourable Conduct.” 
 
 This article was in the Chronicle on Monday, and Bradford 
 made his reply on the following Thursday, March 12. In this 
 article Galloway, “with a Stamp on his left shoulder,” was connected 
 with Americanus and Goddard must have had some thoughtful 
 moments when he looked up the back issues of the Journal and dis- 
 covered the significance of Americanus. The satire in the remark 
 by the pseudonymous writer, Thomas Jackson, V.S., that the “Printer 
 of the CHRONICLE... keeps a free and impartial Press” must have 
 bitten in deeply as he conned the connotations of the word keeps. 
 Cornered, Goddard could do nothing but defend himself in his 
 next issue. 
 
 Galloway and Wharton were watching their newly established 
 printer closely and compelled him to print in the March 23 Chronicle 
 a lengthy attack on the various writers being featured in the Journal. 
 This attack, signed Lex Talionis (the Biblical eye for an eye and 
 tooth for a tooth), really blew things wide open. A copy of this 
 issue in the Yale University Library has in Goddard’s hand this note 
 at the bottom of the page, “The Piece signed Lex Talionis was in- 
 serted in this Paper very much against the Printer’s Inclination—to 
 avoid Persecution from imperious tyrannical Party-men. W.G.” 
 Though this note was probably written years later, we discern the 
 editor’s contemporaneous discomfort in the apologetic sentences he 
 wrote to preface Lex Talionis: “It is hoped the Publication of the 
 following Piece will not be thought a Deviation from the original 
 Design of the Chronicle, when the Occasion which has been given 
 
CHAPTER V 75 
 
 for it, by a late Performance in another Paper, is considered.— 
 Besides, the Reader may be assured, that the Author of this Piece 
 has complied with the Printer’s reasonable Demand, of making him- 
 self known to him, a Demand he shall always think necessary to 
 make in Writings of this Nature; and that if any Persons shall think 
 themselves aggrieved, the Publisher will not hesitate, on the same 
 Terms, to do them all the Justice that can be expected from a Press 
 established on Principles of Secrecy, Freedom, and Impartiality, even 
 tho’ they should be the very Persons who have insidiously endeav- 
 oured to injure him (a feeble Effort!) by the grossest Misrepresenta- 
 tions.” In contrast to the editor’s tone Lex Talionis did not hesitate 
 to call Thomas Jackson a vile scoundrel and his opponents “Grub 
 Street Writing Gentlemen.” 
 
 What hurt the young printer most among the reactions to this 
 piece was a letter he received over a month later from his mother, 
 still in Providence. In the first paragraph she warned her son: 
 
 It is with aching heart and trembling hand I attempt to write, but 
 hardly able, for the great concern and anxious fears the sight of your late 
 Chronicles gave me, to find you involved deeper and deeper in an unhappy 
 uncomfortable situation. In your calm hours of reflection, you must see the 
 impropriety of publishing such pieces as Lex Talionis, let the authors be 
 ever so great and dignified, for every one who takes delight in publicly 
 or privately taking away any person’s good name, or striving to render 
 him ridiculous, are in the gall of bitterness, and in the bonds of iniquity, 
 whatever their pretences may be for it. “The authors of such pieces 
 cannot be your friends, and I conjure you to let all such performances be 
 dropped from your otherwise credible paper. My spirit is moved within 
 me, dreading the direful effects that have too often sprung from such 
 insignificant trifling wrangles in the beginning. Oh my son, my only 
 son, “‘Shearken to wisdom before it is too late—doth she not stand in the 
 streets, and in the high places? to you O men I call, and my voice is to 
 the sons of men—and also at the door of our hearts’—and its effects 
 would be righteousness and peace, if not opposed by our ungovernable 
 wills. I heartily wish it was within the reach of my faint efforts to convey 
 to you what threescore and almost ten years experience has taught me, 
 of the mere nothingness of all you are disputing about, and the infinite 
 importance and value of what you thereby neglect and disregard—a jewel 
 of inestimable value-—I know corrupt nature and our own wicked hearts 
 will prompt us to think—must I then bear such injurious treatment from 
 any person on earth!—Must I give up myself to be vilified and abused 
 by these men! —But remember, we are not under the OLD LAW OF RETALI- 
 ATION, an eye for an eye, &c. for ever blessed be our gracious Redeemer, 
 
76 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 who has abrogated it, and substituted a much more glorious one in its 
 place, no less than the law of universal love; and why should you, or any 
 one else, try to revive what was disannulled above seventeen hundred years 
 past? If such writers were but possest with the spirit of universal love, 
 instead of revenge and resentment for affronts, they would pity and 
 pray for their fellow-sinners, considering we all daily use our greatest 
 benefactor with more ingratitude than one frail creature can another. 
 
 But the writers in the Journal, now abetted by the Gazette, did 
 not wait a month to reply. The Journal of April 2 had an article, 
 signed Philo Libertatis, attacking the “Delaware-crossing gentle- 
 man,” i.e., Joseph Galloway. This was on Thursday, and on the 
 following Saturday the dispute erupted into physical violence. Wil- 
 liam Bradford not only ran a printing business, but he also owned 
 Philadelphia’s most prominent tavern, the London Coffee House at 
 the corner of Front and Market streets. Because of its location so 
 near the docks the coffee house had become the center for informa- 
 tion concerning boat sailings and other marine intelligence. (As a 
 result the Journal featured more marine advertisements than any 
 other Philadelphia paper.) It was therefore necessary for Goddard 
 to visit the London Coffee House regularly to scan the postings by 
 ship captains and brokers. On this Saturday he made his usual trip; 
 and, as though expecting trouble, he carried a printer’s cross, one 
 of the tools of his trade. Within the tavern he soon found himself 
 being attacked by Mr. Hicks, one of the writers of the articles in 
 the Journal, and several of his friends. But let Goddard himself 
 describe the incident, as he did in the Chronicle of April 13: 
 
 I was immediately surrounded by a number of persons unknown to me, 
 with Mr. Hicks at their head, who became grossly abusive, and treated 
 me with great imsolence. He repeated the designs he had formed to 
 break my bones, and that he had prepared a suitable weapon for his 
 purpose. This, with many other insults I received from Mr. Hicks and 
 his confederates, all which I bore with as much temper as I possibly 
 could, on such an occasion. After Mr. Hicks had spit his venom to his 
 satisfaction, against the author of Lex Talionis, and received the plaudit 
 of his associates, who in their triumph treated me with language too in- 
 decent to retort, he went to another part of the house—I walk’d up 
 towards the fire-side, and understanding that my letters were misrepre- 
 sented, I expressed a wish, that those gentlemen of character, virtue and 
 moderation, who with disgust had seen the infamous treatment I had met 
 with, would hear those letters which were then the subject of conversa- 
 tion. Upon this, a person of Mr. Hick’s party, unknown to me, came 
 
CHAPTER V 77 
 
 up, and order’d me about my business; I told him, I had as much business 
 there as himself, and refused to be turn’d out of doors.—Without further 
 ceremony he struck me, and having my cross in my hand, I essay’d to 
 defend myself, not knowing how many I should have to encounter; but 
 before I could get disengaged from my cloak, my assailant was entirely 
 hid from me, and I found myself in the hands of those men that had be- 
 fore encompassed me with malignity im their countenances, who long 
 struggled to obtain that instrument I would freely have resigned to one 
 I knew; and, with Mr. W. Bradford’s assistance, who humanely and 
 disinterestedly lugg’d me by the hair, I was forced out of his doors in the 
 most cruel manner, before my friends were sufficiently apprised of my 
 critical situation, to afford me that relief which their inclination would 
 have led them to have given me; while he who first assaulted me, was 
 suffer’d to remain unmolested; so that six or seven men have the merit 
 of forcing a single man out of the doors of a public house, and of gaining, 
 as a trophy, to their wnmortal honour, a weapon that the Gentlemen of 
 the Faculty would not call by any other name than a ToorH-Drawer. 
 
 The quarrel continued in the following Thursday’s Gazette and 
 Journal. Goddard’s account of the London Coffee House incident 
 was reprinted and followed by a brief note from William Hicks 
 denouncing Goddard as an “infamous Rascal.” The Chronicle of 
 April 20 featured a new defense. This time Goddard boasted of 
 the “solid satisfaction” he had in “gaining a very large Addition to 
 my List of Subscribers.” He also stated that though only three 
 months old the Chronicle had the second largest circulation in the 
 colonies. The Gazette and the Journal of the twenty-third had a letter 
 signed Z attacking Goddard’s “poison of scandal.” The next Chroni- 
 cle had in it a letter from Lex Talionis attempting to clear Goddard 
 personally of any blame for what the pseudonymous author had 
 written. Ten days later William Hicks wound up the quarrel by an 
 article covering all the first page and running over into the second 
 of the Gazette of May 7. Most of this article was taken up by an 
 exchange of letters between Governor Franklin and Hicks, each 
 giving different versions of a conversation between the two men. 
 Hicks wanted to know the name of the author of Lex Talionis, and 
 the governor refused to give it and denied having promised such 
 information. The quarrel burned itself out at this point for want 
 of any new fuel. 
 
 Though this particular dispute had died down, the feelings of 
 the Philadelphia printers were still raw, and it took little to start 
 them shouting for each other’s blood. The Gazette and Journal 
 
78 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 of May 21 featured a letter signed W.Z. attacking the previous 
 Chronicle for “asserting that the young Woman that was found 
 drowned in the River Christiana, had, for some time, been under a 
 melancholy Turn of Mind. The Delusion she was under was the 
 very opposite Extreme.” Goddard defended himself against the 
 accusation of inaccurate reporting in his next issue of the twenty-fifth. 
 W.Z. returned to the attack on the twenty-eighth. The last word 
 was from Goddard on the first of June. It must be admitted that 
 the conclusion of his article was well-nigh unanswerable and very 
 effective. He quoted the famous passage in Tristram Shandy (one 
 of his favorite books) in which Uncle Toby addresses a fly as he 
 throws it out the window, “This World surely is wide enough to 
 hold both thee and me.” For almost three months the Philadelphia 
 printers found their world wide enough. 
 
 The extensive circulation Goddard boasted of is evinced in 
 several ways. An advertisement in his Chronicle could and did 
 secure replies from all through the colonies. The following letter 
 must have given the printer considerable satisfaction, coming as it 
 did from his birthplace: 
 
 New London April 8th 1767 
 To Mr Thomas Wharton 
 Merchant in Philadelphia 
 Sir, In Mr Goddard’s paper No 9 [March 23] I see that their is a 
 Fire Engine Advertiz’d for Sale by Daniel Ellis Esqr and I want one 
 of that kind very much. Should be very much Oblig’d to you to Ingage 
 it for me on the lowest Termes you can (if it be a good One). In two 
 or three days Capt Wm Harris will sail for your Place in a Small Sloop 
 with Fifty or Sixty hogsheads of Molasses wich shall ship to you for to 
 Dispose of for my Accountt & would have you ship me the Engine by his 
 Return. Should be glad you’l write by the Return of the Post if I may 
 depend on the Engine on accountt that I must git one made in Boston if 
 this should be Disposed of before the letter comes to hand. Please to 
 favour me with the Price Current of West India Goods & you’l oblige 
 Sir Your humble Servant 
 Nathaniel Shaw Junior. 
 
 The increased business of the shop is also indicated by the addi- 
 tional employees hired by Goddard. On February 2 he advertised 
 for both a journeyman and an apprentice. On April 27 a carrier 
 of the newspaper to “the lower Part of this City” was demanded. 
 Again, on May 4 the expanding business made it necessary to try 
 
CHAPTER V 79 
 
 to secure another journeyman, and the July 20 issue carried an ad- 
 vertisement for an apprentice. This last notice is interesting be- 
 cause it reveals quite a bit of what was expected of a printing ap- 
 prentice in those days. “WANTED immediately, as an APPRENTICE 
 to the Printinc Businegss, an honest sprightly Lad, about 14 or 15 
 Years old, who can read well, and write a tolerable Hand, and 
 understands something of Grammar.” 
 
 Several of the journeymen who worked for Goddard later be- 
 came printers on their own account. Typical of these is Isaac 
 Collins, who in 1770 left the Philadelphia shop and moved to 
 Burlington, New Jersey, where he took over the printing establish- 
 ment formerly operated by James Parker, who had died a few 
 months previously. Collins became immediately printer to the 
 colony of New Jersey and later, then in Trenton, was printer to the 
 state. Another future New Jersey printer in Goddard’s shop was 
 Shepard Kollock, whom Douglas McMurtrie calls a nephew of 
 Goddard. Kollock may have completed his apprenticeship under 
 Goddard, but of that we cannot be sure. After serving in the 
 Revolutionary army, Kollock started New Jersey’s second newspaper, 
 the New Jersey Journal, at Chatham. In and out of Goddard’s em- 
 ployment during all the seven years of his Philadelphia sojourn was 
 Benjamin Mecom, the constant worry of his uncle Benjamin Frank- 
 lin. William Franklin, probably in 1768, wrote to his father and 
 well described the difficulties Goddard had with this flamboyant 
 printer: “Cousin Ben Mecom is starving at Philadelphia and would 
 have been, I suppose, in jail [for debt] by this time if it had not 
 been for the assistance my mother and I have afforded him and his 
 family. Goddard would have given 35 shillings a week [probably a 
 high wage for a journeyman printer in the 1760’s] to him if he 
 would have worked as other journeymen do, but he insisted on 
 coming and going just as he pleased, on which Goddard and he 
 quarreled and parted.” In 1769 Franklin reported, “There was 
 nothing [for Mecom] to do but go back to journey work for 
 William Goddard.” 
 
 The shop’s activities included not only the regular printing of 
 the Pennsylvania Chronicle each Monday but numerous blanks, hand- 
 bills, and pamphlets as well. On August 3, 1767, Goddard an- 
 nounced that he had finished the printing of the laws passed at the 
 last session of the colony assembly. One of the promises made to 
 
80 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 him by Galloway was being fulfilled. Later Goddard, thinking his 
 shop had not enough equipment, insisted that he had tried to turn 
 this particular printing job over to Hall and Sellers but took it on 
 at the insistence of Galloway. We suspect Goddard did not persist 
 very long in his demurral. 
 
 The same issue that announced the completion of the printing 
 of the colony’s laws carried an advertisement amusing to us of the 
 twentieth century even if the eigtheenth century took it for granted: 
 “WANTED, A woman, to take the Care and Management of a 
 Tradesman’s House, who is a Bachelor. There are four or five 
 Men and Boys to wash, mend and make for; the whole House-work 
 she must do herself, and have no Children. Any such Person, 
 being genteel and well recommended, may have good Wages, and 
 live very happy. It is in a remarkable healthy large Country Town, 
 one Day’s Ride from Philadelphia. Inquire of the Printer hereof 
 [the usual formula for a blind ad]. N.B. The Person will be 
 wanted in a Month or five Weeks.” 
 
 On August 17 Goddard printed a notice which he must have 
 been proud to write and append “The Printer.” He said: “The 
 CHRONICLE... circulates in all the English Colonies on the Con- 
 tinent, the West-Indies, and the principal Cities in Great-Britain 
 and Ireland—That it is honoured with the Subscriptions of most of 
 the Gentlemen in America of superior Stations in Government, as 
 well as of the first Distinction among the Learned; and that it has 
 been favoured with many Pieces Religious, Moral, Philosophical, 
 Instructive and Entertaining, by its learned and ingenious Cor- 
 respondents, of whom, without just Imputation of Arrogance, it may 
 boast of having a greater Number than any other Paper in Ameri- 
 ca.... The quick Circulation of the Paper through all Parts of this 
 Province, and the neighbouring Colonies, where it is as generally 
 received as any Paper on the Continent, renders it an advantageous 
 Vehicle for ADVERTISEMENTS.” 
 
 Goddard’s boasting of his large circulation irked his fellow 
 Philadelphia printers, and Bradford was not slow to rise to the bait. 
 The Pennsylvania Journal of August 27 contained a letter to the 
 printer making fun of Goddard for calling the Chronicle an “infant 
 bark,” as he did in his first paragraph of the seventeenth. The 
 article can only be described as mildly uncomplimentary, but God- 
 dard could not let well enough alone and published lengthy replies 
 
CHAPTER V 8I 
 
 
 
 on September 7 and 14, in which Pope is quoted three times and 
 Tristram Shandy is again called upon for a last word. One slap at 
 Bradford on the seventh must have found its mark and provided 
 amusement for other colonial printers: “Bad Work in Printing, 
 by the Typographers in America, is called Bradfordian.” Having 
 given Goddard’s hair a vigorous pull the preceding April, Bradford 
 did not think it necessary to stir up more of a tempest, and the matter 
 was dropped. Thomas Bradford, the son of William, must have 
 felt particularly chagrined when in a letter of June 3, 1768, he re- 
 ceived a suggestion from Benjamin Rush in Edinburgh, “I think 
 you had better alter the form of your newspaper in imitation of 
 Goddard’s.” In spite of Goddard’s always carrying a chip on his 
 shoulder, he did know how to edit a good newspaper. 
 
 During September, 1767, the proprietor, John Penn, and the 
 provincial assembly argued over Goddard’s being selected to print 
 the assembly laws. Penn demanded in a letter written on September 
 25 the “Right of Nominating or at least of sharing in the Nomina- 
 tion” of the printer. The next day the assembly, about to adjourn, 
 met to consider the governor’s letter. In typical legislative fashion 
 a committee was appointed which reported that it did not have time 
 to make a proper search of the “Precedents in Support of the Right 
 of the House to appoint the Printer of the Laws and Proceedings of 
 Assembly.” It was recommended that the affair be held over until 
 the next session of the assembly, when a more thorough search 
 could be made, a recommendation that was accepted. Then in the 
 next session neither the assembly nor the governor saw fit to raise 
 the issue again, and John Penn lost his point by default. During the 
 next three years Goddard received £223 85. for the four times he 
 printed the assembly’s laws. 
 
 Not only was the print shop a busy place, but its proprietor found 
 it possible to profit from a sideline in imitation of Franklin. We 
 cannot date when Goddard started to sell paper to printers in other 
 colonies, but we do know that paper from Hagey’s mill in Phila- 
 delphia was being sold, with the printer acting as jobber, to Jamaica, 
 Carolina, Newport, Providence, and New York. Among the reasons 
 for Goddard’s frequent trips through the colonies during the next 
 three or four years may have been his attempts to take advantage of 
 Philadelphia’s being a primary center for the manufacture of paper. 
 
 On Wednesday, December 2, 1767, Goddard issued a special 
 
82 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 number of the Chronicle, which he headed: “Having received a 
 Series of Papers, intitled, ‘Letters from a Farmer, &c. with several 
 other Pieces from our Correspondents, all which we are importuned 
 to publish as speedily as possible; and as we find there will not be 
 Room in our Monday’s Chronicle, to insert the Whole—from a 
 Desire to oblige, we are induced to give this Half-Sheet [two pages 
 instead of the customary four], containing such of the Pieces as we 
 could get ready, beginning with the Farmer’s first Letter, being, 
 as he observes, on a Subject of the utmost Importance to the Wel- 
 fare of our common Country.” Immediately there follows Letter I, 
 entitled “For the Pennsytvania Curonicte. Letters from a 
 FarM_Er in Pennsylvania to the Inhabitants of the British Colonies.” 
 Thus appeared the first number of the famous Letters from a 
 Pennsylvania Farmer by John Dickinson. Why Dickinson sent the 
 letters to Goddard we do not know, though the Chronicle circula- 
 tion may have been sufficient reason. Later, in The Partnership, 
 Goddard reported that at the time he had never even seen the 
 author. Dickinson would have been familiar with the Philadelphia 
 gossip about Galloway’s and Wharton’s connection with the Chroni- 
 cle, but that was not enough to deter him from sending his manu- 
 script to Goddard. The letters, twelve in all, were published one 
 in each issue until the fifteenth of February. Hall and Sellers showed 
 their realization of the importance of the series by rushing the first 
 one into print the day after Goddard issued it. Bradford was slower, 
 but he caught up a week later by printing both the first and second 
 letters. Thereafter regularly on Mondays Goddard printed a letter 
 which the Gazette and Journal clipped out and published on Thurs- 
 day. Nor were the two older Philadelphia papers unique in doing 
 this. All but three colonial newspapers printed Dickinson’s defense 
 of the colonial cause. No wonder Goddard wanted to hurry into 
 print an edition of all the letters; even his mother urged it: “Your 
 friend judge C[has? Je, and I think it would be a good scheme in 
 you to print the Farmer’s Letters in a pamphlet, and that soon, as 
 they appear to be the completest pieces ever wrote on the subject in 
 America. They are universally admired here.” No doubt Goddard 
 would have printed this pamphlet but for the vigorous opposition of 
 Galloway and Wharton. In The Partnership the publisher de- 
 scribed their reaction in these words: “They were angry, they 
 fretted, they swore and affirmed, that they [the letters] were too 
 
CHAPTER V 83 
 
 
 
 inflammatory for this latitude.... Mr. Galloway exclaimed, with 
 a countenance expressive of the deepest envy, that they were ‘damned 
 ridiculous! Meer stuff! fustian| altogether stupid and inconsistent|— 
 only a compilation by Dickinson and Thomson!” In an unsuccess- 
 ful attempt to counterbalance the effect of Dickinson’s letters Gallo- 
 way and several of his friends inserted articles into the Chronicle 
 signed by such pseudonyms as A Countryman, A Miller, Frank 
 Meanwell, Jack White Oak, A Barbadian, A Country Farmer, and 
 Son of Liberty (this list was compiled by Goddard himself). As 
 Goddard frankly put it, the attitude of Galloway and Wharton 
 “deprived me of a job that would have produced a handsome sum, 
 which fell into other hands.” 
 
 The disagreement among the partners over John Dickinson’s 
 letters, though it did not come to the attention of the public, was the 
 first important break in the relations between Goddard and the two 
 prominent Philadelphians. The story of this disagreement is prac- 
 tically the story of the remainder of Goddard’s stay in Philadelphia. 
 As early as June 22, 1767, the young printer had proposed in a 
 letter to Galloway and Wharton that the partnership be discon- 
 tinued after the two men had severely berated their junior partner 
 the evening before. This was patched up by the offer of £500 to 
 Goddard to set up a bookstore. Though the offer was never fulfilled, 
 it did serve its purpose in keeping the partnership alive, because a 
 certain amount of gullibility was part of Goddard’s character. The 
 affairs of the three partners continued in this state for several 
 months. The circulation of the Chronicle kept expanding, particular- 
 ly so while Dickinson’s Letters were running in it, and Goddard’s 
 time and attention were fully occupied by the busy shop. 
 
 Goddard was trying to make his business financially secure. In 
 the January 11, 1768, issue he announced that the Chronicle would 
 be reduced from its expensive folio size to a more manageable 
 quarto in an effort to save £200 a year on his paper bill. He justified 
 the reduction of size in terms of its increased convenience to the 
 readers. The quarto-sized paper began to be used the first of 
 February, when the Chronicle ran to eight pages instead of the 
 previously customary four, Another business problem was the col- 
 lection of bills, especially from the many subscribers who had been 
 receiving a newspaper each week for the past year. Though God- 
 dard makes no point of how successful he was as a bill-collector, it is 
 
84 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 doubtful he took in most of his ten shillings. For example, at the 
 Historical Society of Pennsylvania is preserved a receipt to Jasper 
 Yates for a year’s subscription to the Chronicle. In spite of the 
 subscription’s ending with the January 25, 1768, number, the actual 
 payment of the ten shillings was not made until July 4, 1768, by 
 which time no doubt Jasper Yates had received another six months’ 
 supply of Goddard’s paper. Such late payment and even no payment 
 at all were common practices. 
 
 In May, 1768, Galloway and Wharton entertained the printer 
 one evening. They proposed to him that he should sell out his 
 Providence shop and have his mother and sister move to Phila- 
 delphia. They promised to “take a genteel house” for the family 
 and “advance a sum sufficient to set up her [Sarah Goddard] in a 
 store of books and stationery.” Money was also to be allowed to 
 the mother “for her superintendence of family affairs.” Goddard’s 
 feeling about the community of Providence is illustrated by one of 
 the arguments he used against the proposition—that he wanted a 
 place where he could retire should his Philadelphia attempt prove 
 unsuccessful. The two senior partners managed to persuade the 
 always sanguine Goddard of the sincerity of their offer and the 
 benefits that would accrue to him. He wrote to his mother, who 
 replied that she would prefer to remain in Providence, “for my life 
 is almost at a close, and I can hardly think of removing so near the 
 period of my days into a strange part of the world, to launch into a 
 new set of acquaintance, and leave all my former ones, the com- 
 panions of my youth, and the supporters of my old age, as well as 
 my daughter, who seems by nature designed to take care of her 
 mother in sickness, when wanted, which is not so properly the sphere 
 of sons, and cannot be expected of them.” Nothing daunted, Wil- 
 liam then traveled up to Providence and succeeded in doing in person 
 what he had failed to do by letter. He relinquished his postmaster- 
 ship of Providence and sold the print shop and the Providence 
 Gazette to John Carter, Mrs. Goddard’s partner since September, 
 1767, for $550.00. 
 
 Shortly after his return from Providence, Goddard, his nerves 
 apparently very much on edge, got into another quarrel with Wil- 
 liam Bradford of the Pennsylvania Journal. Goddard started the 
 fracas with an article in the August 22 Chronicle berating Bradford 
 by name in his capacity as local postmaster for keeping other news- 
 
CHAPTER V 85 
 
 papers from the hands of the tempestuous printer until their news 
 items had to be used a week later. There is no need here to go 
 through all the details of the charges, countercharges, and new 
 countercharges which went on in all three Philadelphia papers for 
 almost every issue in September. By persistence Goddard got in the 
 last word on September 26, when he accused one of his attackers, 
 John Stanly, of being a convicted forger from Virginia. Seemingly 
 there was enough truth in this particular charge by Goddard that the 
 other papers let the matter rest there. 
 
 In November Goddard got out his hatchet again over an article 
 which had appeared in the Annapolis Maryland Gazette attacking 
 him. One sentence of Goddard’s defense is interesting to us because 
 of what it tells about the Chronicle’s arculation: “I came to Phila- 
 delphia expressly to support the liberty of the press, and this I have 
 maintained invariably to the satisfaction of the most numerous sub- 
 scribers that any paper has on this continent.” In 1770 we learn, 
 in another connection, that the Chronicle had 2500 subscribers. 
 Though the circulation in 1770 was greater than in 1768, it contrasts 
 with the average circulation of a pre-Revolutionary colonial news- 
 paper—soo. Goddard may have bungled his finances and his per- 
 sonal relationships, but he knew how to run a good newspaper in 
 an age when circulation was not to be helped by either the pathos 
 and calculated masochism of contemporary comics or the jejune sen- 
 sationalism of sex crime reporting. The colonial reader got his 
 entertainment from a poem by Prior or Pope in the Poet’s Corner 
 and an essay by John Wilkes or Samuel Johnson on the front page. 
 It must be admitted that added entertainment came from reading 
 about Goddard’s acrimonious disputes, enough that following each 
 affray there was an immediate increase in circulation. 
 
 During this same month, November, 1768, Sarah and Mary 
 Katherine arrived in Philadelphia from Providence. The Provi- 
 dence Gazette of November 5 gave Mrs. Goddard’s farewell to the 
 people of Providence, and a week later John Carter announced his 
 assumption of the business. Goddard went to his partners for the 
 fulfilment of the promise of a house but was disappointed again and 
 had to secure living quarters for the family himself. Though God- 
 dard regarded what he secured as no more than suitable, his partners 
 disagreed with him. Fortunately The Partnership has preserved 
 for us a conversation between William and Wharton. Even though 
 
86 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 the accuracy of the transcription is open to possible doubt, the dia- 
 logue is entertaining and revealing. 
 
 Wharton. William Goddard, we do not approve of thy proceedings. 
 
 Goddard. Why Mr. Wharton? 
 
 Wharton. Thee has taken a house very unsuitable to thee. How 
 came thee to do it, without first consulting Joseph Galloway and myself? 
 
 Goddard. It is a very convenient house, Sir, and a good neighbour- 
 hood. I like it very much Sir. 
 
 Wharton. That is not what I mean—I tell thee William, we disap- 
 prove of the proceedings. 
 
 Goddard. This Mr. Wharton you might have prevented, by an atten- 
 tion to your solemn promise. 
 
 Wharton. I tell thee Friend Goddard, thee has done wrong—and 
 thee shall suffer for it. A house in an alley would answer thy purpose well 
 enough. 
 
 Goddard. Mr. Wharton, if you have no respect for my friends, I 
 will show them that I have; and as we did not come out of an alley, 
 we will not be driven into one by Mr. Wharton. [We must remember 
 that Goddard always regarded himself as a patrician. ] 
 
 Wharton. Very well, young man! thee shall smart for this. 
 
 He retires, comes again, and renews the dialogue. 
 
 Wharton. I have something more to say to thee. 
 
 Goddard. Very well, Mr. Wharton, I shall attend to you. 
 
 Wharton. Friend Goddard, I have been told thee has removed a 
 press into thy mother’s house, which is a proceeding I very much dislike. 
 
 Goddard. I did this to oblige my mother, Sir, who requested me to 
 let her have a press for the printing blanks and small work, while I 
 conducted the large. 
 
 Wharton. William Goddard, thee has sinister views. 
 
 Goddard. Mr. Wharton I have no views but such as are upright, 
 and my intention, and that of my friends, is only to serve the company. 
 
 Wharton. I am confident thee intends to set up a press independent 
 of us—therefore, without multiplying words, I order thee William God- 
 dard, to bring that press immediately back. Thee shall do it, or we'll 
 take measures that shall be unwelcome to thee. 
 
 Goddard. I shall advise with my mother, and if it is her mind that I 
 comply with your request, I will gratify you—and on no other terms. 
 
 Wharton. See that thee do’st it. 
 
 To appease the wrathful Wharton, Sarah Goddard returned the 
 press to the shop. By this time she was a woman in her seventies 
 and doubtless would have preferred the quieter pace of her own 
 household to the inevitable noise and confusion of her son’s estab- 
 lishment. Her difficulties in adjusting to life in Philadelphia are 
 
CHAPTER V 87 
 
 shown in a letter she wrote to her sisters in New England: “I have 
 been much indisposed this winter yet through the goodness of God 
 I am in a better State of Health then I have been for Sometime 
 when I first came to this City the Air and Climate did not Seem to 
 Agree with me if I Stay I hope it will become more Natural... . 
 Katey is now under preparation for the Small Pox and Expect her 
 to be inoculated Some day this week.” 
 
 Interesting though it would be, rarely can we follow in any 
 detail the process by which a printing job in those days was negoti- 
 ated, seen through the press, and finally paid for. Fortunately 
 we can more or less do so for some printing Goddard did for the 
 Library Company of Philadelphia in 1769. On March 13 the Li- 
 brary Company voted to absorb another subscription library, the 
 Union Library Company. This absorption created the task of 
 recataloguing and relabeling the newly acquired stock. On June 
 13 at a meeting of the directors of the Library Company a seven-man 
 committee was appointed. The seven men quickly chose a two-man 
 subcommittee “to agree with some Person to print six thousand 
 Labels to be fix’d in the Books, and Ten thousand Notes for the Use 
 of the Library.” On July 10 agreement for this printing job with 
 William Goddard was reported. By October 30 the committee could 
 report that the labels were all printed and part of the notes com- 
 pleted. On April 9, 1770, “The Committee for procuring Notes for 
 the Use of the Library, report that they have compleated that 
 Business.” Finally, on May 21, 1770, the secretary recorded: “Wil- 
 liam Goddard having produced his Account for printing Labels, 
 Notes &c: amount’g to £20.3.6 from which having deducted £10 
 for a Share in the Library, which he agreed to take, an Order was 
 Drawn on the Treasurer for the remainder, being £10.3.6 & the 
 Secretary is ordered to make out a Certificate & deliver it to said 
 Goddard.” Three types of labels were printed, different only in 
 the ornamentation, for the Library Company. The job for printing 
 six hundred catalogues did not go to Goddard but went to Joseph 
 Cruikshank, from whose bill another ten pounds was deducted for 
 a library membership. As Goddard received his certificate of mem- 
 bership from the secretary, he might well have remembered the 
 action of the Providence Library Company, which in 1763 had voted 
 him a free membership with no printing obligations attached. 
 
 But ten pounds from the Library Company was not enough to 
 
88 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 remove Goddard’s financial troubles. During 1768 Goddard had 
 printed bills for the Chronicle and sent them to his subscribers. In 
 The Partnership Goddard states that he was compelled to bill his 
 customers because his partners had failed to provide him with any 
 ready cash. Apparently Galloway and Wharton intended to keep 
 Goddard in debt, allowing him only enough money to maintain the 
 paper, so that the printer would remain under their thumb. One of 
 the journeymen in the shop, Benjamin Towne, was a representative, 
 according to Goddard’s accusation, of the two older men. This 
 charge is partially substantiated by the remarks made by David Hall 
 in his previously quoted comments on Towne. Benjamin Towne, 
 whose name will occur frequently in this chapter, had a variegated 
 career as a printer. He was never known for the strength of his 
 principles, nor was he clever enough to take advantage of his own 
 unscrupulousness. After leaving Goddard in 1770, he practically 
 disappears from sight for four years, probably working as a journey- 
 man. In 1774 he started under his own name a printing establish- 
 ment in Philadelphia. At the outbreak of the war he was printing 
 a tri-weekly paper, the Pennsylvania Evening Post, the city’s first 
 evening paper. When the Americans controlled Philadelphia, he 
 was pro-American; when the British were in control, Towne was 
 among the most vociferous of the anti-Americans. The British not 
 remaining in Philadelphia, Towne found himself persona non grata 
 to both sides. John Witherspoon took advantage of the situation 
 and forced the shilly-shally printer to print “The humble Con- 
 fession, Declaration, Recantation, and Apology of Benjamin Towne, 
 Printer, in Philadelphia.” At one place in the ludicrous “Confes- 
 sion” Towne is made to say, “But I unfortunately became an under- 
 strapper to the famous Galloway in his infamous squabble with 
 Goddard, and did in that service contract such a habit of meanness 
 in thinking, and scurrility in writing, that nothing exalted .. . could 
 ever be expected from me.” A sentence towards the end gives at 
 least a physical description of Towne: “I hope the public will con- 
 sider that I have been a timorous man, or if you will a coward from 
 my youth, so that I cannot fight—my belly is so big that I cannot 
 run—and I am so great a lover of eating and drinking that I cannot 
 starve.” Thanks to Towne’s ability to change sides rapidly, the 
 Pennsylvania Evening Post was the only paper in Philadelphia to 
 maintain continuous publication during the war. In 1783 the paper 
 
CHAPTER V 89 
 
 was made into a daily, the first daily newspaper in America, but it 
 lasted only another year before disappearing. Towne died in poverty 
 in 1793 in Philadelphia. 
 
 In December, 1768, Goddard had to make a trip to Connecticut 
 and Rhode Island to wind up his affairs there, particularly to collect 
 “considerable debts.” Sarah on the seventeenth of December deeded 
 to her son her remaining interest in the property of her late husband, 
 Dr. Giles Goddard, in return for which William agreed to allow her 
 support from his Philadelphia shop. Also a debt of William to the 
 mother of £109 resulting from the Providence printing establishment 
 was to be wiped out. Most of Goddard’s business on this trip was 
 therefore in New London, where he wanted to sell various items of 
 property belonging to the estate of his father. Before leaving, 
 William placed the shop “under the management of Mr. Towne, 
 subject to the superior direction of Mrs. Goddard.” So many of the 
 annual subscriptions fell due in January that Goddard wanted to 
 make sure the payments would not fall into the hands of Galloway 
 and Wharton. Also there was a commitment to print the votes and 
 proceedings of another session of the colony assembly. So that the 
 work would not be all under the supervision of the not too competent 
 Towne and because he did not have a sufficient number of figures in 
 his type-cases, Goddard hired Dunlap to print a portion of the 
 proceedings. The sojourn in New England lasted almost three 
 months. Goddard could neither collect much from John Carter, 
 just starting for himself, nor sell the principal piece of property 
 in New London. (The colonies were in an economic depression in 
 the latter 1760's after the Treaty of Paris in 1763 ending the Seven 
 Years’ War.) On his return the printer found that, though Dunlap 
 had finished his portion of the government printing, Towne was 
 still not through. Goddard had to pay a £25 penalty for a late 
 printing, but he hurried the task through to completion. 
 
 On March 7, just after his return, Goddard spent the evening 
 with Galloway and Wharton. They complained about many things 
 in the operation of the shop, including the failure of Towne to be 
 in complete charge during Goddard’s absence. Finally they de- 
 manded that the young printer either buy out their shares or sell 
 out his own altogether, and he must make up his mind in three 
 days. In no financial position to think of buying and with a low 
 stock of paper on hand, Goddard tried to delay matters by a letter 
 
90 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 
 
 the next day. In this letter he offered to buy out Galloway and 
 Wharton if they would accept a three-year bond for everything they 
 had put into the business, though he would not take as a partner a 
 “representative” of Galloway and Wharton. After a few weeks of 
 squabbling the upshot was that Goddard found himself unable to 
 keep Galloway and Wharton from selling their shares in the business 
 to Towne. Since there could be no pretense of Towne’s having 
 any money, he nominally assumed a debt for £526 to the two 
 retiring partners, payment to be taken out of income from assembly 
 printing. The new articles of partnership were signed on May 19, 
 1769. 
 
 William had been trying hard to avoid the financial trap set 
 by Galloway and Wharton with the resulting partnership with 
 Towne, whom he despised. On May 11 he was in Bristol, New 
 Jersey (at Mr. Haight’s), and tried to borrow one hundred pounds 
 from John Smith, a prosperous Quaker of Burlington. Smith had 
 been a subscriber to the Chronicle from the very first issue. Not only 
 was Smith a subscriber but he was one of Goddard’s most frequent 
 literary contributors. Under the pseudonym of Atticus, he wrote 
 seventy non-political essays starting with the Chronicle’s second 
 issue in February, 1767, and continuing until August, 1770. Over 
 three weeks before the first appearance of the Chronicle Goddard 
 had written to Smith thanking him for his subscription and requesting 
 the Burlingtonian to write articles for the paper. (Possibly God- 
 dard had learned of Smith’s literary proclivities during his associa- 
 tion with James Parker.) Though the two men had not met by 1769, 
 on August 11, 1768, Goddard had replied to a request from Smith 
 saying that he would collect certain tombstone inscriptions “both in 
 this & the other Provinces.” Writing from Bristol on May 11, 1769, 
 Goddard said that in return for the hundred pounds he would “un- 
 dertake to reprint the Numbers of Atticus, in a handsome Volume, 
 for the good of Mankind for which they were designed; & will make 
 you a Present of as many as you may want for yourself & Friends.” 
 Apparently Smith turned Goddard down, for the following day, 
 May 12, the printer again wrote to Smith, apologizing for disturbing 
 him so soon after the death of a child. A week later Goddard 
 signed the agreement with Towne, though Towne’s name does not 
 appear on the colophon of the paper until November 20. 
 
 During most of the second half of 1769 Goddard was again in 
 
CHAPTER V QI 
 
 New England. So worried was he about the affairs of the shop and 
 the malevolence of Towne under the direction of Galloway and 
 Wharton, who had not as yet given any written release to Goddard 
 for the former partnership, that on July 16 he signed an agreement 
 formally turning over the management of the shop during his ab- 
 sence to one of the journeymen, Theophilus Cossart. In September 
 Goddard was back in Philadelphia with an unnamed friend, who 
 wanted to buy Towne out. Towne offered to accept £500 for his 
 share but demanded that the assembly business go with him. This 
 demand effectually put an end to the offer, and Goddard and his 
 friend returned to New England. During the rest of the year he 
 remained there trying to wind up his affairs in New London and 
 Providence. He may have collected from John Carter at this time 
 since he speaks of returning to Philadelphia with six hundred dol- 
 lars in his possession. 
 
 It must have been during this trip and with some of the six 
 hundred dollars that Goddard arranged for the purchase and manu- 
 facture of what is thought to be the first printing press made in 
 America. The Boston News-Letter of September 7, 1769, printed 
 the first notice of it: “We are informed that Mr. Isaac Doolittle, 
 Clock & Watch-Maker, of New Haven, has lately compleated a 
 Mahogany Printing-Press on the most approved Construction, which, 
 by some good Judges in the Printing Way, is allowed to be the 
 neatest ever made in America and equal, if not superior, to any 
 imported from Great-Britain: This Press, we are told, is for Mr 
 Goddard, of Philadelphia, Printer.” In the preface, dated February 
 12, 1770, to Volume III of the Chronicle the printer placed an N.B. 
 “An elegant Mahogany Press, made by an ingenious Watchmaker, 
 at New-Haven, is just received from thence.” In spite of all the 
 difficulties the business of the shop and the circulation of the Chroni- 
 cle were continuing to increase. 
 
 No doubt one of the chores Goddard had to attend to in New 
 England was the winding up of his affairs as postmaster of Provi- 
 dence. It was probably in connection with a debt he had contracted 
 to the postal system that on December 15, 1769, he and his sister 
 signed a bond to Benjamin Franklin, who as chief administrator of 
 the colonial postal system had had to make good on Goddard?s debt. 
 The bond, the standard one of the period, provides that if the sum 
 of sixty pounds is not paid within six months then one hundred and 
 
92 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 twenty pounds shall be collected. At Franklin’s death this bond 
 was willed to his son-in-law, Richard Bache, though apparently never 
 collected. 
 
 Early in January, 1770, Goddard was in New York, visiting 
 friends there on his way south. He picked up a letter from his 
 mother written on December 23. She condoled him for his various 
 troubles but assured him the Chronicle was daily getting new sub- 
 scribers and once everything was cleared up would be able to sup- 
 port them. The very next day a friend wrote him the news of his 
 mother’s death on the fifth and begged him to return as soon as 
 possible. Mary Katherine was particularly anxious for his return 
 because Towne was threatening to take away office records and start 
 his own newspaper. 
 
 Mrs. Sarah Goddard died on Friday and was buried the following 
 Sunday, the seventh, in Christ’s Church Burial Ground at 5th and 
 Arch streets. There is no doubt of the esteem she was held in by 
 many people. The most complete account of her life and personality 
 appeared in the January 22, 1770, New-York Gazette, reprinted in 
 the February 10th Providence Gazette, as an anonymous letter “To 
 the Printer.” The writer, saying he was “no relation to the family, 
 nor very intimately acquainted” (possibly either John Holt or James 
 Parker) gives a brief summary of her family and her life. The 
 eulogistic article concludes: “Her uncommon attainments in litera- 
 ture, were the least valuable parts of her character. Her conduct 
 through all the changing trying scenes of life, was not only un- 
 blameable, but even exemplary—a sincere piety, an unaffected hu- 
 mility, an easy agreeable chearfulness and affability, an entertaining, 
 sensible and edifying conversation, and a prudent attention to all the 
 duties of domestic life, endeared her to all her acquaintance, especial- 
 ly in the relations of wife, parent, friend and neighbour. The death 
 of such a person is a public loss, an irreparable one to her children!” 
 Such a lengthy obituary was unusual in colonial newspapers. 
 
 The death of the mother, though it relieved some of the more 
 immediate financial problems, by no means made life easy for Wil- 
 liam. An illustration of his difficulties is this anecdote in The 
 Partnership: 
 
 On the death of my mother, he [Joseph Galloway] paid my sister a 
 visit; and after condoling with her for the great loss she had sustained, 
 
CHAPTER V 93 
 
 for which he expressed the utmost concern, . . . he pulls a paper from 
 his pocket, containing an estimate of the value of my business, and by a 
 false view of it, endeavoured to prevail on my sister to sell it for a trifle; 
 for says he, “your brother will not, he cannot return here—you have 
 no friends here—you would live much happier in New-England—and 
 may make something for yourself by a sale of this interest. You shall be 
 paid annually a certain sum to be agreed on.” My sister saw his base- 
 ness, and that he was a man who could smile with a dagger in his hand, 
 told him that she knew the business was very valuable, and that she 
 should listen to no such proposals. ‘To this she generously added, that 
 although by the sudden death of my mother, one half of the interest 
 became hers, by law, yet she would give it all up to me, as it was designed 
 forme. Mr. Galloway represented it a losing business, and was so kind 
 as to wish to take it off my hands, to carry it on himself, to prevent my 
 being a further sufferer. I have it not in my power, on this occasion, to 
 make him a switable return for his benevolence; it must therefore, like 
 his other virtue, be its own reward.—After all this Aimdness and generosity, 
 this jewel of a man, finding my sister deaf to his council, came no more 
 to shew his friendship and regard—but set his tools and emissaries to 
 work, to blast my reputation, and ruin my interest in this province. 
 
 The preface to Volume III of the Chronicle, already quoted from, 
 confirms the sister’s assumption of Sarah Goddard?’s financial interest 
 in the print shop. 
 
 Though the affairs of the shop became more and more involved 
 as Towne tried his best to ruin Goddard (and perhaps it was to 
 escape these very involvements), the ever-hopeful printer during 
 the early part of 1770 tried to expand his business to other towns. In 
 a letter to Isaiah Thomas, written April 22, 1811, just after Thomas 
 had published his History of Printing, Goddard recalls: “W.G. 
 [William Goddard] contemplated the Establishm’t of a Press at 
 Alfexandria] in the Beginning of 1770—but the Death of his in- 
 valuable Parent, Sarah Goddard, uniting with other misfortunes, 
 checked his promising Plan in the Bud. W.G. also made preparation 
 for opening a Printing House in Norfolk—but his Plan was defeated 
 by untoward Events.” 
 
 The kind of trouble Goddard was having with Towne at this 
 time is well shown by an incident narrated in The Partnership: 
 
 My enemies had made themselves acquainted with this affair [a debt 
 owed by Goddard], no doubt by means of my mother’s and my own 
 private letters, which were intercepted and broken open, so that all my 
 private affairs became known to those who were endeavouring to destroy 
 
94 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 my fairest hopes in life, and gave them an opportunity to wound me, 
 before I could put myself in a posture of defence. “Two letters, one 
 from, and the other to, my mother, were accidentally found in Mr. 
 Towne’s apartment, broken open, where he had concealed them for 
 months, in a repository of his own.—This was judged an excellent op- 
 portunity to destroy me. The plan was fixed at once, and Mr. Towne 
 was to be the traitor. He therefore neglects finishing the Chronicle, in 
 order to bring me to the office; and the late publication he could, as he 
 had often done, impute to me; and if I came to finish it, as he expected, 
 he could bring the sheriff upon me, and the point would be settled; and 
 he could take possession of the office, in behalf of his masters, and fix 
 their standard there. About 3 o’clock, Monday afternoon, finding 
 Mr. Towne absent, and the Chronicle not published, I went into 
 the office, and soon put it in a way of publication. In the mean time, 
 Mr. Towne comes to the door, which was fastened, in order to keep out 
 the people, who were continually coming for the paper. Finding me 
 there he goes to the German church, where the sheriff was attending a 
 funeral. He there hung over the pew door, in which the sheriff sat, 
 till the solemn service was ended, then followed him to the edge of the 
 grave, and after the corpse was deposited, this perfidious man whispered 
 the sheriff in the ear—“Don’t you want to see Mr. Goddard? I will, if 
 you please, take you to him![”] The sheriff said he wanted to speak 
 with me, on some business, and went with him to the office. Mr. Towne 
 suddenly bursts open the door and says—“There he is, Mr. Redman! [”] 
 While this gentleman was going toward the fire, Mr. Towne snatches 
 up the form that I had been preparing, and which I had just left, (to wait 
 on a gentleman of my acquaintance, at my dwelling-house) and ran off 
 with it, and, as I understand, put it in the possession of the JuNTo, who 
 lay on their arms all that night. My people thinking that Mr. Towne 
 acted by legal authority did not oppose him.—The sheriff soon went 
 home. My sister waited on him, to know wherefore he took away 
 my materials. He behaved with the humanity and politeness of a 
 christian and a gentleman, assured my sister he had no hand in it, 
 and laid open the treachery of my partner, declaring, if he knew where 
 to find him, he would recover the form, if possible. He seemed to 
 entertain a proper idea of this unjustifiable proceeding. My sister then 
 asked him, whether he had any demands upon me; he said he had 
 nothing but a bill of cost, which had occurred (by means of Mr. Towne, 
 and his patrons) in my absence-—This was immediately discharged— 
 And as my sister was administratix to my mother’s estate, she thought 
 proper to advertise the city of Mr. Towme’s conduct. This alarmed the 
 fugitive so much, that he came to my sister, and said—“For God’s sake, 
 suppress the advertisement, and I will bring back the form—It has 
 played the devil with me.”—This was done, and the paper was published. 
 
CHAPTER V 95 
 
 A second theft of the forms was made by Towne, and Goddard 
 had to go to his partner’s rooms to get them back. Finally during 
 the spring Towne absented himself from the shop altogether. Law- 
 suits were threatened, and Goddard had to raise bail for himself. 
 At the end of May Goddard learned that the individual whose ab- 
 sence in Europe had prevented his winding up the affairs in New 
 London had returned, so he made a quick trip northwards and 
 finally settled the sale of the property. 
 
 Not too long after Goddard’s return to Philadelphia Towne 
 erupted into print, and the whole business soon came to be the 
 gossip of the city. 2Towne was attempting, by means of an advertise- 
 ment in the Pennsylvania Journal of July 12, 1770, to have as many 
 as possible of the subscribers pay their money to him: 
 
 Whereas a partnership was some time ago entered into between 
 WiLi1am Gopparp and BENJAMIN Towne, which, on experiment, 
 is found to be inconvenient, I, the said BENJAMIN Towne, do therefore 
 for legal as well as expedient considerations, decline the connection and 
 desire that no person in future will rely on my credit as a partner in 
 their contracts and dealings with the said William Goddard. 
 
 And whereas a person is appointed, on behalf of the principal creditors 
 of the press to receive so much of the subscription money due from the 
 inhabitants of the city and districts for the Chronicle as will discharge his 
 debt, the said Benjamin Towne therefore can only desire the subscribers 
 for the said paper, in other places, to pay their subscription money to him 
 (at Mrs. Marsh’s in Second street, near Christ Church) as he has been a 
 considerable sufferer by the partnership, and only wishes to have the 
 company’s debts paid. 
 
 July 12. BENJAMIN Towne. 
 
 The Chronicle of the following Monday, July 16, said nothing 
 in reply to this notice, but Towne’s name was dropped from the 
 colophon, which read, “Philadelphia: Printed by William Goddard, 
 at Market-Street, next Door to the Post-Office.” But Goddard, not 
 one to be silent for long, had his say in an article in the Journal of 
 the nineteenth. The article, much too long to quote here, took up 
 in detail the “absolute falsehoods” of Towne’s notice and attacked, 
 though not by name, the “two party men” behind Towne. The 
 first sentence will suffice to give the flavor of the article, whose tone 
 is surprisingly mild for the usually vituperative Goddard: “It has 
 been my great misfortune to be concerned in business, for some time 
 past, with a very unworthy man, under the name of Benjamin Towne, 
 
96 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 formerly a journeyman in my office, a person very little known 
 here, till he was drawn from obscurity to be made a scape goat of his 
 superiors, to bear off their iniquity.” 
 
 A week later Towne returned to the attack in the Journal of the 
 twenty-sixth by announcing that an answer to Goddard would 
 shortly be published. This answer was printed on July 31 as a 
 two-page broadside, entitled “To the PUBLIC, and particularly the 
 kind Customers of the PennsyLvania CurRonicte, &c.” Goddard was 
 described in typical eighteenth-century fashion: “The hot temper and 
 choleric disposition [not far from the truth] of my unhappy partner, 
 William Goddard, incapacitates him from reasoning, with coolness 
 and decency.” The tirade continues. for most of the two folio pages. 
 
 The day after Towne’s broadside was printed Goddard had one 
 of his own in the hands of the much entertained Philadelphia read- 
 ers. Goddard showed that he was no mean hand at invective by 
 writing this opening sentence: “THE Junro, after several private 
 Meetings and Adjournments at the Theatre of Scandal, in Fourth- 
 Street, during swo long Weeks past, and a prodigious Waste of Paper, 
 and much Inkshed, have at last sent forth one Benjamin Towne 
 with a STINK-POT in his Hand, full charged with fulsome Panegy- 
 rics on their own dear selves, and the most infamous Falshoods and 
 Misrepresentations that ever disgraced Humanity, calculated for the 
 inhuman Purpose of poisoning the Minds of the Public, to the 
 Prejudice of my Character.” Actually Goddard’s handbill was more 
 of an “Advertisement,” as he entitled it, than anything else. What 
 he was advertising was the forthcoming appearance of a pamphlet 
 defending himself from the accusations made the day before. Con- 
 sidering that he had only just thought of writing this, the contents 
 Goddard gives for his defense constitute a surprisingly accurate 
 statement of what was eventually published. He says: “I have now 
 only, on this Occasion, to beg the Favour of the Public candidly to 
 suspend their Judgment respecting my Conduct, till I can lay a 
 complete State of my Case before them, which I am now preparing 
 for the Press, under the Title of ‘An historical Account of the Rise 
 and Progress of the PENNsyLvANIA CHRONICLE, &c, wherein the 
 Conduct of Joseph Galloway, Esq; and Mr. Thomas Wharton, 
 Srentor, my late Partners, is fairly stated, and properly exposed; 
 including their Attempts to prostitute and enslave my Press, to the 
 Exclusion of the Farmer’s Letters, which they judged too inflamma- 
 
CHAPTER V 97. 
 
 tory for this Latitude, and the Admission of such Pieces only as 
 abused their Enemies, and served their own ambitious Party Purposes 
 —and in which Benjamin Towne, the present Favourite, I. H-t, alias 
 Jack Traveller, and some other under Characters will appear in their 
 native Colours.’—This Work will contain the Articles of Co-partner- 
 ship between Galloway, Wharton and Goddard, a remarkable Dia- 
 logue between the two latter, and some curious Anecdotes, &c. &c.” 
 No longer was there vague talk about “two party men” or the “duum- 
 virate,” as Goddard had phrased it on July 23 in the Chronicle, 
 Galloway and Wharton were now named. Tongues in Philadelphia 
 must have wagged furiously. 
 
 On August 3 in both the Gazette and Journal Towne printed 
 a last reply before disappearing from the scene. In this article he 
 denied that anyone besides himself had written his broadside of 
 July 31. What probably worried Goddard more was his request 
 for subscription money from Chronicle readers, though the number 
 of those obedient to Towne’s request was apparently very small. 
 Goddard printed a notice in the Chronicle of September 3 assuring 
 subscribers and advertisers that all the firm’s books were in his 
 possession. He dated his partnership with Galloway and Wharton 
 as lasting until May 19, 1769. The Towne connection lasted from 
 that date until February, 1770, when “Mr. Towne . . . eloped from 
 his business.” Inevitably Towne came in for some more abuse. 
 
 An event which may or may not have anything to do with what 
 has just been narrated is the announcement in the Chronicle of 
 August 20 of the moving of the print shop from its location on 
 Market Street near Front to Arch Street, “about mid Way between 
 Front and Second Streets, on the North-Side, (a few Doors below 
 Messrs. Benezet and Bartow’s Store).” The colophon on the last 
 page of each issue hereafter reads: “Philadelphia: Printed by Wil- 
 liam Goddard, in Arch-Street, between Front and Second Streets.” 
 
 The only reply of Galloway and Wharton to their names being 
 broadcast was, in true merchant fashion, their sending Goddard a 
 bill for £38 17s. 6d. This was one from William Strahan in London 
 for various English magazines and the London Chronicle. God- 
 dard’s account in The Partnership is this: “I sent a lad to Mr. Gallo- 
 way, with a written message, that J should be glad to converse with 
 him on business. We said he would not—he had no business with 
 me, I then sent to know, as he had ‘no business with me, why he sent 
 
98 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 in an account against me. He said he had paid the money in Eng- 
 land, and would be repaid. I gave myself no further trouble about 
 the matter, and am determined never to pay a farthing of it, until 
 Messrs. Galloway and Wharton step forth and discharge their debts, 
 when I shall willingly pay one half of that account.” On August 
 21, 1772, Strahan complained in a letter to Franklin that he had 
 not been paid by Galloway (thereby refuting Galloway’s remark to 
 Goddard) for his debt and others for types, in all amounting to 
 £172 15s. 2d. He had already written to Philadelphia about this 
 on December 6, 1770, and again on August 7, 1771. Finally in this 
 letter he asked Franklin to help him collect. “It is hard I should 
 suffer by the Madness and Ingratitude of Goddard whom I never 
 had the least Concern with. It was Mr. Galloway’s Order that I 
 obeyed; and to him I look for my Reimbursement.” Possibly 
 Strahan was able to collect in the 1780’s when Galloway was a 
 resident Loyalist in London and a pensioner of the Crown. Gallo- 
 way then lost most of the arrogance Goddard and others of his 
 colonial contemporaries complained so much of. 
 
 During latter August and early September Goddard was busy 
 writing his announced publication as Philadelphians eagerly awaited 
 the promised scandal against two of the city’s most prominent and 
 wealthy burghers. Finally on September 17 the Chronicle adver- 
 tised: “Just published, and to be sold at the printing-office, in Arch- 
 Street, between Front and Second Streets, THE PARTNERSHIP: OR 
 THE Hisrory of the Rise and Progress of the Pennsylvania Chroni- 
 cle, &c. wherein the Conduct of JosEpH GaLLoway, Esq; Speaker 
 of the Honourable House of Representatives of the Province of 
 Pennsylvania, Mr. THomas Wuarton, sen. and their Man BENJAMIN 
 Towne, my late Partners, with my own, is properly delineated, and 
 their Calumnies against me fully refuted. ... Number II of this 
 History is in the Press, and will be published as speedily as possible.” 
 The second part or “Number” was released on September 28, God- 
 dard wanting to get it out before the Pennsylvania Assembly elec- 
 tions on the first of October. The announcement in the October 1 
 Chronicle for this second part says that a second edition is “now 
 in the Press.” This second edition was apparently published October 
 8, a date given at the end of an advertisement in some of the extant 
 copies of the pamphlet. By October 29 the printer of the Chronicle 
 could advertise that some of the third “edition” were available in 
 
CHAPTER V 99 
 
 
 
 the print shop. No wonder in the copy of The Partnership that late 
 in life Goddard sent to Isaiah Thomas (now in the possession of 
 the American Antiquarian Society) he wrote: “Several Editions of 
 this Work were published, & produced, by a rapid Sale, many 
 Hundred Dollars.” It may well have been the acquiring of these 
 dollars that prompted the printer to flirt with the idea of establishing 
 a branch in Norfolk. Altogether several thousand copies of his 
 seventy-three page pamphlet must have been printed. 
 
 On Election Day, October 1, Goddard saw the Chronicle through 
 the press, announcing there that his readers could find him at the 
 polls, and then went to do what he could against the election of 
 Galloway to the assembly. In this issue he said the “freeholders 
 and freemen” will only vote for “Men of real Merit,” obviously 
 not including Galloway. The article continued: “Alarmed at this 
 noble Resolution, AMERICANUS, we hear, in a Panic, mounted 
 his Galloway [that Galloway was the name of a breed of horses pro- 
 vided this pun], and fled to Bucks, in order to get into the Assembly, 
 even, to use his own Words, if he should ‘come in at the back Door.” 
 The election verified this prophecy, Galloway being elected from 
 his country residence in Bucks County, not from Philadelphia as he 
 had been before. Though there are no copies extant, apparently an 
 anonymous broadside defending Galloway against Goddard’s attack 
 was circulated just before the election. The Chronicle of October 8 
 greeted the newly elected member from Bucks County with this 
 welcome: 
 
 On Thursday the —famous AMERICANUS, who, on Monday last, 
 was properly distinguished by the virtuous and discerning Freeholders of 
 this City and County, arrived in Town, on his much-jaded Galloway, 
 from Bucks (whither he had precipitately fled, as mentioned in our last) 
 with the great and important News, that he had by a masterly Stroke in 
 Politics obtained a Seat in the Assembly as a Representative for that 
 County—so now that great ‘Friend to Liberty’ still ‘soars ALOOF on the 
 Wings of Fame and Fortune, (as his Apology [an apparent reference 
 to the broadside with Galloway’s defense] expresses it) regardless of 
 those who should freswme to assert that he (a Non-resident) smuggled 
 himself into the House at the ‘back Door, contrary to the Tenor of the 
 Bill he once drew up in order to deprive a Non-resident Member for 
 another County of a Seat in the Assembly. 
 
 Affairs of the Chronicle’s belligerent editor continued along after 
 this outburst at a reasonably even keel. To show his opposition to 
 
100 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 British actions and to whatever Joseph Galloway favored, Goddard 
 dropped from the flag of his paper on January 28, 1771, the 
 cut of the royal arms. As we know, Galloway was a supporter of 
 Lord North’s policies and an opponent of colonial political attitudes. 
 
 In his advertisement for The Partnership on October 29, 1770, 
 Goddard had stated, “The Narrative of Mr. Galloway’s Election 
 for Bucks County is received, and will be laid before the Public in 
 due Season.” This promise was fulfilled by a notice in the Chronicle 
 for July 29, 1771, announcing that Goddard had just published 
 and was selling for fourpence each a pamphlet entitled, “A TRUE AND 
 FAITHFUL NARRATIVE or tHE MODES anp MEASURES pur- 
 sued at the Anniversary Election, for Representatives, of the Freemen 
 of the Province of Pennsylvania, held at Newtown, in and for the 
 County of Bucks on Monday the first Day of October, Anno Domini 
 1770”—all this written by a “Bucks County Man.” The style in 
 which the pamphlet is written makes us think Goddard the author. 
 This conclusion is indirectly supported by his including a copy of this 
 along with The Partnership and The Prowess of the Whig Club, 
 both of which have his name printed on them as author, in a parcel 
 sent many years later to Isaiah Thomas. On all three is written in 
 Goddard’s handwriting, “return.” Fortunately for us Thomas never 
 did, and we can still look at Goddard’s own copies of these three 
 pamphlets in the library of the American Antiquarian Society in 
 Worcester, Massachusetts. 
 
 The Narrative has on the title page a quotation from Goddard’s 
 favorite Tacitus, which he freely translated, “Men that are above 
 all fear, soon grow above all shame.” The text, covering five 
 octavo pages, opens: “I have for some time past observed the turn- 
 ings, windings and twistings of a certain self-important person, to 
 wriggle himself into power and authority, without having any abili- 
 ties, either natural or acquired, to secure to himself that awe and 
 reverence he would proudly and vainly arrogate to himself.” The 
 alleged means whereby Galloway got himself elected from Bucks 
 County after realizing that the Philadelphia voters were in no mood 
 to return him to the assembly were to have William Yardley present 
 himself as a candidate only to announce his withdrawal the morning 
 of the election. In the resulting confusion Galloway’s name was 
 presented. Before the afternoon was over, Galloway was declared 
 elected, thanks to the obsequious help of the Bucks County sheriff. 
 
CHAPTER V IOI 
 
 (Any reader interested in the manner of conducting a colonial elec- 
 tion will find this pamphlet fascinating reading, irrespective of the 
 merits of Goddard’s accusations. ) 
 
 The “Bucks County Man” was doing his bit towards the forth- 
 coming annual assembly election on October 1. Galloway feared 
 the animus of his former partner enough that sometime during the 
 middle of September, 1771, Goddard found himself in the Phila- 
 delphia jail as a debtor. The affairs of the three-way partnership 
 had never been wound up. Since all bills had been in the name of 
 William Goddard and since he refused to pay them unless Galloway 
 and Wharton paid their share, it was not difficult to incarcerate the 
 recalcitrant printer. But being in jail did not silence Goddard. 
 Signing himself “A Friend to Liberty,” he published in the Chroni- 
 cle of September 23 an article over a column long attacking Gallo- 
 way by name and recommended “to the particular attention of 
 AMERICANUS’s present constituents in the county of Bucks.” A 
 Friend to Liberty started by showing how even the worst of men 
 have some pangs of conscience over their misdeeds. What then 
 must be the feelings of one who has tried to destroy the liberty of 
 his country? Contrasted with this are the feelings of a patriot. Just 
 as Cato serving his country contrasts with Caesar seeking the ruin of 
 Rome, so “Who would not rather be a Franky, gloriously de- 
 fending the liberties and the honour of his distressed country, before 
 a Brivish Senate, than the first Minister of State [Galloway as 
 Speaker of the Pennsylvania Assembly] endeavouring to enslave 
 and ruin his countrymen?—And who would not rather be a Dick1n- 
 SON, in a private station, armed with truth, supported by the im- 
 mutable laws of nature, the common inheritance of man, and leaning 
 on the pillars of the BririsH Constirution, nobly exerting his great 
 talents for the preservation of the invaded rights of his country, than 
 a GALLoway, asserting the cause of slavery, reviling American 
 honour, treacherously undermining the capital pillars of the Con- 
 stitution of his native Country, and slandering one of her ablest 
 Advocates?” 
 
 Goddard did not have to wait long for a reply to his article. 
 That same afternoon an unnamed member (Galloway?) read the 
 Chronicle’s comments to the Pennsylvania Assembly. A committee 
 was appointed to prepare a resolution “shewing the sentiments of 
 the House.” On the next day, the twenty-fourth, the committee 
 
102 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 
 
 brought in a resolution to which the assembly quickly agreed: “The 
 House taking into Consideration the Publication in the Pennsylvania 
 Chronicle, Number 245, signed A Friend to Liberty, with another 
 Piece, dated German-T own, September 20, 1771, published by Wil- 
 liam Goddard, Printer, who is now confined in the common Gaol of 
 the City and County of Philadelphia under divers Executions for 
 Debts. Resolved, That the Charges and Reflections contained in 
 the said Publications against the Honourable Joseph Galloway, the 
 Speaker, are false, scandalous and malicious, a daring Insult to, and 
 a Breach of the Privileges of this House. Ordered, That the fore- 
 going Resolve be published in the Pennsylvania Gazette and Journal, 
 and that the Clerk of this House immediately furnish the Printers 
 with a Copy of the same.” (Fortunately for Goddard colonial legis- 
 latures had not discovered the punitive measures exercised by their 
 twentieth-century counterparts’ committees. ) 
 
 On the twenty-sixth the Gazette and the Journal published the 
 assembly’s resolution, but Bradford now came to the support of 
 Goddard and inserted a vigorous attack on Galloway and the as- 
 sembly immediately after the resolution. Bradford in no uncertain 
 terms indicated his position: “For my Part, I not only consider it 
 [the resolution] disgraceful but, dangerous, as it may be a Precedent 
 hereafter to intimidate the Press, and infringe the Liberties of the 
 Subject—And I am sorry to find the Representatives of a free 
 People indulging Rancour and Malice, under a Mask of preserving 
 Dignity and Honour.” 
 
 Emboldened by this support and showing no fear of the “privi- 
 leges” of the Pennsylvania Assembly, Goddard busied himself in 
 the Philadelphia jail preparing copy for the September 30 Chronicle. 
 With Mary Katherine in charge of the shop he did not need to 
 worry about the paper’s meeting its printing schedule. Issued just 
 the day before the election, the newspaper had more than two pages 
 devoted to an attack on Galloway and an appeal to the voters of 
 Bucks County not to re-elect their present representative. The 
 names of the members of the assembly who had voted against the 
 resolution passed on the twenty-fourth were printed; Andrew Mar- 
 vel, made famous in the Constitutional Courant of 1765, had a letter; 
 A Freeman and A Freeholder both expressed their horror of 
 Joseph Galloway; and generous extracts were given from the original 
 Americanus article of 1765 along with the comments on it as given 
 
CHAPTER V 103 
 
 in The Partnership’s “Postscript.” Compared to this persistent flow 
 of invective, the article of the week before which had aroused the ire 
 of the assembly was as gentle as a newborn lamb. Though Gallo- 
 way won the election, he must have felt uncomfortable whenever he 
 thought of his former partner’s truculence and fearlessness. Prob- 
 ably this was the issue of the Chronicle Franklin was referring to 
 when he wrote to his son William on January 30, 1772, from 
 London: “I cast my eye over Goddard’s Piece against our friend 
 Mr. Galloway, and then lit my Fire with it. I think such feeble, 
 malicious Attacks cannot hurt him.” Obviously not everybody in 
 Philadelphia agreed with Franklin. 
 
 In the Chronicle of October 14 Goddard could finally announce 
 his release: “The Printer of this Paper, impressed by the most lively 
 Sentiments of Gratitude, takes a sincere Pleasure, on this Occasion, 
 of returning his warmest Acknowledgments to a Number of respecta- 
 ble Citizens, who, on the first Notice of the relentless Severity of 
 Messrs. Galloway and Wharton, his former Partners in the Printing 
 Business, generously united and made him a Loan of Money suf- 
 ficient to extricate him from the Iron Hand of Oppression. He 
 now enjoys the Sweets of Liberty, and is enabled, by the Generosity 
 of some Friends, to continue in Business, in which his utmost En- 
 deavours shall ever be [ex]erted to give all possible Satisfaction 
 to the Public, and shew himself not altogether unworthy of the 
 Favours he has received.” 
 
 To show that the three or four weeks in jail had not soothed 
 his spirit or intimidated him, Goddard published in this same issue 
 another attack on Galloway. The article was signed by A Friend to 
 Liberty “not ‘confined in the Common Gaol, under divers Executions 
 for Debts?” A week later Goddard clipped another attack on Gallo- 
 way from his friend John Holt’s New-York Journal. The Phila- 
 delphian was not hiding his hatred under a bushel. 
 
 April, 1772, was a busy month for William Goddard. First, he 
 changed the location of his printing establishment. This time he 
 moved from Arch Street to Front Street “nearly opposite the London 
 Coffee House.” On better terms with the Bradfords now that he 
 was in bitter opposition to Galloway, Goddard doubtless found it 
 much more convenient to be just across the street from Philadelphia’s 
 chief center for gossip among seamen and merchants and tradesmen 
 of the town. 
 
104 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 A more important event in this month was another eruption of 
 the Goddard-Galloway feud. It started innocently enough for 
 Goddard with announcements in the Journal and Gazette for April 
 16. In the Journal Galloway was offering £50 reward, and in the 
 Gazette Governor John Penn £100—both for information leading 
 to the capture of the writer of a mysterious letter. On the fourth 
 of the month Joseph Sellers, a blacksmith living on the road from 
 Philadelphia to Chester, was given a letter by some strangers, which 
 he was requested to send to Joseph Galloway. As Galloway ex- 
 pressed it in his £50 reward notice, whoever had written the letter 
 was “accustomed to use stops or points in his writing.” Apparently 
 many people in those days were not. What Galloway received was 
 this: 
 
 To Mr. JosEPH GALLoway, Esqr. 
 
 I stand in need of 50 pounds & Desier you would, not fail to let me 
 have it against the 10. of this month, by leaving it close behind the 5 
 mile stone between Philadelphia-& Darby and I shall pay you in a year 
 with intrest. Sir—lI shall pay you to a day— 
 
 N.B. If you dont leave it you shall sorely repent it in a few; days 
 and wish you had left it; you shall be sure of it again 
 
 from a Chester Countryman. 
 
 The version of this letter printed in the Gazette adds at the end, 
 “April ye 2.1772.” The 5 Mile Stone was, of course, the stone mark- 
 ing five miles on the country road then winding its way leisurely over 
 wooded hills but now the busy Chester Avenue in southwest Phila- 
 delphia. 
 
 The feud having been given such reams of publicity, it is not 
 surprising that suspicion should fall on Goddard. Therefore on 
 Saturday, April 18, he was haled into court before Chief Justice 
 Allen and then released on bail. But let Goddard continue with the 
 story as given in the following Monday’s Chronicle, as he employed 
 his choicest invective and poured on the abuse. 
 
 This was at the Instigation of Mr. Galloway, MY OLD INVETERATE 
 Enemy, grounded solely on the Evidence of one WILLIAM EVITT, 
 [Printer! ]* who deposed, not that I wrote the Letter, but that he heard 
 me say I wrote it, after the Publication of the Proclamation, &c. This 
 Evitt is the most wretched, drunken, contemptible Sot that can any where 
 
 be found, and the Matter deposed of the most wmprobable Kind. I 
 
 * Brackets in original. 
 
CHAPTER V 105 
 
 certainly am not Fool enough to confess a detestable Fact of that Sort 
 to him, if I had been guilty of it—yet such Stress has been laid on the 
 incredible Evidence of that worthless besotted Wretch, that I have been 
 taken into Custody, &c. on the Strength of it.... I really cannot but 
 pity Mr. Galloway, my great and capital Enemy, that he should be 
 reduced to such contemptible Shifts for Revenge and Mischief against 
 me, as to run pimping and sneaking up a dirty Alley to the House of such 
 a Wretch as Fvitt, to soricir Evidence against me, and there to dance 
 Attendance until Evitt’s drunken Fit could be far enough over for him 
 to awake, and be capable of talking. 
 
 To this article, signed “Monday Morning 5 o’clock,” Goddard ap- 
 pended this N.B.: “An ingenious Gentleman of distinguished Honour 
 and Probity, whom Mr. Galloway had slandered, having told him, 
 as became a Man of Spirit, that if he, (Galloway) was in a firm State 
 of Health, he would instantly give him the Discipline due to such 
 an infamous Scoundrel, Mr. Galloway, with his usual Intrepidity, 
 swore the Peace against him—and thus honoured him with a Share 
 of his Malice, in Company with W. Goddard.” 
 
 A week later the Chronicle contained another specimen of 
 Goddard’s invective against Galloway. Nothing new had happened, 
 so the printer was forced to repeat himself a good deal in his 
 article, this time dated at eight o’clock Monday Morning. He did 
 include this emphatic statement of his innocence: “I do declare 1n 
 THE MosT SOLEMN Manner, and with THE sAME Sincerity as if I 
 was sworn on the HOLY EVANGELISTS, That I am not the 
 Author, Writer or Sender of the Incendiary Letter, said to have been 
 received by Joseph Galloway, Esq; and contained in the Governor’s 
 Proclamation—and further, that I was not DIRECTLY Of INDIRECTLY 
 concerned in Writing or sendimg the said Letter, or privy thereto in 
 ANY Respect whatsoever, or had any KNowLeEDGE thereof, until it 
 was publicly reported thro the Town, and published in the several 
 News-Papers.” This article was immediately followed by one of 
 the “characters” the eighteenth century was so fond of, probably 
 written by Goddard himself. It was entitled “A SHorr CHaracrer 
 of a SLANDERER.” Appropriately it ended with the familiar 
 quatrain from Shakespeare beginning, “Who steals my purse steals 
 trash.” 
 
 No further news was available until the Chronicle of May 11. 
 This time Goddard headed his article, “FRESH NEWS from the 5 
 Mile [figure of stone] Stone.” To this title he appended a footnote: 
 
106 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 “Curiosity having lately led several People to the 5 Mile Stone, 
 on Purpose to look at it, it may not be thought amiss to give a View 
 of it here, which may gratify those who have similar Desires, without 
 Danger or Expence.” The fresh news was that another letter had 
 been received from the blackmailer. 
 
 On Friday morning last, between 7 and 8 o’Clock, as Isaac PEARSON, 
 Esq; one of the Representatives of Chester County, was coming to this 
 City, from his Seat at Darby, in Company with a young Gentleman of 
 the Name of Hit, he observed a Letter on the Edge of the Road, 
 lying with the Seal upwards, about half a mile from Mr. Galloway’s 
 Monument, the ever memorable 5 Mile Stone, and near the same Distance 
 from the Lower-Ferry on Schuylkill, Mr. Hitt dismounted from his 
 Horse, took it up, and found it was directed in this Manner—“To Mr. 
 George Gray These,” to whom it was immediately after delivered, with an 
 Account of the singular Manner of meeting with it. Mr. Gray, upon 
 opening it, discovered two sealed Letters inclosed, one directed “To Jos 
 Galloway These,” and the other “To Jos Sellars These,” with a positive 
 Injunction for their immediate Delivery, in the following Terms, with- 
 out a Signature: 
 
 “Mr. Gray 
 
 take the within Letters Directly to where directed or you may 
 expect” 
 
 Mr. Gray sent Advice to Mr. Sellers, who is his Neighbour, that he 
 had a Letter for him, written, as he thought, by Mr. Galloway’s 5 Mile 
 Stone Correspondent. Mr. Sellers being curious to know its Contents, 
 waited on Mr. Gray without Delay, and received his Letter, which con- 
 tained the following Words: 
 
 “Mr. Sellars 
 
 If you watch or help to watch for Galloway any other Time as 
 you did before you shall repent it very shortly so I would have you 
 be still—” 
 
 Mr. Galloway having retired to Bucks County, a few Days since, 
 to recover his Spirits (which are said to be much exhausted by his late 
 fatiguing Manoeuvres, Midnight Councils and Watchings) Mr. Gray 
 hath not yet had an Opportunity to execute his whole Commission, by the 
 Delivery of his Letter, being commendably unwilling to awaken the Fears 
 of his Family, during his Absence; so that the Contents of Mr. Galloway’s 
 Letter remain as yet a profound Secret-—But whenever he receives it, 
 and thinks proper to lay it before the Public, he shall be welcome to a 
 Place in his beloved Chronicle, IN PERPETUAM REI MEmMorIAM—and 
 the Printer assures his OLD NEVER-TO-BE-FORGOTTEN PARTNER, that 
 he considers an Injury offered HIM as CRIMINAL as if it was done against 
 an HONEST Man. 
 
CHAPTER V 107 
 
 Alternating entertainment with news items, Goddard in the May 
 25 Chronicle had the 5 Mile Stone, pictured in his May 11 issue, 
 give its comments on the affair. The resulting essay is a fair sample 
 of the printer at his satiric best. 
 
 On June 1 Goddard published the text of the letter sent to 
 Galloway almost a month before, but by now a third letter had been 
 added, dated May 23. All threatened vague reprisals if the £50 
 was not soon forthcoming. At the conclusion of the article God- 
 dard inserted an alleged advertisement written in the newspaper 
 jargon of the day: “WANTED immediately—A fresh Evidence, 
 who can tell a tolerably plausible LIE, and swear to it afterwards, 
 agreeable to Directions, Ev-tt being now considered a mere Marplot. 
 —Such a useful Person may meet with a lucrative Jobb, and re- 
 ceive great Encouragement, by applying at the Sign of AMERICANUS 
 —in Despair. N.B. The Person must be able to read Writing, and 
 must learn to distinguish a Semicolon from a Comma.” 
 
 For Goddard the finale of the affair of the 5 Mile Stone was 
 his trial on the charges brought against him by Galloway. On 
 Tuesday, July 7, Goddard spent the day at the Mayor’s court, then 
 meeting in the State House (now called Independence Hall). His 
 case was not called up, nor was it the next day, when the grand 
 jury was dismissed in the evening. On Thursday morning the dis- 
 charge of the case was moved and granted by the presiding justice. 
 According to Goddard’s account, Evitt, who forfeited a bond for 
 his appearance, left Philadelphia on the fifth, “and the next Day was 
 seen staggering up the Lancaster Road, about thirteen Miles from 
 this City.” That the whole business had worried Goddard more 
 than he would admit is shown by the rather petulant tone he uses in 
 summing up: “And thus hath ended a Prosecution that hath given 
 me much Trouble and Vexation, brought my Business and Character 
 into Danger, and threatened my total Ruin, and which would have 
 been the Event, if the manifest Asperity and Rancour of the Charge, 
 and the contemptible Deficiency of the Evidence, had not induced 
 a Number of worthy Men of Character and Influence to appear for 
 me in the Crisis of my Distress, and for which ‘Heaven will reward 
 them.’” From then on the affair dropped out of the newspapers, 
 and apparently no further effort was made to find the unknown 
 letter-writer. 
 
108 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 The end of September, 1772, found Goddard once more trying 
 to defeat Galloway’s re-election. He issued a broadside reprinting an 
 article from Holt’s New-York Journal of October 8, 1771, which had 
 attacked the Speaker of the Assembly and wondered how the people 
 of Pennsylvania could ever be duped into electing such a man. On 
 September 26, in the last issue of the Chronicle before the election, 
 Goddard had a two-column article prefaced by a cartoon. The 
 caption on the cartoon of two horses is detailed enough to give a good 
 idea of the contents: “AMERICANUS, heavy laden, with the 5 
 Mile Stone on his Back, trampling on the Goddess LIBERTY, the 
 Bill of Rights, and Pennsylvania Charter, on his Way to Bucks 
 County Election, (accompanied by the Buckram Marquis of New 
 Barrataria [Wharton was at this time much involved in a land de- 
 velopment scheme in the Wyoming Valley, for which the name 
 New Barrataria was proposed],) begging Relief from his Burthern.” 
 Goddard concluded the article by swearing that Galloway could never 
 expect the printer to give up the campaign: “If the Rage and Wild- 
 ness of Party should, after all, sanctify his Villainies, and again give 
 him a Seat in the Senate, let him represent what County he will, 
 or sit on what Seat he may, I shall (unawed by any of his resolving 
 Brethren) take the Liberty to hold his Picture, taken from Nature, 
 up to View, shewing him as he is—an Enemy to his Country, a Dis- 
 grace to Pennsylvania, and a ‘Blot and a Stain to America’—and 
 while I live I shall exert my utmost Abilities to detect and expose 
 him in every Attempt to injure the Cause of Liberty and his Coun- 
 try, to expose his Ignorance, and to shew the Weakness of his Head, 
 and the Wickedness of his Heart; not doubting but I shall find a 
 Support amongst the disinterestedly Good, the Friends of Liberty 
 and our excellent Constitution.” A third prong in his attack on 
 Galloway was another broadside issued on October 1, Election Day 
 itself. This was a letter presumably written by a not too literate 
 chimney sweep offering to exchange places for a year with Galloway. 
 It was headed, “To the printer of the Penselvaney Kronical mr. 
 Godard.” 
 
 The results of all this electioneering on Goddard’s part were 
 announced in the October 3 Chronicle. Galloway won his seat, 
 though still from Bucks County. But the more surprising thing is 
 that Goddard was almost elected to the assembly. He felt obligated 
 to thank publicly those who had given their “spontaneous Suffrages” 
 
CHAPTER V 109 
 
 in his behalf. That Goddard came close to election is attested by a 
 letter Franklin wrote to Abel James on December 2, 1772, from 
 London: “I do not at this Distance understand the Politics of your 
 last Election, why so many of the Members declin’d the Service, 
 and why yourself and Mr. Fox were omitted (which I much re- 
 gret) while Goddard was voted for by so great a Number.” 
 During 1773 Goddard’s energies were a good deal taken up by 
 his starting the Maryland Journal, a story to be told in a later 
 chapter, and his sister Mary Katherine probably edited as many 
 of the Chronicles as did William. Therefore the assembly elections 
 of 1773 lacked the fervor of former years. Goddard undertook no 
 campaign of harassment before the electors went to the polls and only 
 noticed the annual event by this brief comment on October 18: “The 
 noted Joseph Galloway, is, to the Disgrace of Pennsylvania, again 
 elected Speaker of the Assembly! Perjury, Subornation, and the basest 
 Treachery, we may see, thro’ blind Party Rage, are sometimes no 
 Disqualifications to a Place of Trust. Those who patronize such 
 Crimes, we may suppose, as Junius observes, feel for their own.” 
 During latter 1773 the colonists were agog over the East India 
 Company and tea. Familiar to everybody are the various incidents 
 climaxed by the Boston Tea Party. In Philadelphia Thomas Whar- 
 ton was appointed one of the agents of the Company to handle the 
 tea. Goddard greeted this announcement in the October 23 Mary- 
 land Journal by attacking his former partner viciously. On the 
 twenty-fifth he was able to state that everybody in Philadelphia 
 who had been appointed agents for the despised tea had resigned 
 his commission, including Thomas Wharton. The bitterness of 
 three years before was enough behind for Goddard to rub only a 
 little salt into the wounded pride of his former partner: “The 
 Printer of this Paper thinks it incumbent on him to mention, on this 
 Occasion, that Mr. Thomas Wharton, senior, prudently took the 
 HINTS that have been given him, and hath actually made a decent 
 Renunciation of his dangerous and disgraceful Office of Tea Com- 
 missioner; so that he is now—‘despised something less than he used 
 to be”—And, at the same Time, the Printer assures his old Partner, 
 that he is pleased to see this Dawn of Virtue in his Conduct, and 
 hopes he will not, for the Sake of rendering this single virtuous Act 
 the more conspicuous, let it stand alone. Whenever any Thing 
 
 meritorious in his future Life appears, the OLD COMPANY 
 
IIO WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 PRESS shall be heavy laden with Panegyric—for this CHRONICLE, 
 like those of o/d, is designed to record the Deeds of good Princes, as 
 well as those that are dad.” 
 
 The remainder of Goddard’s Philadelphia story can now be 
 briefly told. Less and less of his attention was devoted to the 
 Chronicle during the winter months of 1773 and 1774. Not that 
 this means that the paper was allowed to come out irregularly or be 
 slovenly in its appearance. Mary Katherine proved her mettle as 
 a printer and a newspaperwoman. From her brother she had learned 
 both things well. Quite likely Goddard during the summer and 
 fall of 1773, while he was getting his Baltimore shop into functioning 
 order, had in mind the running of the two shops concurrently. For 
 six months the Philadelphia and Baltimore newspapers overlapped, 
 but by February 8, 1774, Goddard called it quits for the Chronicle 
 for reasons to be given in the next chapter. In his farewell statement 
 thanking his subscribers and friends Goddard expressed his gratitude 
 for their patronage and support “amidst the Rage and Wildness of 
 Party, the Insolence of Office, the gigantic Strides of arbitrary 
 Power, and the more dangerous Plots and Manoeuvres of secret 
 Conspirators.” Goddard’s seven years in Philadelphia had given him 
 much to remember, and Philadelphians had had their best-edited 
 newspaper before the Revolution. 
 
- VI. 
 
 N 1773 things were not going well for the British postal system 
 
 in the colonies. During the latter part of the year Hugh Finlay, 
 the system’s surveyor for Canada as well as the colonies, was sent 
 out into the field to discover at first hand what was happening. 
 Typical of his findings is this excerpt from his journal, dated Oc- 
 tober 28, 1773: 
 
 He [Thomas Vernon, deputy postmaster for Newport] says that there 
 are two Post Offices in New Port, the King’s and Mumfords [Ben Mum- 
 ford, postrider between Newport and Saybrook; Peter Mumford, post- 
 rider between Boston and Newport], and that the revenue of the last is 
 the greatest. It is the same in Boston, both Mumford and the rider of 
 the upper Stages (Hyde) receive much postage for which they do not 
 account. It is common for people who expect letters by Post finding 
 none at the Post office to say “well there must be letters, we'll find them 
 at Mumfords.” It is next to impossible to put a stop to this practice in 
 the present universal opposition to every thing connected with Great 
 Britain. Were any Deputy Post Master to do his duty, and make a stir 
 in such matter, he would draw on himself the odium of his neighbours 
 and be mark’d as the friend of Slavery and oppression and a declar’d 
 enemy to America. 
 
 To comprehend Finlay’s comments, we must go back to Febru- 
 ary 17, 1692, when William and Mary made a grant to Thomas 
 Neale, a court favorite. This grant gave Neale the privilege of 
 conducting in the colonies a postal system from which he would 
 receive all the revenues in return for six shillings a year. Neale’s 
 only interest was in these potential revenues; so on April 4 he dele- 
 gated the actual running of the system to Andrew Hamilton, a 
 former governor of the Jerseys, Neale never even seeing the shores 
 of America. By May, 1697, Hamilton reported a deficit of £2,360 
 for the operations under the postal monopoly. Neale died in 1699 
 and his interests under the original grant were assigned to Hamilton 
 and an Englishman named West, as creditors of the estate. Finally, 
 
I12 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 in 1707 the crown purchased the rights of West and Mrs. Hamilton 
 (Hamilton had died in 1703) for a reported £1,664 and took the 
 system under its own wing. Not until 1711 did Parliament pass 
 the Act of the Ninth of Queen Anne, which regularized the postal 
 system for the home country and the colonies and provided an 
 explicit legal basis for future operations. John Hamilton, the son 
 of Andrew, was appointed Postmaster General for America, and 
 headquarters for the far-flung colonial system were installed at 
 New York. 
 
 In 1773 the deputy postmaster general, the person in charge 
 of the system, was Benjamin Franklin. He had been in England 
 most of the time since 1757 and was not to return to Philadelphia 
 until May 5, 1775. Under Franklin’s direction the service had been 
 improved a great deal, and the increased efficiency had made the 
 colonial postal system into a source of revenue for the crown. But 
 the developing ill-feeling between the colonials and the home govern- 
 ment was reflected in the operations of the post office. 
 
 The chief complainers in 1773 against the vagaries of postal 
 operations were the newspapermen. Their obvious dependence on 
 mail made them hypersensitive to defects in the system. Usually 
 wherever there was a newspaper, the editor acted as local postmaster. 
 This was fine for the particular editor who secured the appointment, 
 but woe betide his competitors. Those competitors frequently found 
 their mail arriving late; also they were compelled to pay heavy 
 charges for the carriage of their papers. Therefore many printers, 
 as we havé seen, organized their own system of independent riders to 
 deliver newspapers. 
 
 Typical of the newspapermen who felt themselves sufferers from 
 postal inequities was William Goddard. During his years in Phila- 
 delphia the local postmaster was William Bradford. Commencing 
 with the very first issue of the Chronicle, Goddard had instituted 
 a system of riders. The bill already referred to in the previous 
 chapter from John Borrows charges Goddard for the “carriage of 
 your Newspaper from Philadelphia to New Brunswick... and... 
 from Philadelphia to Trenton.” This close acquaintance with de- 
 livery problems no doubt was an impelling force behind Goddard’s 
 campaign in early 1774 against the official postal system. But, as we 
 have seen, Goddard’s difficulties with Bradford as postmaster were 
 not his first contacts with the colonial post office. His father, Giles 
 
CHAPTER VI mg 
 
 
 
 Goddard, had been village postmaster of New London as well as its 
 doctor. As a printer’s apprentice, Goddard had worked under James 
 Parker, at that time comptroller of the postal system under Franklin. 
 While still with Parker, the young apprentice had made in latter 
 1755 a postal surveying trip through Connecticut. And from 1764 
 to 1769 he had been the local postmaster of Providence, even though 
 during most of this time his mother and his sister had done the 
 actual postal work. 
 
 During the six months that Goddard was simultaneously pub- 
 lishing the Maryland Journal in Baltimore and the Pennsylvania 
 Chronicle in Philadelphia the postal riders between the two cities 
 became very much his concern. In the Journal of November 20, 
 1773, 2 notice reads: “A post-RIDER will be speedily established, by 
 the Printer of this Paper to set out from hence every Thursday 
 Afternoon, for Philadelphia, and to return hither the Tuesday Eve- 
 ning following.” After three months of publication for the new 
 paper there was already enough difficulty in sending and receiving 
 mail for the publisher to be willing to pay for a regular rider out 
 of his own pocket. A week later, November 27, two notices ap- 
 peared in the Journal, one relative to the Chronicle and the other 
 to the new Baltimore paper: “The PEnnsyLvania CHRONICLE . . 
 will, by the Establishment of a new Northern Post, be able to 
 visit its old Friends in this Province, from whom it hath, for some 
 Time, been cut off by an arb[itrary] Decree of a malicious 
 Postrider, late a Hostl[er in t]he Service of one of the D. Post- 
 masters Gene[ral].” The second notice, less vituperative in its 
 tone, says: “The Marytanp JournaL, &c. will, positively be pub- 
 lished, regularly, every Thursday Morning, as soon as the new 
 Philadelphia Post is established, which it is expected will be the Case 
 in about a Fortnight. Then our Customers will have the earliest 
 Intelligence from the Northward, before they could possibly obtain 
 it by any other Mode of Conveyance.” Goddard was able to fulfil 
 his promise, as a heading in the December 9 Journal reveals: “Advices 
 received by the newly established Northern Post, who arrived here 
 on Tuesday last.” The advantages to a newspaper of having its 
 own riders are clearly shown by the December 30 issue, where we 
 read: “Yesterday evening, Mr. Butler, one of the post riders, lately 
 established by the Printer of this Paper, arrived here, express, from 
 New-York, with the following interesting intelligence, having left 
 
II4 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 the same at Philadelphia, where it was printed and distributed as a 
 Christmas-Box to the Public—and we have, for some time, delayed 
 publishing this paper, in hopes of being able to close the old year 
 with eclat, which we have now the pleasure of doing by the publica- 
 tion of the unexampled, spirited, and noble conduct of our brave 
 countrymen, who disdain to wear the CHAIN—and who are un- 
 alterably determined to be FREE.” Directly after this notice is a 
 long account of the Boston Tea Party of December 16. Two weeks’ 
 time between Boston and Baltimore was not bad for colonial days. 
 
 So far everything we have described was done solely as a business 
 measure in connection with getting news and delivering newspapers. 
 But doing all this work and observing the colonial difficulties with 
 England made Goddard think beyond his immediate problems to 
 those of the entire thirteen colonies. On December 16, 1773, he 
 suggested what was in his mind in a letter to John Lamb of New 
 York: “Mr. Wm Stenson . . . will communicate to you a Sketch of a 
 Plan I am forming to give a firm Opposition to a certain unconsti- 
 tutional Act of Parliment now operating in the Colonies.” 
 
 By February, 1774, Goddard’s plan had matured enough for 
 him to act. He first closed his Philadelphia paper and had his 
 sister, Mary Katherine, transfer to Baltimore, so that she could 
 manage the shop and newspaper while he was absent, just as she 
 had been running the Pennsylvania Chronicle during William’s 
 frequent and prolonged trips to Baltimore in 1773. The last issue 
 of the Chronicle was dated February 8, 1774, and a farewell state- 
 ment hinted at the great things to come: 
 
 Urged by very important Reasons, which will hereafter, and in due 
 Season, be fully and clearly stated to the Public, I have come to the 
 Resolution of suspending the Publication of the PENNSYLVANIA 
 CHRONICLE &c. (which hath now completed it’s seventh Year) 
 until a Matter I have engaged in, of a very interesting Nature to the 
 common Liberties of all America, as well as to myself, as the Printer of 
 a Public Paper, is brought mearer to a Conclusion. ... Sensible that my 
 Designs are just and laudable, I am determined to persevere, until a 
 Question that will necessarily arise, of the last Importance to this Country, 
 receives a constitutional Decision, in an American Court of Justice... . 
 
 N.B. The new constitutional Post, which under Favour of the Public, 
 hath been lately established between this City and Baltimore, will be 
 continued in the most regular, and punctual Manner, 
 
CHAPTER VI 115 
 
 
 
 Nine days later, February 17, Mary Katherine Goddard ofhcially 
 took over the management of the Maryland Journal, not to re- 
 linquish it for almost ten years. The first sentence of her announce- 
 ment of the new management implies that her brother had already 
 started on his trip northward: “An Affair in a very high Degree 
 interesting to the common liberties of all AMERICA, as well as to 
 the Printer of this Paper, having made it necessary for him to repair, 
 for a few Weeks to an Eastern Colony, I esteem it my indispensable 
 Duty to acquaint the Public... .” 
 
 Goddard started north with his plan well formulated in his 
 mind. The very phrase, “constitutional post,’ used in the Chroni- 
 cle’s farewell remarks became the name for his projected establish- 
 ment. He had an already existing system of postriders between 
 Baltimore and Philadelphia. Possibly John Borrows continued in 
 Goddard’s employ until November, 1774, to ride between Phila- 
 delphia and Trenton; at least the bill already referred to would so 
 indicate. If this is true, Goddard already had the nucleus of his 
 proposed postal system and could base his arguments on facts, not 
 on fantasy or whim. His plan was, of course, to set up a completely 
 new postal system independent of the British. 
 
 Though we have no record of his visit, probably his first stop 
 was Philadelphia. In this community Goddard possessed about as 
 many enemies as friends. Unfortunately in his newspaper wars 
 in the city he had fought against, even though the choice was not his, 
 the persons who would have been of most help to him in his present 
 situation. Typical of these was William Bradford, who later partici- 
 pated in Goddard’s “constitutional” scheme but would have de- 
 manded at this time more assurance than what his erstwhile com- 
 petitor could give on his own. Nor would Goddard’s Philadelphia 
 reception have been helped by the various debts he had left lying 
 around. Moreover, the particular group in the city that the Balti- 
 more printer was appealing to for support included his former 
 partner Joseph Galloway. In most of the colonial communities, 
 especially in New England, the local committee of correspondence 
 and the town meeting were indistinguishable. When the request 
 from Boston’s committee to set up other committees came to Phila- 
 delphia, the Pennsylvania Assembly under the speakership of Gallo- 
 way made the Philadelphia committee one of the prerogatives of 
 its speaker. The resulting committee of correspondence, never to 
 
116 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 become noted for its vigor, was therefore chairmaned by Galloway 
 and had for its members his friends. In the colonies above Pennsyl- 
 vania, by contrast, many of the members of the local committees had 
 been Sons of Liberty in the 1760’s and had known about Goddard’s 
 anti-Stamp Act activities in 1765. Goddard planned to go from 
 one committee to another and make the members his backers for the 
 new postal system. To get their help required that he secure letters 
 of introduction from one committee to others; in spite of the handi- 
 caps he did manage to secure at least one such letter from the 
 Philadelphia committee, whether from the group as a whole or only 
 from an individual member we cannot now say. 
 
 In New York it was another story. Goddard had several friends 
 there among those pressing the cause of the colonies, and they were 
 in control of the local committee of correspondence. Chief among 
 these was John Holt, publisher of the New-York Journal. There 
 was also John Lamb, who seems to have taken the thirty-three-year- 
 old printer in tow. It was to him Goddard had written the preceding 
 December. No doubt there were enough others familiar with God- 
 dard’s having published the anti-Stamp Act Constitutional Courant 
 in September, 1765, that his prestige as a vigorous supporter of the 
 colonial cause was high in the inner councils of the New York Com- 
 mittee of Correspondence. So it was with little difficulty that he 
 acquired letters of introduction dated February 28, most important 
 of which was the one to Boston. The members of the New York 
 committee were favorably impressed by the plan but wanted the 
 support and agreement of other communities. Leaving New York 
 on the twenty-eighth Goddard continued his travels, bolstered by 
 this support and encouragement. 
 
 During his New York stay Holt and Lamb must have talked 
 for some time with Goddard concerning the best tactics to use in his 
 campaign. The crucial importance of Boston would have been ap- 
 parent to them, and so our traveler made only short stops on his way 
 to the Hub City. After New York his first visit would have been 
 New Haven. Apprenticeship memories did not long detain him as 
 he pushed his way on to New London, the scene of his birth and the 
 first fifteen years of his life. No doubt Goddard told some people 
 of his proposal as he had in New Haven, but he did not wait for the 
 calling of a town meeting to formulate public opinion. From New 
 London the sanguine printer moved up the Thames River to Nor- 
 
CHAPTER VI 117 
 
 
 
 wich, a brief day’s ride away. Again his stay must have been little 
 more than a night or two before plunging on to Providence. 
 
 As editor of the Providence Gazette in the early 1760's, Goddard 
 had participated in the struggles between Providence and Newport. 
 Many people in both places knew the name of William Goddard, 
 especially in Providence, where he had both friends and relatives. 
 In these towns Goddard stopped long enough to make a more 
 thorough canvass of the sentiments of the local committees of cor- 
 respondence and other citizens. We do not know the exact dates 
 of his stay in Providence, but the Congregational minister of New- 
 port, Ezra Stiles, later President of Yale, was an indefatigible diary 
 keeper, and for March 11 he entered: “The Sons of Liberty at Phila- 
 delphia [the phrasing of this remark suggests that Goddard’s Phila- 
 delphia letter may not have been from the local committee of corre- 
 spondence at all but from persons active against the 1765 Stamp 
 Act] and N. York have sent Mr. Goddard to sollicit us in N. 
 England to unite in opposing the parliamentary Post Office in 
 America, and in setting up Provincial Post Riders.” This meeting 
 attended by Ezra Stiles was later reported in a London newspaper 
 of April 14, which was clipped by Purdie and Dixon and placed 
 in their Virginia Gazette of June 9 under a London date-line. 
 “Extract of a Letter from Newport, im Rhode Island, March 12, 
 1774. ‘By an Express from Philadelphia, and New York, last 
 Night, we are informed that a Resolution has been come to, at 
 [probably New York], to take the Post Office out of the Hands of 
 Government, and to appoint Regulations themselves; and I think 
 it is probable they will soon take the Custom-house into their own 
 Possession, and ship home the Commissioners.’” Purdie and Dixon 
 added in brackets after the clipping an expression of their senti- 
 ments: “So let it be.” 
 
 Like the New York Sons of Liberty, those in Providence 
 and Newport looked with strong favor on the plans. The Newport 
 Committee of Correspondence gave Goddard a letter of introduction 
 dated March 10 to its Boston counterpart to add to the ones he 
 already had. In fact, Goddard probably attended a meeting of the 
 Newport committee before one in Providence. Providence, not too 
 hurried, gave only verbal promises for the moment but assured the 
 roving printer that a letter would soon follow his arrival in Boston, 
 a promise that was fulfilled. 
 
 
 
118 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 On Monday, March 14, William Goddard swung his weary legs 
 off his horse in Boston. Perhaps that very night he turned his 
 letters over to William Cooper, clerk of the town meeting of Boston 
 and secretary of the local committee of correspondence under the 
 direction of Samuel Adams. Goddard’s plan seemed perfect to 
 Adams, and there was no doubt much enthusiastic discussion con- 
 cerning its merits and methods to get it into operation during Mon- 
 day evening and Tuesday morning and afternoon. So enthusiastic 
 was Boston’s reception of Goddard that he must have pinched him- 
 self at times to see if it was all true. 
 
 On Tuesday (probably at seven in the evening, the customary 
 time) a town meeting was held in. the Selectmen’s Chamber. The 
 secretary’s minutes for the meeting show only one topic of dis- 
 cussion that night. 
 
 Mr. Goddard of Philadelphia, who is come this way on the design of 
 establishing Post Riders, independent of those established by Act of 
 Parliament, attended, this Evening by invitation,— 
 
 Letters from the ‘Committees of Correspondence at New York and 
 Newport in Rhode Island on the subject of Provincial Post Riders, were 
 laid before the Committee and read— 
 
 Upon a Motion made. Voted, that 
 
 Joseph Greenleaff Esq 
 
 Dr. Benjamin Church 
 
 Dr. Thomas Young 
 be a Committee to prepare a piece for the Spy in order to shew the 
 utility of the proposal for Provincial Post Riders— 
 
 Voted, that this Meeting be Adjourned to next Thursday Evening. 
 7s wo Cork, 
 
 Somehow it seems appropriate that the only action taken at this 
 first evening’s meeting was the selection of a committee to prepare 
 something for the press. We suspect that the members must not 
 have spent too long discussing the possible merits of the proposal, 
 but instead agreed on that quite soon (though no resolution was 
 placed in the minutes) and passed on to the more engrossing subject 
 of how to bring the public around to their conviction. By this time 
 the Boston patriots had well developed techniques of persuasion, 
 and we can perceive the experienced direction of Sam Adams and 
 others during the ten days of Goddard’s stay in Boston as they 
 worked out the appropriate tactics for the campaign. First, a com- 
 mittee to write articles for newspapers. Next, on Thursday, March 
 
CHAPTER VI 119 
 
 17, another meeting was held in the Selectmen’s Chamber. God- 
 dard was present, and the proposed postal system was again the sole 
 item on the agenda for the evening. A committee was selected to 
 confer with the local merchants (some of whom are named in the 
 minutes, nothing being left to chance). And at the meeting on 
 Tuesday, March 22, “a number of the principal Merchants of the 
 Town attended by desire in order for a conference respecting the 
 practicability of the Scheme for Colony Post Riders.” 
 
 But other things were happening between the seventeenth and the 
 twenty-second to forward the “Scheme for Colony Post Riders.” 
 By the nineteenth the Boston town clerk, William Cooper, must 
 have received from the Providence Committee of Correspondence 
 the promised letter, dated the seventeenth. This said that the com- 
 mittee had received letters from New York and Newport relative to 
 the proposal. “We are full in Opinion that the Parliment of Great 
 Brittain have no Right to impose that Regulation on us for the 
 Purpose of Rasing a Revenue in America without our Consent.” 
 The letter goes on to assure the Boston committee that Providence 
 will back up whatever plans the Boston town meeting makes. The 
 signatures of seven Providence citizens then follow. 
 
 Within two days the committee appointed on the fifteenth had 
 a news item in Isaiah Thomas’s Massachusetts Spy. 
 
 Last Monday [March 14] arrived in this Town, Mr. WILLIAM 
 GODDARD, Printer in Philadelphia and Baltimore—The Cause of 
 that Gentleman’s tour is interesting to all the Colonies, and we are happy 
 to find that all through which he has come are so thoroughly engaged in 
 it. Every Colony to the Southward of us, manifest their readiness to 
 come into the measure, provided we adopt it, and we are informed there 
 is not the shadow of a doubt of its being as warmly patronized here as 
 any where. How cheerfully will every well wisher to his Country lay 
 hold of an opportunity to risque the channel of public and private intel- 
 ligence out of the hands of a power openly inimical to its Rights and 
 Liberties. Several Meetings have already been held on the interesting 
 subject, and on the Morrow Evening it is hoped to be concluded so far 
 that Mr. Goddard may proceed Eastward, with a moral certainty of 
 carrying his point throughout the Colonies. 
 
 Thomas also printed as from a New York to a Boston gentleman 
 the letter Goddard had brought from New York. 
 
 Another press outlet for the Boston Committee of Correspondence 
 was the Boston Gazette, published by the ardent patriots, Benjamin 
 
120 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 Edes and John Gill. Its March 21 issue reprinted the news item 
 from the Spy of the seventeenth and followed this by a letter 
 written “To ——- —— ——, Esq” and signed Hortensius, in which 
 various objections to Goddard’s proposal were refuted. In the last 
 paragraph of the letter, added after the name of Hortensius as a 
 kind of postscript, is this statement: “We are informed the Patriotic 
 Doctor Franklin is severely threatened with the loss of that Place 
 [deputy postmaster general] under the British Minister.” The 
 writers of this paragraph realized that the affection for and the 
 prestige of Franklin could be one of their biggest obstacles, whereas 
 a Franklin removed from his position could be used to their ad- 
 vantage. Therefore they concluded the letter: “Many of the Patrons 
 of this new Scheme were much concerned lest it should appear un- 
 grateful to Doctor Franklin, especially at a Period when he has 
 given such signal Proof of faithfulness to his Trust, in obtaining and 
 sending over the treasonable Letters of Hutchinson, Oliver, &c. 
 But perhaps the new Post-Office may be beneficial and more agree- 
 able to the Doctor than ever was the old one.” Not until April 25 
 could the Boston Gazette confirm the rumor of Franklin’s dismissal, 
 which had taken place January 30. 
 
 The Massachusetts Gazette in its account on the twenty-fourth 
 summarized the progress so far (progress perhaps more wished for 
 than actual): “That a considerable Fund is already raised for the 
 Support of the new Posts at Philadelphia and Baltimore.—That in 
 Virginia, Maryland and Pennsylvania, they will certainly establish 
 such Riders. That at New-York the Citizens there are determined 
 to open Subscription Books for the like Purposes, as soon as the Town 
 of Boston has given a Sanction to this Capital Plan—That at New- 
 London, Norwich, Rhode-Island and Providence, they appear hearti- 
 ly in the Plan, but only wait for Boston.” This news item was read 
 by the royal governor of Massachusetts, Thomas Hutchinson, and 
 worried him. He clipped it out and mailed it to Lord Dartmouth 
 in England. 
 
 The meeting of the Boston Committee of Correspondence on 
 March 22 attended by “a Number of the principal Merchants” men- 
 tioned earlier featured the appointment of a committee on the sub- 
 ject. Five persons were appointed and “Mr. Adams the Chairman, 
 and Mr. Goddard were desired to attend the Committee.” Probably 
 for this group Goddard prepared a subscription form. An undated 
 
CHAPTER VI 121 
 
 copy of this in his handwriting is in the Boston Committee of Cor- 
 respondence papers in the New York Public Library. 
 
 With considerable pride Goddard sat down the day after this 
 meeting and wrote an exuberant letter to John Lamb in New York. 
 He was bubbling with enthusiasm, confidence, and plans as he told 
 his hopes for the future. For the citizens of Boston “I have not 
 Terms to convey to you the Sentiments I entertain of their Mag- 
 nanimity, Wisdom, Patriotism & Urbanity.” The Boston committee 
 was to meet that evening to answer the letters from New York, 
 Newport, and Providence and to write new ones for various towns 
 to the north, “whither I shall proceed with all Dispatch, determined 
 to do Business, & nothing will damp my Ardor but an Idea that I 
 cannot suffer myself to entertain that my Countrymen will abate of 
 theirs.” He hoped New York would start the ball rolling, so that 
 the city would have “the Glory of originating one of the greatest 
 Plans that, as they say, was ever engaged in since the Settlement of 
 this Country.” Articles should be written for the New York papers 
 and for Bradford’s Pennsylvania Journal. Cards and handbills 
 “under a Variety of Signatures” should be scattered. Near the end 
 of the letter he says, “I have had the Pleasure of drinking the Health 
 of the Committee of Correspondence at N.Y. Mr. Lamb, & other 
 Friends of Liberty in your City, in Company with the first Char- 
 acters here.” 
 
 At the town meeting on Thursday the twenty-fourth, held again 
 in the Selectmen’s Chamber, the final plans were made for God- 
 dard’s trip north. In the name of the committee appointed the 
 preceding Tuesday a letter, probably written by Sam Adams, was 
 presented for the northern towns and entered into the minutes. This 
 letter, dated March 24, 1774, and addressed to Marblehead, New- 
 bury Port, Portsmouth, and Salem, well shows the arguments used 
 by Goddard in support of his proposals. 
 
 Gentlemen 
 
 The Bearer of this Mr Wm Goddard has brot us Letters from our 
 worthy Brethren the Committees of Correspondence of New York 
 Newport and Providence, recommending to our Consideration the Ex- 
 pediency of making an Effort to constitute & support a Post throughout 
 America in the room of that which is now establishd by an Act of the 
 British Parliament. When we consider the Importance of a Post, by 
 which not only private Letters of Friendship and Commerce but publick 
 
122 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 Intelligence is conveyd from Colony to Colony, it seems at once proper & 
 necessary that such an one should be established as shall be under the 
 Direction of the Colonies; more especially when we further consider 
 that the British Administration & their Agents have taken every Step 
 in their Power to prevent an Union of the Colonies which is so necessary 
 for our making a successful opposition to their arbitrary Designs, and 
 which depends upon a free Communication of the Circumstances and 
 Sentiments of each to the others, and their mutual Councils. Besides, 
 the present Post Office is founded on an Act of the British Parliament 
 and raises a revenue from us without our Consent, in which View it is 
 equally as obnoxious as any other revenue Act, and in the time of the 
 Stamp Act as well as since it has been pleaded as a Precedent against us. 
 And though we have appeard to acquiesce in it, because the office was 
 thought to be of publick Utility, yet, if it is now made use of for the 
 purpose of stopping the Channels of publick Intelligence and so in Effect 
 of aiding the measures of Tyranny, as Mr Goddard informs us it is, the 
 necessity of substituting another office in its Stead must be obvious. The 
 Practicability of doing this throughout the Continent is to be considerd. 
 We by no means despair of it. But as it depends upon joynt Wisdom 
 & Firmness our, Brethren of New York are sollicitous to know the 
 Sentiments of the New England Colonies. It is therefore our earnest 
 Request that you would take this matter so interesting to America into 
 your consideration, & favor us by the return of Mr Goddard with your 
 own Sentiments, and as far as you shall be able to collect them, the 
 Sentiments of the Gentlemen of your Town & more particularly the 
 Merchants and Traders. And we further request that you would, if you 
 judge it proper, communicate your Sentiments in a Letter by Mr 
 Goddard to the Committees of Correspondence of New York & 
 Philadelphia &c. It is our present opinion that when a plan is laid 
 for the effectual Establishment and Regulation of a Post throughout 
 the Colonies upon a constitutional Footing, the Inhabitants of this Town 
 will heartily joyn in carrying it into Execution. We refer you for further 
 particulars to Mr Goddard, who seems to be deeply engagd in this 
 attempt, not only with a View of serving himself as a Printer, but equally 
 from the more generous motive of serving the Common Cause of America. 
 We wish Success to the Design and are with cordial Esteem, 
 Gentlemen, 
 Your Friends 
 & fellow Countrymen 
 
 At this same meeting a reply to the New York committee was re- 
 corded in the minutes. Then the Boston meeting voted that “Mr. 
 John Pitts be a Committee for the purpose of presenting a Sub- 
 scription Paper for the supporting a Constitutional Post Office in the 
 Colonies, to the Gentlemen of the Town for their signing.” No 
 
CHAPTER VI 123 
 
 stones were being left unturned by the energetic Boston Committee 
 of Correspondence. 
 
 The next day the happy Goddard left Boston for his well- 
 planned trip. Before leaving, he called on Sam Adams, who gave 
 him a personal letter to Elbridge Gerry to help push things along 
 for the printer when he was in Marblehead. Nor did Adams let 
 the matter rest while Goddard was beating the bushes in the prov- 
 inces. On March 29 letters were sent to the Newport and Provi- 
 dence Committees of Correspondence in reply to theirs. On the 
 thirty-first Adams wrote to James Warren in Plymouth about the 
 new proposals. Not for nothing did Sam Adams win the reputation 
 of being one of the most effective agitators for the revolutionary 
 cause. 
 
 Goddard followed carefully the route planned for him in Boston. 
 His first stop was probably Marblehead, where he called on Gerry 
 and other members of the local committee. On the evening of the 
 twenty-eighth he was in Salem and presented his Boston credentials 
 to the committee of correspondence in that community. The next 
 day a meeting, doubtless attended by Goddard, to discuss the proposal 
 was held, but no action is recorded as being taken. Apparently God- 
 dard’s plan was to present his letters in each town, talk more or less 
 privately with some of the individual committee members, and then 
 proceed on his way without waiting for a formal reply in the ex- 
 pectation of picking this up on his return journey to Boston. 
 
 On the thirty-first one of Franklin’s friends, Tuthill Hubbart, 
 wrote to him in London about all the goings-on. Hubbart said 
 that Goddard had originated the new postal plan. In a more 
 personal note he added, “indeed some says that you are threatned 
 with being displaced from the Office and they shall have it in their 
 Power to reinstate You and make it equally profhtable to You.” 
 
 Of more serious importance to Goddard was a letter written 
 April 5 by John Foxcroft, who had assumed Franklin’s postal re- 
 sponsibilities, to his superior in London, Anthony Todd. Under 
 the British laws the activities of the Baltimore printer were illegal, 
 and the appropriate authorities were looking into the punitive possi- 
 bilities. Foxcroft was in consultation with the New York colony 
 attorney-general and Mr. Jones, a lawyer in the city of New York, 
 both of whom saw difficulties in the way of a succcessful prosecution 
 of any case; “however they are both of opinion that it will be best 
 
124 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 to commence a prosecution against Goddard as soon as sufficient 
 proof can be had against him, to have the Matter determined, 
 whether he can be held to bail or not? if he can not, our Jurisdiction 
 is so circumscribed that a prosecution will have no effect and the Law 
 be entirely evaded.” The paragraph describing Goddard to Todd 
 deserves quoting not just for its derogatory picture but for the 
 supercilious attitude it reveals towards the entire colonial cause, an 
 attitude that did almost as much damage to the British armies as 
 did all the musketry of Washington’s soldiers. 
 
 Goddard was formerly Post Master of Providence and at present owes 
 the Office near One Hundred Pounds lawful Money, he left that place 
 in debt and since has been many times in prison with his Press and 
 Journeymen and you may rely on it, notwithstanding the publication in 
 Boston, that he is only supported by a Set of licentious people of desperate 
 Fortunes whose sole Consequence, nay even Dependance, is on their 
 fishing in troubled Waters; Men of property both in and out of Trade 
 hold him and his Scheme in the greatest Contempt and Abhorrence, as 
 tending to disturb the public peace and Tranquility of America. 
 
 On Friday, the first of April, Goddard was in Portsmouth, New 
 Hampshire, after paying his respects in Newburyport on the way 
 north. The Boston Gazette of April 11 inserted a dispatch from 
 Portsmouth dated April 8 telling about his arrival, wishing his 
 mission success, and concluding: “. . . we are informed there is not 
 the Shadow of a doubt of its being warmly patronized by the genuine 
 Sons of Liberty in Portsmouth, who are to meet at Union-Hall this 
 Afternoon—How cheerfully will every well Wisher to his Country 
 lay hold of an Opportunity to rescue the Channel of Public and 
 Private Intelligence out of the Hands of a Power, openly inimical 
 to its Rights and Liberties.” 
 
 Though Goddard is recorded as not leaving Portsmouth until 
 the thirteenth, he did not stay in this town all the two weeks. Some- 
 time during this interval he traveled up to Casco Bay for a visit to 
 Falmouth, now Portland. His route in Maine took him through 
 the settlements of Wells, Kennebunk, and Biddeford, where no 
 doubt he turned the conversation during the evenings in taverns to 
 his proposals. The northernmost link in his chain of postriders 
 would be Falmouth. 
 
 The return trip to Boston took a week. At each town where 
 he had dropped off a letter from the Boston Committee of Cor- 
 
CHAPTER VI 125 
 
 respondence he now picked up a reply. Most of these replies were 
 ready and waiting for him before Goddard actually rode into the 
 town. For example, those of Portsmouth and Newbury are dated 
 April 11. The one from Salem must not have been ready when 
 Goddard reined in his horse there, because this is dated the twentieth, 
 the day of his arrival in Boston. He had been given letters to four 
 mercantile communities but returned with five, Newbury stating its 
 satisfaction as well as Newburyport. Portsmouth in its reply said 
 that the merchants and traders “are now subscribing” for the postal 
 plan. Newbury was “well pleased with the Proposal.” Timothy 
 Pickering, as town clerk of Salem, wrote at some length about the 
 financial difficulties of his community. A hospital for smallpox 
 inoculation, costing £1900, had just been built, and the townsmen 
 were in a turmoil over the possible advantages and disadvantages of 
 inoculation. Opposition had been so strong that the town had been 
 forced to close down the hospital. “However, notwithstanding 
 these difficulties, a subscription was begun yesterday.” 
 
 Edes and Gill inserted in their Boston Gazette of April 25 under 
 the Boston date-line an enthusiastic news item about the trip north- 
 ward as far as Casco Bay: 
 
 Last Wednesday [April 20] arrived in this Town from the Eastward, 
 Mr. William Goddard, by whom Letters are received from the Com- 
 mittees of Correspondence of Portsmouth, Newbury, Newbury-Port, 
 Salem, &c. expressive of the hearty Concurrence of the Gentlemen in 
 those Towns with the Proposal of erecting a Post-Office upon constitu- 
 tional Principles, throughout this Continent. Subscriptions are set on 
 foot in each of them, and they have already succeeded beyond the most 
 sanguine Expectation in all—The Removal of Dr. Franklin from the 
 Post-Office has added fresh Spirit to the Promoters of this salutary Plan, 
 as several viewed an Opposition to his Interest, at a Time when he had 
 signally served the Cause of America, as a very disagreeable Object; 
 but all Reluctance from that Quarter must now vanish, and all the 
 Friends of Liberty rejoice that they now have an Opportunity of taking 
 up a Gentleman discarded by an unrighteous Ministry for the faithful 
 Discharge of his Duty, and placing him above a Dependence on their 
 Caprice, in the grateful Arms of his applauding Countrymen. 
 
 The Boston Committee of Correspondence now really got down 
 to work on the problem of how to put the proposal into actual opera- 
 tion. On the evening of the twenty-fifth the first of several meet- 
 ings was held in the Selectmen’s Chamber. Goddard formally pre- 
 
126 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 sented the replies from the towns he had just visited. Then a 
 subcommittee composed of Samuel Adams, Dr. Benjamin Church, 
 Dr. Thomas Young, Nathaniel Appleton, and Joseph Greenleaf 
 was selected to work out the details. The next evening another 
 meeting was held, and the subcommittee “had leave to sit again.” 
 A day later the subcommittee brought forward a proposed draft, only 
 to have the meeting recommit their proposal and put them to work 
 again. Apparently the desired changes were minor since the sub- 
 committee is recorded as reporting again that same evening, though 
 no indication is given in the minutes what action was taken. 
 
 In spite of the omission in the minutes of an official approval 
 the Boston group led by Sam Adams started to put its plan into 
 execution on April 30. Subscription blanks headed “The PLAN for 
 establishing a New American POST-OFFICE” were printed, prob- 
 ably by Edes and Gill. Copies of these were circulated and actual 
 subscriptions taken. The Boston Gazette two days later reported: 
 “The second Gentleman to whom it was presented, generously en- 
 gaged Fifty Pounds, Lawful Money, and many others have done as 
 handsomely in proportion to their Circumstances.” Of Goddard it 
 was said that he would now be able to set out towards the south, 
 “rejoicing in the great Success which hath attended his Endeavours 
 to rescue the Channel of pudlic and private Intelligence from the 
 horrid Fangs of ministerial Dependents.” 
 
 A copy of the subscription form is to be found in the John Carter 
 Brown Library. At the top of the broadside is an inscription in 
 Goddard’s graceful handwriting, “To the Gent". of the Committee 
 of Correspondence for the Town of Newbury, from their most 
 humble Ser".,” and signed W™. Goddard. The broadside reveals 
 the arguments used and the general outline of the new private 
 postal system as Goddard and the Boston group conceived it. 
 
 . .. [By means of the British postal system] a Set of Officers, Ministerial 
 indeed, in their Creation, Direction and Dependance are maintained in 
 the Colonies, into whose Hands all the social, commercial and political 
 Intelligence of the Continent is necessarily committed; which, at this 
 Time, every one must consider as dangerous in the extreme. It is not 
 only our Letters that are liable to be stopt and opened by a Ministerial 
 Mandate, and their Contents construed into treasonable Conspiracies, but 
 our News-Papers, those necessary & important Alarms in Time of public 
 Danger, may be rendered of little Consequence for want of Circulation. 
 
CHAPTER VI 127 
 
 Whenever it shall be thought proper to restrain the Liberty of the Press, 
 or injure an Individual, how easily may it be effected! A Postmaster- 
 General may dismiss a Rider, and substitute his Hostler in his Place, who 
 may tax the News-Papers to a Prohibition; and when the Master is 
 remonstrated to upon the Head, he may deny he has any Concern in 
 the Matter, and tell the Printer he must make his Terms with the Post. 
 [Goddard is writing this from personal experience; in fact, he used as 
 one of his arguments this statement: “The sum of fifty-two pounds 
 sterling, Pennsylvania currency, per annum was demanded at the Post 
 Office for the carriage of about three hundred and fifty news-papers, one 
 hundred and thirty miles, payable in weekly payments, as the papers were 
 delivered to the Posts.” ] 
 
 . it is therefore proposed. ‘That Subscriptions be opened for the 
 Establishment and Maintenance of a Post-Office; and for the necessary 
 Defence of Post-Officers and Riders employed in the same. 
 
 That the Subscribers, in each Colony, shall annually appoint a Com- 
 mittee from among themselves, consisting of seven Persons, whose 
 Business it shall be to appoint Post-Masters in all Places within their 
 respective Provinces, where such Offices have hitherto been kept, or may 
 hereafter be judged necessary; and to regulate the Postage of Letters 
 and Packets, with the Terms on which News-Papers are to be carried; 
 which Regulations shall be printed and set up in each respective Office. 
 
 . . . That a Post-Master General shall be annually chosen, by the 
 written Votes of all the Provincial Committees, inclosed and sent to the 
 Chairman of the New-York Committee. .. . 
 
 IN Order that the foregoing Plan may be carried into Execution, 
 We the Subscribers do severally promise to pay the several Sums annexed 
 to our Names, to the Chairman of the Committee to be appointed in 
 Pursuance of said Plan, whenever according to the Conditions thereof 
 
 they shall be called for by him or his Successor in Office. 
 Boston, APRIL 30, 1774. 
 
 During this time the newspapers were not inactive. Apparently 
 the keen eye of Isaiah Thomas first noticed in one of the London 
 papers a letter which seemed peculiarly appropriate to the situation. 
 In typical colonial fashion several newspapers reprinted this, in- 
 cluding Purdie and Dixon’s Virginia Gazette, whose readers were 
 given Goddard’s activities in considerable detail through the fol- 
 lowing August. Thomas’s Spy printed the London letter on April 
 22, and the Williamsburg paper on May 26, which presented it under 
 a Boston date-line of April 21 after the account of Goddard’s return 
 to Boston. Purdie and Dixon prefaced the letter: 
 
128 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 To the PRINTER. 
 
 Sir, 
 
 Be pleased to present to your Readers the following short Address of 
 a prophetick Pennsylvanian [Franklin? ] to Lord North, in Consequence 
 of the happy Dismission of Dr. Franklin from the ministerial Post Office 
 in America, extracted from a London Paper of the 5th of February last. 
 I heartily congratulate my Countrymen on this auspicious Event, and 
 am persuaded they will now unanimously join in verifying the Prediction 
 of our absent Friend; and I believe I may say, without any extraordinary 
 Gift of Prophecy, that a CONSTITUTIONAL AMERICAN POST 
 OFFICE will be permanently established in six Weeks from the 21st 
 Day of April, 1774. 
 
 A New Englandman. 
 
 [Quite possibly the “New Englandman” may have been Goddard; the 
 last clause of this introduction sounds much like him. ] 
 
 To Lord North 
 My Lord, 
 
 As an American, give me Leave to assure your Lordship that I think 
 the dismissing Dr. Franklin from the Office of Postmaster General in 
 North America, at this particular Crisis, one of the most fortunate Events 
 that could have happened for that Country. It was that Gentleman 
 that brought the Post Office in America to be of some Consequence, and 
 to yield something of a Revenue to the Mother Country. The People 
 there never liked the Institution, and only acquiesced in it out of their 
 unbounded Affection for the Person that held the Office, who had taken 
 infinite Pains to render it convenient to the several Colonies. But what 
 will follow now, my Lord? I will tell you: The Post from Philadelphia 
 to Boston is that alone which produces any Profit worth mentioning; the 
 others, taken together, do not more than maintain themselves; and be- 
 tween Philadelphia and Boston, you may depend on it, the Americans 
 will immediately set up a Carrier of their own, which you, with all your 
 Brethren in Power, together with Lord Hillsborough’s Abilities, cannot 
 prevent, and thereby they will entirely starve your Post between these 
 capital Cities; and thus will happily end your boasted Post Office, so often 
 given as a PRECEDENT for raking the Americans. 
 
 A PENNSYLVANIAN. 
 
 On April 26 Thomas Pownall, former royal governor of Massa- 
 chusetts, echoed the sentiments of “a Pennsylvanian” during the 
 course of a speech in Parliament when he said that the colonists 
 “now send their letters by couriers, instead of the post, from one 
 town to another; and I can say, your post-office will very soon be 
 deprived of its revenue.” Speeches and letters like these, of course, 
 made Goddard’s task of persuasion just that much easier. 
 
CHAPTER VI 129 
 
 On the third of May the Boston Committee of Correspondence 
 met again. This time Dr. Young of the subcommittee submitted a 
 draft of a letter to be sent the “Southern Governments,” i.e., the 
 Committees of Correspondence of Philadelphia, New York, New- 
 port, and Providence. The minutes read that the clerk was “to 
 provide Mr. Goddard with a Copy” of this letter, which was ap- 
 proved by the meeting. The final letter, as recorded in the minutes, 
 is dated May 5. 
 
 In the meantime news of what was happening in New England 
 had reached Philadelphia. Governor William Franklin on May 3 
 wrote to his father in London: “Your Friends in Boston, as I am told, 
 before they heard of your running any Risk of a Dismission, were 
 encouraging Goddard in his new Post Office, which, if successful, 
 must have deprived you of your Salary as Postmaster General even 
 if you had not been deprived of your Office.” As phrased by the 
 royal governor, this was not news to please his father. 
 
 Returning to the traveler, we find the Boston Gazette reporting 
 Goddard’s departure from Boston on May 9: “This Day Mr. Wil- 
 liam Goddard set out on his Return Homewards, taking Providence, 
 Newport and the principal Towns in Connecticut in his Way. The 
 last mentioned Colony is the only one in New-England who has not 
 greatly encouraged his Undertaking, and there can hardly be a 
 Question whether a Plan, so conservative of American Liberty, will 
 be favoured by that patriotic People or no, when laid before them.” 
 
 From Boston the Baltimore newspaperman went to Providence, 
 there to deliver one of the letters from Boston and to do what he 
 could to push affairs along. The Providence Committee of Corre- 
 spondence now showed no reluctance. On May 13 an enthusiastic 
 letter was sent from Providence to the Hartford Committee of 
 Correspondence. The first sentence reads: “We wish this to recom- 
 mend to you the Business that Mr Goddard is engaged in as highly 
 worthy of your Notice.” 
 
 On the sixteenth Goddard was in Newport, probably expecting 
 to leave the next day, since we have two letters which he wrote from 
 Newport on that date. One was to Peter Vandervoort, a2 merchant 
 in New York; the other was to John Lamb. In both letters God- 
 dard asked for certain unnamed articles to be forwarded, presumably 
 subscription forms and the like, to other towns south of New York. 
 In his letter to Lamb, Goddard says that his next stops would be in 
 
130 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 Connecticut, where “I shall set out this Day... , & as soon as Sub- 
 scriptions are opened in the principal Towns on the Post Roads & 
 Postmasters nominated, I shall repair to New York, which I hope 
 will be within 10 Days.” 
 
 A report from a New York newspaper tells us that Goddard 
 arrived in that town on Saturday, May 28. Apparently things had 
 gone well with his proposals in Hartford, New London, and the 
 various towns along the Boston Post Road; in fact, New London 
 had opened up a subscription as early as April 4. By Monday 
 morning he was ready to leave New York since his friends there had 
 already started the operation of the new postal system. A New-York 
 Journal article of June 2 defends the “Constitutional Post Office” 
 from its calumniators and indicates that riders were at work on a 
 regular schedule between New York and Philadelphia. When 
 Purdie and Dixon reprinted this article in their Virginia Gazette 
 of July 7, they appended as a bracketed and italicized remark (the 
 article had ended with the hope that the new system would “in a 
 few Weeks, be carried into complete Execution”): “The sooner the 
 better, for the publick Good.” 
 
 “The vast noise and bustle which has lately appeared in almost 
 all the papers relative to the POSTOFFICE in America . . .” opens 
 a letter written from Philadelphia to Williamsburg printed in Mrs. 
 Rind’s Virginia Gazette, April 21, 1774. Clearly enough, in returning 
 to Philadelphia, Goddard was not on an unknown mission. Though 
 he must have had some difficulties assuaging the feelings of certain 
 individuals, he did succeed in getting his plan into effect. William 
 Bradford apparently as early as April 21 had become the local 
 postmaster for the new constitutional or Goddard’s post office, as it 
 was sometimes called. The letter quoted above goes on to imply 
 that the Philadelphia merchants selected Bradford in preference to 
 Goddard, who was not liked, but more likely Goddard was not even 
 a candidate since he had severed his connections in Philadelphia 
 when he closed down the Pennsylvania Chronicle the preceding 
 February. At any rate, the new system was already in operation by 
 the time Goddard passed through Philadelphia on his way to Balti- 
 more during the first week of June. Subscriptions had been taken, 
 a postmaster been appointed, and postriders been secured. A Mr. 
 Stinson is spoken of on May 19 as riding the post between Phila- 
 
CHAPTER VI I31 
 
 
 
 delphia and Baltimore. (Stinson may well have been the William 
 Stenson mentioned by Goddard in December, 1773.) 
 
 An article signed Amor Patriae in the Maryland Journal of 
 June 4 bears all the earmarks of having been written by Goddard. 
 He reveals little specific information but does proudly say: “A 
 complete plan for establishing a new American post OFFICE hath 
 lately been executed at Boston, where, as well as in many other 
 principal towns to the northward, it has been so liberally encouraged 
 and so nobly patronized by a very considerable number of principal 
 gentlemen and others that no doubt seems now to remain of its 
 being very seasonably carried into execution throughout the whole 
 continent.” 
 
 During the summer months of 1774 Goddard busied himself 
 in extending southward the operations of the Constitutional Post 
 Office. By the first of June, as we have seen, it was a going concern 
 from Baltimore to Falmouth. The first important city below Balti- 
 more was Annapolis. No doubt this continuation southward was 
 arranged so easily by Goddard and the printers of the Maryland 
 Gazette, Anne Catherine Green and her son Frederick, that it 
 warranted no discussion in either the Annapolis or the Baltimore 
 papers. 
 
 On the second of July Goddard published in the Maryland 
 Journal a lengthy article, most of which is a reprint of the subscrip- 
 tion form first printed in Boston on April 30. The opening sentences 
 of the article give the present condition of the new system: “The 
 Printer of this Paper, with great Pleasure, acquaints the Public, that 
 his Proposal for establishing an AMERICAN POST-OFFICE, on con- 
 stitutional Principles, hath been warmly and generously patronized 
 by the Friends of Freedom in all the great commercial Towns in 
 the Eastern Colonies, where ample Funds are already secured, 
 Post-Masters and Riders engaged, and, indeed, every necessary 
 Arrangement made for the Reception of the Southern Mails, which, 
 it is expected, will soon be extended thither—As therefore the final 
 success of the Undertaking now depends on the Public-spirit of the 
 Inhabitants of Maryland and Virginia, it is not doubted . . . but they 
 will cheerfully join... .” 
 
 Two weeks later another article informed the Baltimore public 
 that the new post offices would soon be in operation “from Virginia 
 to Casco-Bay.’ Goddard’s activities and plans are revealed: “On 
 
132 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 the Return of a particular Agent, who is just setting off for Virginia, 
 the Public will have further Intelligence of the State of the Enter- 
 prize in Question, which the Friends of Freedom and their country 
 wish to see compleated by the first of September next, that being the 
 Time appointed for the Meeting of the grand congress at Phila- 
 delphia—a Body that cannot, with any Degree of Consistency or 
 Safety, intrust or encourage the Tools of those who have forged our 
 Chains, and are striving to rule us with a Rod of Iron.” In other 
 words, the system was to be extended to Williamsburg; then what 
 we now call the First Continental Congress was to take over the 
 running of the entire setup. 
 
 Before Goddard’s visit to Williamsburg there had been much 
 ado in the Williamsburg papers about the proposed post offices. 
 Purdie and Dixon were continuing to reprint many of the accounts 
 from the Boston and New York papers, including the subscription 
 form of April 30. Mrs. Rind in her similarly named Virginia 
 Gazette had not printed any of these notices; instead it was in her 
 newspaper that the attack on Goddard of April 21 had appeared. 
 Goddard and Holt may have suspected that Joseph Galloway or 
 someone directly under his influence had written this attack since 
 Holt’s New-York Journal of July 14 had a contribution from P. Q. 
 censuring Galloway and three other individuals for their assumption 
 of the role of Philadelphia’s Committee of Correspondence. 
 Whether Galloway or not, the letter-writer of April 21 continued his 
 campaign against Goddard in Mrs. Rind’s July 21 Virginia Gazette, 
 asserting that the peripatetic printer had had his proposals rejected 
 in Philadelphia at a “meeting of mechanics.” 
 
 William Goddard was not the kind of person to take these 
 attacks lying down. In Purdie and Dixon’s paper of August 4 he 
 announced in an anonymous letter, dated July 25, that he would 
 set out for Williamsburg “in a few Days” to present in person his 
 proposals to the colony’s assembly and the local committee of cor- 
 respondence. But it was in Mrs. Rind’s paper of the same day that 
 he made his counterattack on the letter-writer from Philadelphia. 
 Signing himself “A Lover of Justice,” he said the two letters “con- 
 tain the grossest misrepresentations in some parts, and the most 
 palpab(le] and impudent falshoods in others, which will be made 
 fully to appea[r] whenever the writer, or his correspondent, shall 
 have the spirit to st{and] forth from their dark retreat, and avow 
 
CHAPTER VI 133 
 
 those insidious and inhu[man] attempts to injure the reputation of 
 a person who is a stranger in t[his] province.” 
 
 A few days after July 25, therefore, Goddard rode down to 
 Williamsburg to complete the last link of his chain. (Aware of the 
 sparse population of the Carolinas and Georgia, Goddard was 
 probably little interested in pushing the system farther south. Also, 
 Hugh Finlay in his journal writes at great length about the general 
 inefficiency and sloppiness of the post offices in the Carolinas.) In 
 spite of the campaign against him by the anonymous Philadelphian 
 he was again successful in his attempt, so that the Williamsburg an- 
 nouncement of August 11 is really the announcement of the com- 
 pletion of what Goddard had set out to accomplish just six months 
 earlier. Not only did the Williamsburg Committee of Correspond- 
 ence approve, but the Virginia colony put itself on record as recom- 
 mending that the Continental Congress take over the Constitutional 
 Post Offices. It was a similar instruction from the Virginia colony 
 which resulted in the introduction in the Continental Congress on 
 June 7, 1776, by Richard Henry Lee of the resolution affirming 
 independence. The Williamsburg news item of August 11 in Purdie 
 and Dixon’s version of the Virginia Gazette reads: “Mr. Goddard’s 
 Proposals and Plan for establishing an AMERICAN POST OF- 
 FICE on constitutional Principles, which appears, by Letters from 
 the Committees of Correspondence and principal Gentlemen of 
 many respectable Provinces and Towns, to have met with the most 
 generous Patronage and warmest Approbation, were agitated at the 
 late Convention of the Representatives of this Colony [from the first 
 to the sixth of August], who justly considered the Object Mr. God- 
 dard is pursuing of great Importance to America, highly worthy the 
 Attention of the General Congress, and as such, particularly recom- 
 mended it to the Gentlemen appointed Delegates from this Colony.” 
 And so a functioning postal system in opposition to the official British 
 one was by this date a going concern from Casco Bay in Maine to 
 Williamsburg, Virginia. No small achievement for the Baltimore 
 printer! 
 
 The next and final promotional step was to get the Continental 
 Congress to take over the system. The first attempt made by God- 
 dard was unsuccessful. An entry in the Journal of Continental 
 Congress dated Wednesday, October 5, 1774, reads: “An address 
 from William Goddard to the Congress was read and ordered to lie 
 
134 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 on the table.” No other action or discussion is recorded for the 
 First Continental Congress. Apparently the influence of such con- 
 servatives as Joseph Galloway was too strong at this time. 
 
 During the winter of 1774-1775 Goddard traveled through the 
 colonies again in efforts to expand and strengthen his system. 
 Probably it was on these travels that Goddard was seized in Phila- 
 delphia and again placed in the city jail as a debtor. To secure his 
 release, he had to petition the Pennsylvania Assembly and go 
 through the equivalent of bankruptcy. On March 18, 1775, the 
 Assembly passed a bill releasing Goddard, and he was now ready 
 to resume his postal activities. The effectiveness of these activities 
 is evidenced by the notice sent out in March, 1775, by the post- 
 master general in London to his American deputies. He could no 
 longer give positive directions to them, but they must use their own 
 discretion and judgment since no more was expected of them. A far 
 cry from Foxcroft’s arrogant letter of almost a year before. 
 
 John Foxcroft as the operating head of the British post office 
 in the colonies inevitably became the target of abuse by Goddard 
 and his supporters. Foxcroft had his headquarters in New York, 
 where John Holt, John Lamb, and several others of the most active 
 and vociferous colonial partisans were also. On May 2 Goddard 
 issued in New York a broadside attacking Foxcroft. The contents 
 of the handbill provide us with little information except how 
 vituperative Goddard could be on occasion. 
 
 On May 7 Hartford appointed William Ellery postmaster “to 
 Recive and forward all Letters untill the Business of the Post office 
 shall be regulated by the Continental Congress.” By this time 
 more persons than Goddard expected Congressional action. On 
 this same seventh of May Titus Hosmer of Middletown, Connecti- 
 cut, wrote to Goddard, telling him, “I have seen as many of the 
 Committee as I could conveniently and we have agreed to nominate 
 as a Post-Master for this Town Mr. Wensley Hobby.” The next 
 day the Hartford paper published an article on the local appoint- 
 ment, which also contained a list of “Goddard’s Post-Offices.” This 
 list names postmasters from Cambridge, Massachusetts (Boston was 
 at this time occupied by British troops), to Williamsburg, Virginia. 
 Such doughty patriots as Isaiah Thomas, Thaddeus Burr, and John 
 Holt are included. Postriders are listed starting from Falmouth. 
 Several of these postriders had formerly worked for the British 
 
CHAPTER VI 135 
 
 system, such as Peter and Benjamin Mumford, whose activities Hugh 
 Finlay had complained of. Between Cambridge and New York 
 there were different routes for the mails to go. One went from 
 Cambridge to Hartford, probably through Worcester, and then on 
 to New York. Another rider took his way from Cambridge to 
 Providence, to Newport, to New London, and thence to New York. 
 A third rider varied this last route by going through Norwich in- 
 stead of Newport as a stop between Providence and New London. 
 
 The Second Continental Congress started its meetings in Phila- 
 delphia May 10, 1775. The battles of Lexington and Concord had 
 occurred the previous April 19, and the mood of this Congress was 
 much different from the first. Apparently in the expectation that 
 the Congress would assume the responsibilities for Goddard’s post 
 offices, several of the colonial assemblies now took over the postal 
 operations from the local Committees of Correspondence: Massa- 
 chusetts on May 12; New Hampshire on May 18. Then on May 
 29, 1775, the Second Continental Congress “Resolved, that Mr. 
 Franklin, Mr. Lynch, Mr. Lee, Mr. Willing, Mr. S. Adams, and 
 Mr. P. Livingston, be a Committee to consider the best means of 
 establishing Posts for conveying Letters and Intelligence through 
 this Continent.” 
 
 The final action on a report from this committee was taken 
 July 26, 1775, when the Continental Congress adopted a postal 
 system in opposition to the British. Franklin was at the same time 
 elected Postmaster General. Later Franklin appointed his son-in- 
 law, Richard Bache, as comptroller. Goddard was made surveyor, 
 a minuscule post that disappointed him. By its action of July 26, 
 however, Congress ratified and gave status to Goddard’s post offices. 
 
 The British system continued to operate irregularly and feebly 
 for some time. The remarks made in a debate in Congress on 
 October 7, 1775, imply that the British mails were functioning most 
 in Georgia. This debate was over a motion by Richard Henry Lee 
 that “parliamentary or ministerial posts” should be stopped. Action 
 on this motion was indefinitely postponed, there still being many 
 members of Congress who wanted to offend England as little as 
 possible. The Maryland Assembly finally took matters into its own 
 hands on December 11, 1775, when it passed a motion forbidding 
 the Parliamentary post to go through the province. The effective- 
 
136 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 ness of the motion is admitted by the announcement officially ending 
 the British system on Christmas Day: 
 
 General Post-Office, New-York, December 25, 1775. 
 
 Whereas, the Provincial Convention at Annapolis has passed a Resolve, 
 “That the Parliamentary Post (as they are pleased to term it) shall 
 not be permitted to suffer or travel in, or pass through that Province 
 with any mail, packages, or letters;” and, in consequence of that Resolve, 
 have taken his Majesty’s mail from the Post-Office at Baltimore, with the 
 letters contained therein. The Committee at Philadelphia having also 
 taken the mail containing all the last packet letters to the Southward, 
 opened many of them, to the great hurt of individuals; and signified to 
 the Postmaster their intention of stopping all others for the future; and 
 other of his Majesty’s mails having been taken and obstructed, notice is 
 hereby given to the publick, that the Deputy Postmaster-General is 
 obliged, for the present, to stop all the Posts. ‘They are also hereby 
 desired to take notice, that for the safety of the letters coming by the next 
 or any future packet, they will be kept on board, and the names of those 
 who shall have letters will be advertised, that may either apply them- 
 selves, or write to their friends in this city to take them up. An order in 
 writing from the person to whom any letters may be directed will be 
 necessary. 
 Francis Dashwood, Secretary. 
 
 More than six months before the Declaration of Independence 
 was promulgated in Philadelphia the channels of communication in 
 the colonies were completely (except, of course, in areas occupied 
 by the British army) under the control of the colonial authorities 
 thanks to the efforts of William Goddard. As Carl Bridenbaugh 
 has phrased it: “Thus occurred the first institutional change of the 
 American Revolution. . . . Indeed, the Colonial Post Office had 
 played a vital role in bringing about American independence; the 
 committees of correspondence could not have succeeded had not 
 communication lanes been so readily available.” 
 
- VII. 
 
 ALTIMORE, the scene of William Goddard’s activities for 
 
 almost twenty years, in the 1770’s was only beginning to show 
 indications of its future importance. Its population in 1775 has been 
 estimated at 5,934, a figure surpassed by several colonial communi- 
 ties. The nation’s first census in 1790 gave the town’s inhabitants as 
 13,503. Though probably few other colonists would have agreed 
 with the Baltimoreans of the early 1770’s, we must still be aware of 
 their faith in the town’s potential growth. The six thousand burghers 
 could not create the well-nigh metropolitan atmosphere of the 
 Philadelphia of this period, but there was much of the urbane and 
 cosmopolitan about the Maryland town. A building on Market 
 Street was set aside for theatrical performances. Like Philadelphia, 
 Baltimore had not only many German settlers, but it also had on 
 South Charles Street an area called Frenchtown, named after the 
 Acadians who had made their homes there since their forced migra- 
 tion in 1755. In typical Baltimore fashion besides six churches 
 there were three breweries when Goddard first moved into the 
 settlement. The one shipyard and the two ropewalks kept a few 
 families fed, but many other cities along the Atlantic coast surpassed 
 this commercial representation. 
 
 Because Baltimore was not the Maryland capital, Annapolis 
 instead had been the scene of printing activity for many years. 
 Since 1738 Jonas Green, great-grandson of Samuel Green of the 
 seventeenth-century Cambridge press, had printed there and had 
 published a weekly newspaper, the Maryland Gazette. On his 
 death in 1767, the widow, Anne Catherine Green, took over the 
 business. At the time of Goddard’s arrival in Baltimore the An- 
 napolis firm was operating as Anne Catherine Green & Son. The 
 son, Frederick Green, continued as a printer in Annapolis from 1775, 
 when his mother died, until his own death in 1811. The business 
 
138 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 had never produced a fortune, but the government printing had 
 provided a comfortable living for the Greens. 
 
 Though Goddard was not Baltimore’s first printer, no one before 
 him had managed to make a go of it nor had anybody even tried to 
 start a newspaper. The first printer was Nicholas Hasselbach, who 
 is supposed to have learned the trade in the German shop of Chris- 
 topher Sower in Germantown. There is a record of his buying 
 property in Baltimore on July 6, 1765, and the one imprint extant 
 from his shop is dated that same year. Little else is known of his 
 shop’s activities. Hasselbach himself died at sea in late 1769 or 
 early 1770 on his way to England, and his wife seemingly made no 
 attempt to continue the business. In 1773 she sold his press and 
 types to Goddard. According to a tradition reported by Wroth, 
 Goddard thought he was buying Caslon type. After he discovered 
 his error, he was able to sell the type to Francis Bailey of Lancaster. 
 
 The next printers in Baltimore were Robert Hodge and Fred- 
 erick Shober. They announced their partnership by an advertisement 
 dated October 31, 1772, in the Maryland Gazette of November 5. 
 Only one imprint remains from their shop; they apparently moved 
 to New York by the end of the year. 
 
 Isaiah Thomas says that the next printer was Enoch Story, the 
 younger, who ran a print shop from the end of 1772. The three 
 extant imprints all date from 1774 and 1775, so it is possible that 
 Thomas erred by two years. More likely, since Goddard himself 
 carefully read through Thomas’s History of Printing and wrote down 
 all the errors he noticed and his eye did not catch this as an error, 
 Story did start work in 1772, but no imprint of 1772 or 1773 remains 
 today. Like the widow Hasselbach, Story sold his equipment to 
 Goddard in 1775 and returned to Philadelphia. 
 
 The week before Hodge and Shober made their announcement 
 in the Maryland Gazette, William Goddard advertised his expecta- 
 tions of opening a print shop in Baltimore. Specifically, the ad- 
 vertisement, dated October 20 (Goddard’s thirty-second birthday), 
 proposed the publication of a newspaper to be entitled The Mary- 
 land Journal, and Baltimore Advertiser. In contrast to the Gazette’s 
 twelve and six for annual subscriptions Goddard set his price at ten 
 shillings, the same rate he was charging for the Pennsylvania 
 Chronicle. Though Goddard spoke of the encouragement he had 
 
CHAPTER VII 139 
 
 “some Time since received from many Gentlemen” in Baltimore, 
 one suspects that the idea of establishing a paper in the Maryland 
 port occurred to him in the afterglow of the 1772 assembly elections, 
 when he had received many votes. Anyway, he said he had “en- 
 gaged a suitable Printing-Apparatus” for work “both in the English 
 and other Languages.” He hoped to avoid the early Philadelphia 
 financial difficulties by requiring one-half of the subscription costs in 
 advance. The new paper would “contain every material Piece of 
 Intelligence, either foreign or domestic, with Accounts of the Arrival 
 and Departure of Ships, the current Prices of Goods, the Course of 
 Exchange, Deaths, Accidents, and Events of every Kind, that may 
 be thought interesting to the Publick.” Newspapers, pamphlets, 
 and magazines from the other colonies, Great Britain and Ireland, 
 as well as Germany would be received and perused for the benefit of 
 the proposed newspaper. Having his Philadelphia experience in 
 mind, Goddard said that “the Freedom of the Press shall be main- 
 tained, the utmost Impartiality observed, and every well-written 
 Piece admitted, without Scruple, that does not tend to destroy or im- 
 pair our excellent Constitution, injure the Cause of Liberty, disturb 
 the Repose of Society, give Offence to Modesty, or, in any Shape, 
 reflect Scandal on a News-Paper.” 
 
 During the spring of 1773 Goddard must have made many trips 
 between Baltimore and Philadelphia. By May 20 he could advertise 
 in the Maryland Gazette that his shop at the corner of South and 
 Baltimore streets was now open for business. The notice is dated 
 May 12, so this is the probable date for the opening of the Balti- 
 more print shop. In the Pennsylvania Chronicle of May 31 there 
 is another notice, dated May 26, about the new shop. Mostly it 
 repeats the Gazette advertisement, but it does tell us that “W1iLL1aM 
 Gopparp’s English and German Printing Office is removed from the 
 House of Mrs. Hasselbach, to that of Mr. Jacob Mohler, Clock and 
 Watchmaker, near the Corner of South and Market Streets.” Both 
 notices requested that subscription agents turn in the names and 
 addresses of the subscribers, so that the new paper might get 
 started. Readers of the Chronicle were assured that the Philadelphia 
 paper would be continued “as usual.” 
 
 Probably during most of 1773 Mary Katherine Goddard super- 
 vised the operations of the Philadelphia shop while her brother 
 
140 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 busied himself in Baltimore. We can also deduce that at this time 
 Goddard had every intention of maintaining the two shops. Though 
 he had not paid off the debts of the old Galloway-Wharton partner- 
 ship and no longer had any of the Pennsylvania Assembly printing, 
 the Chronicle was finally a profitable operation, and Goddard once 
 again was thinking in hyperbole. Later in life he said that he started 
 business in Baltimore with only a guinea of capital—romantic non- 
 sense if ever there was. Though the partnership debts would land 
 him in a Philadelphia jail in early 1775, it was no pauper who 
 started the Maryland Journal in 1773. Certainly Goddard did not 
 think of himself as that. He was making what he hoped would be 
 an expansion of a profitable business. Each newspaper would help 
 the other, and together they would provide an increased efficiency. 
 Typical of one helping the other is the notice in the June 14 Chroni- 
 cle asking for a compositor, in both English and German, for the new 
 Baltimore shop. (The continued emphasis on German makes one 
 suspect that Mrs. Hasselbach had made quite a point of this potential 
 business when she sold Goddard her late husband’s equipment.) 
 Finally, on Saturday, August 20, 1773, the long-awaited Mary- 
 land Journal made its initial appearance, and Baltimore had its first 
 newspaper. Isaiah Thomas in his History of Printing described the 
 Journal as “handsomely printed on a demy sheet,” and John T. 
 Scharf called the presswork “admirable.” The coat-of-arms of the 
 Maryland colony was placed in the flag. Tradition (reported in 
 Scharf’s Chronicles of Baltimore) has it that the engraving of 
 these arms was done by Sparrow at Annapolis. The following 
 December Goddard in a letter (referred to in the previous chapter) 
 to John Lamb in New York inquired after the “Maryland arms that 
 Dawkins was to execute for me.” Henry Dawkins must never have 
 done the work since the Sparrow engraving continued in use until 
 1776, when it was dropped. Underneath the title was a quotation 
 from Horace, “He carries every point who blends the useful with the 
 agreeable, Amusing his reader while he instructs him.” (Transla- 
 tion is by Scharf.) No doubt the haste in getting out the issue 
 caused the glaring error of the date-line—Friday instead of Saturday. 
 On page one there is the usual statement of the printer “To the 
 Public.” Not so confident now, Goddard apologized for the delay 
 in starting the Journal, blaming it on the difficulty in getting to- 
 
CHAPTER VII I4I 
 
 gether printing materials, “an inadequate Number of Subscribers,” 
 and “several unfortunate Events which have happened to me.” 
 The troubles in securing a postrider between Philadelphia and Balti- 
 more were gone into in some detail. But when this problem was 
 solved, he would receive the papers from the other colonies and even 
 the “British and Irish Papers.” In heavy capitals Goddard promised 
 his readers that the new paper should be “FREE and of NO 
 PARTY”—a promise he and his sister fulfilled for almost twenty 
 years. 
 
 Elsewhere in the opening issue the printer advertised for “An 
 active faithful Man, who can write a tolerable Hand, and keep a 
 fair Account ... to ride as a private Posr or Carrier between this 
 Town and Philadelphia, once a Week.” On the same page (three) 
 Goddard inserted a notice requesting ship captains and anybody else 
 having news information to keep him posted. Also there was a 
 pseudonymous letter addressed to Messrs. Chase and Paca and 
 signed Hononcrononthotontologus. It is not difficult to see why this 
 did not become a popular name to sign the innumerable letters 
 published in eighteenth-century newspapers. On page four George 
 Washington had the first of his many advertisements in the Mary- 
 land Journal. Finally at the end of the paper there was this 
 colophon: “Baltimore: Printed by William Goddard, at the Printing- 
 Office in Market-Street, opposite the Coffee-House. . . .” 
 
 In the next issue, August 28, Goddard advertised again for a 
 rider and apologized to his readers for inconveniencing them. He 
 also requested in this same issue the services of “A soBER Lap, as an 
 Apprentice to the Printinc Business.” Later, on September 9, he 
 advertised for “one or two sober Journeymen Printers, who can and 
 will work.” Obviously he was having troubles with the staff he had 
 recruited from the vicinity of Baltimore. 
 
 Unfortunately, the help was not the only problem Goddard had 
 in getting his Journal on its feet. During most of the fall the ap- 
 pearance of the paper was irregular, contrasting with the clocklike 
 regularity Mary Katherine maintained for the Pennsylvania Chroni- 
 cle. So often was this true that the November 20 issue featured an 
 apologetic statement by the printer: “The Proprietor of this Paper, 
 who hath been several Weeks on a Tour to the Northern Colonies, 
 for the Benefit of his Health, is just returned. ... The Printing 
 
142 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 Business, in general, he is determined, under their [his customers’] 
 Favour, to prosecute in this Place, with the most persevering In- 
 dustry, and the MaryLanp Journal, and BALTimorE ADVERTISER, 
 in particular, being so very respectably patronized, shall, im future, 
 be the primary Object of his Care and Attention.” The notice con- 
 cluded with the hope of the publisher to be “able speedily and 
 effectually to remove” all the obstacles to regular publication. Ap- 
 parently during Goddard’s sickness there had been rumors in Balti- 
 more that the printer was more interested in the Philadelphia branch 
 of the Goddard business and would let the Baltimore paper languish, 
 and this in spite of the respectable patronage; so Goddard was forced 
 to explicitly state his intentions. 
 
 Difficulties with paper supplies are revealed by the olive-drab ap- 
 pearance of the November 20 Journal. A week later the same hue 
 of the paper caused Goddard to say: “The Printer hereof not having 
 received a Supply of good fair Paper, which he contracted for and 
 expected, is, for the present, under the disagreeable Necessity of 
 using this dark complexioned Sort.” Not until December 18 was 
 the printer able to change from his “dark complexioned” paper. 
 
 Il] health, inadequate paper supply, and staff troubles must all 
 have added up to make the launching of the new Baltimore news- 
 paper a trying time for Goddard. In the Journal of November 27 he 
 advertised for “two Journeymen Compositors, and one Pressman.” 
 Circulation was good, and the commercial activities of Baltimore must 
 have provided a reasonable amount of job printing. But Goddard 
 took a drastic step, which he announced in a news item under the 
 Baltimore date-line of December 9: “The Printer of this Paper has 
 laboured under the greatest Disadvantages since the Institution of 
 the Maryland Journal, particularly in being obliged to employ a 
 worthless Set of Hands, and the most inartificial of the Occupation— 
 but he has now discharged the whole Knot that infested his Office, 
 and engaged a regular Set, whereby he hopes to give greater Satisfac- 
 tion to his Customers in future.” For some time afterwards publica- 
 tion was more regular, evidencing either the truth of this statement 
 or the closer application of Goddard to the business. 
 
 As in Providence Goddard was printing the community’s first 
 newspaper. In this role there were many functions that the paper 
 played in assisting the town’s commercial and cultural development. 
 
CHAPTER VII 143 
 
 One can be followed throughout the fall of 1773. Michael Kraus 
 has traced the idea of a private circulating library back to John 
 Mein’s twelve-hundred-volume establishment in Boston in 1765. 
 Shortly afterwards Lewis Nicola and Thomas Bradford set up a 
 similar business in Philadelphia. Though Goddard apparently had 
 no hand in the Baltimore institution, he must have followed with 
 interest the activities of Joseph Rathell. Rathell was a schoolmaster 
 in Baltimore who had in the first issue of the Journal advertised his 
 services as a private tutor in addition to his duties in the classroom. 
 The self-described “Teacher of the English Language, Writing- 
 master and Accomptant” sought another method of supplementing 
 his income in the Journal of October 23. He proposed the establish- 
 ment of a “Circulating Library in Baltimore-Town.” Subscription 
 proposals were to be distributed on the following Tuesday (October 
 26) at the Coffee House, the Fountain Inn, and the printing office. 
 Other places in the vicinity were also named. These proposals, issued 
 also as a broadside (a copy is to be found in the Maryland Historical 
 Society), constitute the first item under Goddard’s name recorded 
 in Wroth’s listing of colonial Maryland imprints. The broadside 
 assured its readers that “Libraries have become objects of attention in 
 every polite part of America” and that once a “suitable number of 
 yearly subscribers” was secured, a library of “not less than eight 
 hundred volumes” would be supplied. Catalogues for the con- 
 venience of subscribers would be printed. The library itself would 
 include the following categories (a list suggesting the tastes of the 
 potential subscribers): Latin classics, history, poetry, religion, phi- 
 losophy, physics, agriculture, logic, rhetoric, mathematics, astronomy, 
 geography, chronology, cookery, voyages, travels, adventures, mis- 
 cellanies (the eigtheenth-century counterpart of today’s anthologies), 
 novels, plays, magazines, memoirs, pamphlets, essays, “and every 
 other work of Merit, Erudition and true Humour. Additions to 
 the original holdings would be derived from the “newest Publications 
 from London.” ‘The method of operation was that each subscriber 
 would pay four dollars a year and have the privilege of taking out 
 as many books as he pleased, one at a time. 
 
 The October 30 follow-up advertisement, besides saying that the 
 proposals were already out, included a parenthetical remark about 
 competition from Annapolis: “the Subscription to the Avmnapolis 
 
144 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 Library is one Guinea per Annum, besides the Expence of a Dollar 
 a Year for Carriage of Books from thence to this Place by Water.” 
 Obviously Rathell was worrying about competition from the An- 
 napolis bookseller William Aikman, who immediately set up a branch 
 agent in Baltimore, Christopher Johnston, advertising this on Oc- 
 tober 30. All during the month of November Aikman repeated his 
 advertisement, not only for his circulating library, but for the sale of 
 books. How Rathell and Aikman fared in the competition for the 
 trade of the Baltimore readers we do not know, since both discon- 
 tinued their advertisements, probably for reasons of economy, in the 
 later columns of the Journal. But clearly the presence of the new 
 paper and print shop had led to a definite improvement in the facility 
 with which the readers of Baltimore could secure books. 
 
 The expansion of business caused Goddard to seek larger quarters. 
 By December 30 he had moved to a new location, only a short dis- 
 tance from the old, indicated by the colophon of that date: “Printed 
 by William Goddard, at the Printing-Office in Market-Street, next 
 Door-above Dr. John Stevenson’s and two Doors below the Fountain- 
 Tun? 
 
 A lighter note for the modern reader and a notice that must have 
 entertained the eighteenth-century Baltimorean as well is to be 
 found in the issue of January 20. 
 
 Baltimore, Jan. 18, 1774. 
 
 Catherine Treen, the wife of the subscriber, having, in violation of 
 her solemn vow, behaved herself in the most disgraceful manner, by 
 leaving her own place of abode, and living in a criminal state with a 
 certain William Collins, a plaisterer, under whose bed she was, last night, 
 discovered, endeavouring to conceal herself, her much injured husband, 
 therefore, in justice to himself, thinks it absolutely necessary to forewarn 
 all persons from trusting her on this account, being determined, after such 
 flagrant proof of her prostitution, to pay no debts of her contracting from 
 the date hereof. 
 
 Henry Treen. 
 
 As recounted in the preceding chapter, on February 8, 1774, ap- 
 peared the last issue of the Pennsylvania Chronicle, and on February 
 17 Mary Katherine took over the management of the Journal. For 
 almost three years William’s energies were bound up with the affairs 
 of the postal system, and the experienced Mary Katherine had to 
 carry on the paper and the business alone. Early in 1774 William, 
 
CHAPTER VII 145 
 
 bitten by the bug of his postal scheme, was enabled by the well 
 proved abilities of Mary Katherine to take off on the journey we 
 have already described. During this trip he must have had few 
 worries over the Baltimore shop, knowing her capacities. It would 
 be a pleasure if we could talk about her personality, but we have 
 today none of her personal letters, and, contrary to her brother’s 
 practice, she almost never allowed her personal affairs to intrude 
 into her newspaper. A picture of her, the only one we have, ap- 
 pended to her 1783 almanac, shows a not unattractive woman in her 
 mid-forties. The most striking feature is the thin lines of the lips 
 and the fierce, dogged determination they reveal. As publisher of 
 the Maryland Journal during all the years of the Revolution she 
 needed whatever determination she could muster. 
 
 Soon after she took over the Baltimore paper she ran into troubles 
 which caused the Journal to appear with this date-line: “From Thurs- 
 day, March 10, to Thursday, March 31, 1774.” She apologized in 
 a brief note to her readers for the long delay in publication, occasioned 
 by a “Multiplicity of business, respecting the Election now de- 
 pending.” As the war drew near, she frequently had struggles in 
 maintaining any kind of regular schedule for publication—a difficulty 
 she shared with most colonial editors of this period. Insufficient 
 supplies of the usual folio sheets occasionally forced her to print the 
 Journal on small-sized sheets. However, we must admit that her 
 carrying on the Journal during the entire Revolutionary War was no 
 small achievement. 
 
 More than likely the financial difficulties William Goddard was 
 having in Philadelphia in February and March, 1775, caused the 
 temporary removal of a colophon from the Maryland Journal start- 
 ing with the issue of February 6. Until then the colophon read, 
 “Printed by William Goddard.” Upon his release from the Phila- 
 delphia jail on March 18, Goddard must have made some kind of 
 financial arrangement with his sister. We have no record of this 
 agreement, but on May 10, 1775, the colophon becomes, “Baltimore: 
 Published by M.K. Goddard, at the Printing-Offce in Market- 
 Street, next Door above Dr. John Stevenson’s.” And so it remained 
 for the duration of the war, not only for the newspaper but for all 
 publications issued by the Goddard press. 
 
 Among the people in Philadelphia learning of Goddard’s being 
 
146 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 in jail for debt was a printer named Andrew Stewart, who deduced 
 from the Baltimore printer’s circumstances that here was an op- 
 portunity for him. Who Stewart was we are not sure, but he may 
 well have been the Andrew Steuart who edited the North-Carolina 
 Gazette from 1764 to 1766 in Wilmington, North Carolina. Any- 
 way, Stewart advertised proposals in the March 2, 1775, Rivington’s 
 New-York Gazetteer for a newspaper to be named the Maryland 
 Gazette and the Baltimore Advertiser, to start as soon as one thousand 
 subscriptions were pledged. Also, “Advertisements of a moderate 
 length, shall be inserted three times in this paper for Five Shillings” 
 —probably the going rate at the time. No more is heard of either 
 Andrew Stewart or the proposed paper, the vigor with which Mary 
 Katherine pursued her editorial duties no doubt proving an effective 
 deterrent to Stewart’s potential subscribers. 
 
 The change of the American-British struggle from political to 
 military was recorded quickly in the columns of the Journal. The 
 first incomplete news was in the issue of April 26, exactly a week 
 after the Lexington and Concord expedition of the British forces in 
 Boston. This item was date-lined Watertown (Massachusetts-Bay ) 
 April 19. That afternoon more complete news came through, 
 and Mary Katherine hustled this into print as a broadside—an extra 
 in the newspaper parlance of today. The note at the bottom of this 
 broadside reveals how the news arrived so quickly: “The above is a 
 true Copy, as received by Express from New-Haven, &c. attested bv 
 the Committee of Correspondence from Town to Town.” The lead- 
 ers of the colonial cause considered it imperative that their version 
 of the Lexington and Concord affair reach the ears of the American 
 public before any British account. So effective were they in this 
 attempt that the British never even tried to get their version into 
 print outside Boston, and the colonists had only the committee of 
 correspondence account. The committees were performing the 
 functions conceived for them by Sam Adams. 
 
 During the spring of 1775 the colonial struggle was not the 
 only problem for Mary Katherine. Her future competitor, John 
 Dunlap, had learned the printing business from his uncle, William 
 Dunlap. In 1771 he had started the Pennsylvania Packet, a news- 
 paper he continued under various names until 1795. He was ap- 
 pointed printer to Congress in 1778. Sometime during the spring 
 
CHAPTER VII 147 
 
 of 1775 he set up a branch office in Baltimore and made James 
 Hayes, Jr., its manager. On May 2 this new print shop issued the 
 first number of Dunlap’s Maryland Gazette; or the Baltimore Gen- 
 eral Advertiser. Wayes, under the name of Dunlap, continued to 
 run the shop and print the newspaper in competition with Mary 
 Katherine until September 8, 1778, when the pressure of business 
 in Philadelphia probably made Dunlap want to get rid of his 
 Baltimore branch, and so Hayes took over on his own. He continued 
 for almost a year, until July 5, 1779, after which he moved to 
 Annapolis. 
 
 The Journal of November 8, 1775, carried in its columns an 
 advertisement for linen rags “for the Use of the Paper Manufactory, 
 now erecting near this Town.” Probably the proposed paper mill 
 did not go into operation for some time since not until the issue of 
 April 8, 1777, does Mary Katherine announce the Journal as printed 
 on paper from the new mill at Elkridge Landing. The Maryland 
 Convention had on May 26, 1776, granted James Dorsett four 
 hundred pounds to set up a paper mill. More than likely this was 
 the mill in which William Goddard had a financial interest and the 
 one that started operations in early 1777. 
 
 In the fall of 1775 the administration of the colonial postal 
 system was given by Congress to Benjamin Franklin. Goddard 
 hoped to get the second post in the system—the comptrollership. 
 Instead Franklin made his son-in-law, Richard Bache, comptroller. 
 Goddard was offered the postmastership at Baltimore or the sur- 
 veyorship of the system. He accepted the low-paying position of 
 surveyor, no doubt feeling greatly chagrined at the turn of events. 
 Mary Katherine was made the postmistress of Baltimore, and a notice 
 regarding the “Constitutional Post-Office” in the Journal of October 
 II, 1775, is signed M. K. Goddard. Thereby she became, as far as 
 we have any record, the first postmistress in the colonies and the only 
 one in an important position under the new government after 
 July 4, 1776. 
 
 Goddard’s duties in his new position required that he travel 
 about the country checking the routes, etc. Ezra Stiles records a 
 meeting with Goddard in Wrentham, Massachusetts, on November 
 21, 1775. The conversation that evening, centering on which 
 members of the Continental Congress would likely vote for inde- 
 
148 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 pendence, showed how much the minister and the printer and 
 obviously many other colonial leaders supported the break with 
 England almost eight months before its eventual promulgation. 
 Stiles calls Goddard “very much acquainted with the principal 
 characters of the present day.” Then he entered into his diary the 
 probable vote of each member along with the presumed wealth of 
 most. At the end Stiles summarized the estimated vote by colonies 
 as ten for and three against (New York, Pennsylvania, and Mary- 
 land). As early as November, 1775, there were many in the colonies 
 who were not only talking about independence but were confidently 
 expecting it to take place. (Why the discussion should have in- 
 cluded the wealth of the members is hard to tell now, since no eco- 
 nomic determinism either for or against independence is discover- 
 able from the figures in Stiles’s diary. Of course, that may have 
 been the point.) 
 
 Though he doubtless had other convivial evenings of talk be- 
 fore tavern fireplaces besides the one in Wrentham, Goddard 
 was quite unhappy in his position as surveyor of the postal system. 
 He felt that his accomplishments in 1774 and 1775 deserved much 
 more consideration and reward. Also, no love was lost between 
 Franklin and Goddard. As a result, on June 21, 1776, while in 
 New York, the postal surveyor wrote a memorial to Congress peti- 
 tioning for a commission in the army. Goddard said how much he 
 had suffered financially in order to set up the colonial postal system 
 in opposition to the British. His position as surveyor maintained 
 him, but that was all. More important, the preliminary work of 
 getting the system going was now finished. Since the country needed 
 men in its army, could he have one of the field grade positions in 
 either of two regiments currently without a colonel as commanding 
 officer? The petition was read by Congress on June 24 and referred 
 to the Board of War. This board, without comment, then referred 
 it to Washington. On July 29, 1776, Washington made his reply. 
 Unfortunately for Goddard, the commander-in-chief was doing his 
 best at this time to accept as few political appointees to his army as 
 he could; therefore he strongly recommended that no commission 
 be awarded. One of his aides, Colonel Parsons, spoke with Goddard 
 and assured him that there were too many experienced officers who 
 deserved promotion before such a political appointment should be 
 
CHAPTER VII 149 
 
 made. Goddard had too few friends in Congress for any attempt 
 to be made to overrule Washington’s decision, and so he remained 
 in the postal service, much disgruntled. 
 
 His travels took Goddard through the colonies a great deal. 
 On September 15, 1776, Ezra Stiles refers to his being in Newport 
 after leaving New York a week before. This time their conversation 
 was on military prospects. On November 20 he was in Baltimore; 
 an affadavit of that date, now in the Maryland Hall of Records, 
 bears his signature as a witness. By the winter of 1776-1777 
 Richard Bache was postmaster general in place of his father-in-law, 
 who had departed for France, but Goddard was not promoted. 
 
 Inevitably Bache and Goddard quarreled and the latter resigned. 
 In a letter to John Hancock, as president of Congress, dated Janu- 
 ary 18, 1777, Bache reported that Ebenezer Hazard of New York 
 had been appointed to the surveyorship. Goddard “whilst in Office, 
 did Business in a very careless, slovenly Manner.” Bache then 
 narrated the incident precipitating the resignation: “Immediately 
 upon my receiving the late Resolve of Congress to establish more 
 frequent, the Current of Intelligence between the Armys of the 
 Northern and Middle Departments and the Congress, I sent off the 
 late Surveyor of the Post Office to carry this Resolve into Execution, 
 he got as far in his Journey as Hackensack, where he found the Army 
 under General Washington retreating, he thought proper to retreat 
 along with it as far as Newark, where he staid for some Time, and 
 then came back again to Philadelphia desponding, and appearing to 
 me, as if he gave the whole American Cause up; I was a good deal 
 chagrined at his Return, & as he had frequently threaten’d to resign 
 his Office, I thought this a proper Time for him to do it.” This 
 letter is the only account we have of the resignation, and from this 
 distance it is impossible to judge the merits of one side or the other. 
 No doubt Goddard’s dislike of the Franklin family did not make 
 him a satisfactory employee, and it was better to sacrifice Goddard 
 than the influential Bache. Though it has not been preserved, 
 probably Goddard?s side of the incident was given in a petition to the 
 Continental Congress, read on January 10,1777. It was referred to 
 the Board of War, so that Goddard must have been again trying to 
 get a commission in the army in spite of the aspersions cast on the 
 
150 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 printer’s courage and loyalty by Bache. No other record of this 
 petition is to be found; obviously nothing came of it. 
 
 Shortly after the first of the year Goddard was back in Baltimore 
 helping his sister get out the Maryland Journal. Mary Katherine 
 had recently taken on the business of bookbinding in addition to her 
 printing and bookselling, as an advertisement of December 11, 1776, 
 informed her customers. All during 1776 she had had much trouble 
 with her paper supply. In Philadelphia Goddard had numbered his 
 pages consecutively through each annual volume. Until July 3, 
 1776, Mary Katherine had continued this practice in the Journal, 
 but this made only too obvious the irregularity of publication, and 
 therefore was discontinued. Life as a printer in the midst of the 
 Revolutionary War was difficult, but she was managing to keep 
 things going. In issues of February 25 and March 4, 1777, she 
 did snipe at the statements of a competitive bookbinder, William 
 Pritchard, but otherwise Mary Katherine refused to be drawn into 
 the disputes her brother could never avoid. 
 
 -This serenity was interrupted by the violent quarrel William 
 had with the members of a Baltimore organization calling itself 
 the Whig Club—a quarrel which threw the whole Maryland com- 
 munity into a turmoil. To understand this turbulent affair, we 
 should go back to May 29, 1776, when George Somerville called on 
 Mary Katherine at her printing office. As she described the call in 
 a letter to the Baltimore Committee of Safety, he “abused her with 
 threats and indecent language on account of a late publication in 
 her paper.” On June 3 the committee met to consider her letter 
 and, “conceiving it to be their duty to inquire into everything that 
 has a tendency to restrain the liberty of the Press,” ordered Somer- 
 ville to appear before them that afternoon at three o’clock. At first 
 Somerville ignored the summons, but, the committee promptly 
 sending soldiers out for him, he found himself before them not too 
 many minutes after three. He was reprimanded severely, made to 
 apologize, and released on good behavior. Evident throughout the 
 entire incident is the committee’s assumption of the importance of 
 the “liberty of the Press.” 
 
 Another bit of background is supplied by William Eddis, the 
 surveyor of customs for the British at Annapolis. He reported on 
 May 31, 1776, that within Baltimore a group calling itself the Whig 
 
CHAPTER VII 151 
 
 Club had been organized. Eddis thought the aim of the group 
 was to seize the royal governor, then on a ship (along with the port 
 surveyor) in the Chesapeake Bay. Though nothing came of this 
 purported scheme, the Whig Club of Baltimore continued to func- 
 tion. During the winter months of 1776-1777 the club became 
 more active as it acquired new members from the men on leave 
 from Washington’s army. The club’s method of operation was to 
 send individuals whom it suspected of Toryism into banishment by 
 means of anonymous notes signed “Legion.” On January 9, 1777, 
 the Maryland Council of Safety warned the Baltimore County Com- 
 mittee of Observation about the Whig Club’s activities as “contrary 
 to the twenty-fifth section of the Declaration of Rights.” The local 
 committee, four days later, replied that they did not know who the 
 members of the club were, but that Mr. Edwards of the town guard 
 had received one of the notices of banishment. To show its respect- 
 ability, the club on February 11, 1777, published in the Maryland 
 Journal a statement of purpose and a set of rules. 
 
 The president of the Whig Club at this time was Captain (acting 
 Commodore) James Nicholson. In March, 1776, while in com- 
 mand of the state ship Defence, he drove a British sloop, the Otter, 
 out of the Patapsco River and recaptured a prize from her. After 
 this one naval exploit Nicholson rested and never thereafter sullied 
 his record by anything as plebeian as combat. Instead, he became 
 the Revolutionary counterpart of today’s briefcase-carrying Pentagon 
 admiral. In June, 1776, he was appointed by the Continental Con- 
 gress to superintend the building and the fitting out of the Virginia. 
 Not until 1778 did this ship leave harbor, and then on March 31 it 
 was captured by the British without a round of shot having been 
 fired from her guns. In spite of this record so successful was the 
 brave commodore in his forays into Philadelphia that the Continental 
 Congress in October, 1776, named him number one in the order of 
 seniority among naval captains. In this position Nicholson not only 
 continued his efforts not to fight the British but thwarted almost 
 everybody else’s attempts to contact the enemy—and succeeded 
 rather well in both enterprises. John Paul Jones may have beaten 
 the Serapis, but he could not prevail against the senior captain of 
 the United States Navy in the halls of Congress. In disgust Jones 
 left this country in 1783, never to return. Another exploit of the 
 
152 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 commodore resulted in a reprimand from the Maryland Council of 
 Safety. As “Captain Snug-in-Harbor” he found it necessary to 
 maintain a full complement for the unfinished Virginia. Privateers 
 and ships not involved in Nicholson’s seniority were known to have 
 attacked British ships, and the seamen of Baltimore did not want to 
 sail under the distinguished stay-at-home. As a result, Nicholson’s 
 officers resorted to press gangs in the streets of Baltimore. Within 
 Maryland there was much criticism including the reprimand men- 
 tioned, but Nicholson fought his usual successful holding action 
 within Congress, and nothing except a short temporary suspension 
 came of the various appeals to that body by governors, councils, and 
 private citizens. It was Goddard’s. misfortune to run afoul of the 
 commodore’s brand of patriotism, always the concern of those “snug 
 in harbor,” not of those at sea. 
 
 Samuel Chase, one of the Maryland signers of the Declaration 
 of Independence, was worried about the seeming receptivity shown 
 by many Americans to the peace offers made by the British. As 
 part of a campaign against these offers, in the February 25, 1777, 
 Journal he published two short articles, which soon threw all Balti- 
 more into an uproar, at least after the Whig Club had read them. 
 Chase had given the articles to Goddard, who in turn gave them to 
 his sister for publication. The first anonymous paragraph appeared 
 on page two: 
 
 To the Printer. 
 
 Through the channel of your Paper, I take the liberty to congratulate 
 my countrymen on the important intelligence, this day received by 
 Congress.—The terms of peace offered, by General Howe, to America, 
 manifest the magnanimity, generosity, humanity, and virtue of the British 
 nation. The offers of peace, and, in return, to require only our friendship, 
 and a preference in our trade and commerce, bespeak the ancient spirit 
 and love of liberty, which was once the acknowledged and boasted char- 
 acteristick of an Englishman. My soul overflows with gratitude to the 
 patriotic virtuous King, the august incorruptible Parliament, and wise 
 disinterested Ministry of Britain. I am lost in the contemplation of their 
 private and public virtues. I disbelieve and forget, nay will readily be- 
 lieve every assertion, that the monarch of Britain is a sullen and inexorable 
 tyrant, the Parliament venal and corrupt, and the Ministry abandoned 
 and bloody, as wicked and base calumnies. I am not able to express the 
 feelings of my soul on the prospect of immediately seeing my native 
 country blessed with peace and plenty. I am almost induced to complain 
 of Congress for concealing one moment these glad tidings; however I 
 
CHAPTER VII 153 
 
 will anticipate the pleasure, and claim thanks from all lovers of peace, 
 for thus early communicating what may be relied on as literally true. 
 Yours, &c. 
 TOM TELL-TRUTH. 
 
 Baltimore, Feb. 20, 1777. 
 
 Directly opposite, on page three, was this implied comment on 
 Tom Tell-Truth: 
 
 For the MaryLAND JOURNAL. 
 
 Many and various Stratagems have been already practised by the 
 insidious and wicked Court of Britain, and her artful Agents, to deceive 
 and divide the open, generous, unsuspecting Americans. One more 
 Attempt is made. A Report is industriously circulated, that the Com- 
 missioners of Britain, Lord and General Howe, through General Lee, 
 have offered to Congress honourable Terms of Negociation. Be not 
 deceived my Countrymen. Expect nothing but Fraud, Force, Rapine, 
 Murder, and Desolation from the Hands of the Tyrant of Britain, and 
 his base and bloody Partisans. Neglect not one Moment to collect your 
 Forces, to drive the Enemies of Peace, Liberty and Virtue from your 
 Country. Shun any Connexion with the People of Britain, as with a 
 common and infected Prostitute. “The Sun beholds not a more perfidious, 
 corrupt and wicked People. My Soul detests them as the Gates of Hell. 
 
 I have it not in my Power to communicate the Letter from General 
 Lee to Congress. I have seen his Letters to his Friends, to whom he 
 writes, ““That by Permission of Lord and General Howe, he had wrote 
 to the Congress, requesting them to depute two or three Gentlemen to 
 New-York, to whom he wishes to communicate something, deeply in- 
 teresting not only to himself, but, he thinks, the Public.” 
 
 “Timeo Danaos, et Dona ferentes.” 
 
 I suspect the Commissioners, nay, their most conciliatmg OFFERS. 
 
 CAVETO! 
 
 According to Goddard the irony of Tom Tell-Truth so thorough- 
 ly eluded the members of the Whig Club that some of them came 
 to Chase for advice about what to do to Goddard. Chase, not taking 
 them seriously, said that Miss Goddard should be tarred and feath- 
 ered. The reaction of Chase makes clear that neither he nor the 
 two Goddards had any expectation that what was written as irony 
 would be taken literally, a miscomprehension by no means unknown 
 in the history of irony; but events dramatically proved them wrong. 
 On the evening of March 3 the club met at its usual meeting place— 
 David Rusk’s tavern. As a result of the deliberations it was de- 
 termined to find out the name of the author of Tom Tell-Truth. 
 
154 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 (Caveto was ignored.) Lieutenant-Colonel Nathaniel Ramsay and 
 George Turnbull called on Mary Katherine to divulge the author. 
 She referred them to her brother as the deliverer of the article at 
 issue. On asking Goddard the same question, the two club members 
 received a resounding refusal. Back to Rusk’s tavern Ramsay and 
 Turnbull went to reveal the results of their mission. More delibera- 
 tion and Captain John Slaymaker was sent to Goddard with a hand- 
 written note requesting him to attend the next evening’s meeting, 
 at six o’clock, of the Whig Club. The note was signed Legion. 
 
 At six o’clock on the evening of the fourth Goddard was not at 
 Rusk’s tavern, so a delegation of six, some armed, was sent to his 
 house to bring him forcibly to the meeting. One of the print shop’s 
 workmen, Justus Brown, was with Goddard at the time and ac- 
 companied the group to the tavern. Upon arrival Brown was refused 
 admittance to the club room and had to spend the evening at the bar. 
 Apparently there was a bit of a struggle before Goddard would go, 
 but the six, combined with the printer’s rheumatism, were enough 
 to make any delay perfunctory. In the club room Commodore 
 Nicholson was in the chair. Goddard was again asked who the 
 author of Tom Teli-Truth was and again refused to name him. 
 The meeting with Goddard lasted until nine-thirty, long enough 
 for everybody to become insulted and insulting. The net result 
 was that the Whig Club, on one of the different occasions when 
 Goddard, still under guard, was shunted out of the club room into 
 the bar, voted to banish the printer from Baltimore. The written 
 notice was handed to him about ten o’clock by Captain David Plunket 
 after Goddard had returned to his living quarters with Brown. This 
 notice, again signed Legion, said that banishment from the town was 
 to be effective by twelve the next morning (later Goddard poked 
 fun at this timekeeping) and from the county in three days. 
 
 Rheumatism momentarily forgotten, Goddard did leave town 
 the next day, his destination the state capital Annapolis. There he 
 wasted little time in preparing a memorial, dated the sixth of March, 
 addressed to the Maryland Council of Safety delineating his 
 troubles, excoriating the members of the Whig Club, and requesting 
 the protection of the laws and the censure of the club. The council 
 referred the memorial to the state assembly then in session. On 
 March 7 the legislature considered the matter and referred it to its 
 
CHAPTER VII 155 
 
 
 
 Committee of Aggrievances to find out the truth in the affair. This 
 report was ready by the tenth, and on that date an account favorable 
 to Goddard was submitted. The conclusion of the Committee was 
 “that such proceedings [of the Whig Club] are a manifest Violation 
 of the Constitution, directly contrary to the Declaration of Rights... , 
 and tend in their consequences . . . to the overthrow of all Regular 
 Government.” 
 
 Content with this state of affairs for the moment, Goddard re- 
 turned to Baltimore only to be greeted by a broadside, dated March 
 11, from the Whig Club defending its actions. No copy of this 
 broadside has survived, but fortunately for us Goddard reprinted it 
 in his pamphlet less than a week later. The gist of the defense is 
 contained in a word placed in large capitals—recommended. God- 
 dard was recommended to leave Baltimore; to the club’s “gentle 
 entreaty and mild argument Mr. Goddard opposed the most mulish 
 obstinacy and brutal impoliteness.” No mention was made of Caveto 
 on page three of the by now well-known issue of the Maryland 
 Journal of February 25; only Tom Tell-Truth came in for more 
 denunciation. 
 
 Goddard was never one to take such comments quietly. So he 
 busied himself in his rooms over the print shop preparing his de- 
 fense; instead of a broadside he wrote a twenty-page pamphlet. This 
 appeared with the date March 17, so Baltimoreans did not have 
 long to wait for the next installment of the Whig Club affair. This 
 pamphlet, entitled The Prowess of the Whig Club, and the 
 Manoeuvres of Legion, had the appropriate couplet from Swift on 
 the titlepage: “These Demoniacs let me dub/ With the Name of 
 Lecion-CLus.” Of course, Goddard gave his version of the events 
 and embroidered them with his choicest epithets. The members of 
 the Whig Club were “a motley crew of extortioners, military petti- 
 foggers, and petty clerks, amphibious heroes, and deluded artists” — 
 and these terms were footnoted to indicate their accuracy. More to 
 the point Goddard gave m toto his memorial to the Maryland 
 Council of Safety, the note from the Whig Club banishing him from 
 Baltimore, and the report to the assembly of the Committee of Ag- 
 grievances. In an appendix were included the Whig Club broadside 
 of March 11 and the two articles from the pen of Samuel Chase 
 which had started all the uproar. Earlier Goddard had stated that 
 
156 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 the articles were “written by one of the Delegates to Congress.” 
 It should not have been too difficult for the local readers to deduce 
 the figure of Chase behind the pseudonym of Tom Tell-Truth, 
 though apparently not too many of them were so observant. God- 
 dard concluded the main part of the pamphlet with this threatening 
 N. B.: “A KEY to the names and characters of the Legion, who have 
 become so famous by their expedition against Tom Tell-Truth, will 
 be published, as soon as it shall appear necessary.” 
 
 For several days the community remained superficially calm 
 while The Prowess was read by everybody, including the members of 
 the group presided over by Commodore Nicholson. But this latter 
 group of readers became more and more uncomfortable as they heard 
 the jibes of the people of Baltimore. Finally on Tuesday, March 25, 
 the Whig Club erupted into action and caused one of the first of the 
 many riots for which Baltimore was notorious. From the various 
 depositions made a few days later we can reconstruct the events of 
 ithe day in some detail. 
 
 Between ten and eleven in the morning of the twenty-fifth, 
 headed by Commodore Nicholson, several men armed with sticks 
 and cutlasses came up the street towards the Goddard printing estab- 
 lishment. They first surrounded the building, so that no one could 
 escape from within. Then the Commodore, armed with a stick, ran 
 up the staircase to the workroom where Goddard was and grabbed 
 hold of the printer to force him downstairs. One of the workmen 
 shut the door, only to have it immediately pushed open by others of 
 the Whig Club, who then joined in the struggle. One of the work- 
 men, Justus Brown, later said that he was much bruised on the arms 
 and back by the fight and thought it best, when Goddard was in- 
 evitably dragged away, to spend the afternoon in the country. 
 Another of the workmen was thrown downstairs by Benjamin Nichol- 
 son and badly hurt. Goddard, who, according to Brown, had been 
 under a physician’s care for his rheumatism, after getting his face 
 bloodied, was forced down the stairs and outside. Here his pockets 
 were searched by several of the club members. The commander 
 of the Virginia started to hit Goddard with his stick but was stopped 
 from doing so by his compatriots. Instead, grabbing the printer by 
 the collar, he pushed his victim down the street towards Rusk’s 
 tavern. Henry Sheaf, a friend of Goddard’s, was standing in the 
 
CHAPTER VII 157 
 
 
 
 doorway of Hayes’s print shop as the procession passed. Captain 
 James Cox, one of the Whig Clubbers, greeted Sheaf with this sneer, 
 “Where are your fifty men to support Goddard?” To this remark 
 Commodore Nicholson added, “You damned rascal, I will fifty 
 men you,” and swung his stick menacingly. 
 
 While Goddard was being escorted to the club room at Rusk’s 
 tavern, Mary Katherine was doing her best to help her brother. 
 First, she requested Andrew Wilson to go to the captain of the 
 town guard, William Galbraith, and ask his assistance in quelling the 
 riot and preventing the threatened loss of her brother’s life at the 
 hands of Nicholson’s mob. Captain Galbraith’s reply was that he 
 could do nothing without the specific orders of the chairman of the 
 Baltimore committee. (Probably he meant the committee of ob- 
 servation.) To prove his point, Galbraith produced his orders, but 
 he did dispatch one of his corporals, Murdock Kennedy, to Nathaniel 
 Smith, captain of the troops stationed in Baltimore. Smith, a mem- 
 ber of the Whig Club, was at Rusk’s tavern awaiting the arrival of 
 Nicholson and his motley crew. He told Kennedy that Galbraith 
 could have part of his men, but he would not command them or 
 order them in any way; in fact, “he would sooner lay down his 
 commission than order his men to fire on such a body of gentlemen.” 
 Smith then went up in person to the guardhouse and repeated his 
 sentiments to Galbraith, adding that “there was not above two or 
 three words to be said to Mr. Goddard and then he would be dis- 
 missed.” With this comment Smith returned to the tavern not to 
 miss the “two or three words.” Meanwhile Miss Goddard had gone 
 herself to Captain Galbraith to find out why nothing was being done. 
 He read through his orders to her to prove his hands were tied. A 
 boy was then sent to the committee chairman, James Calhoun, fol- 
 lowed shortly by Mary Katherine. Calhoun, apparently not know- 
 ing what was afoot, in reply to the boy’s request for orders for 
 Captain Galbraith said that he had none. Miss Goddard then ap- 
 peared on the scene and demanded that Calhoun dispatch orders 
 to Galbraith. He responded, “Captain Galbraith’s Guard [was] 
 very insufficient for that purpose, and might only occasion her brother 
 being worse treated than he otherwise would be and should give no 
 orders about it.” As a result, in spite of all this running around by 
 various people nothing was done by anybody constituted to maintain 
 
158 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 law and order in the community. (Because of the unsettled con- 
 ditions of the Revolution there were no magistrates functioning as 
 yet.) 
 
 In the meantime two of the Whig Club members, Daniel Bowley 
 and David McMechan, prepared for the arrival of Goddard at 
 Rusk’s tavern by getting a horse and cart belonging to Andrew 
 Stigars and placing them in front of the tavern. Seemingly they 
 had in mind to tar and feather Goddard after he had ridden the rail 
 out of town. 
 
 The procession led by Commodore Nicholson eventually arrived 
 at Rusk’s tavern with its captive. (There had been talk of including 
 Justus Brown in the party, but Brown had pleaded his injuries.) 
 They went into the meeting room of the tavern, where a discussion 
 about what to do with Goddard ensued. After sending the printer 
 outside the room, the group concluded that their captive should de- 
 part from Baltimore immediately. Unbeknownst to Goddard but 
 perhaps known to Nicholson and his cohorts, some thirty or forty 
 people had gathered near the Market House to put an end to the 
 mob rule of Baltimore. The presence of this group may have de- 
 terred the Whig Club from making any use of Andrew Stigars’ 
 horse and cart. Anyway, after some discussion between Nicholson 
 and Goddard it was agreed that the printer would return to his home 
 and prepare himself for departure that night. Accordingly God- 
 dard was then released. 
 
 The thoroughly alarmed printer, who had at no time in the 
 entire proceedings ever yielded his basic principle to the mob, went 
 back to the print shop and prepared for his departure. As part of 
 his preparations he printed a broadside directed to Mr. David 
 Rusk, the owner of the tavern used by the Whig Club. Eighteen 
 of the participants were named and described as a “gang of Ruffans.” 
 Goddard announced his intentions “as expeditiously as possible, to 
 proceed to Annapolis, where I shall solicit the Legislature of this 
 State for Protection against the Miscreants, who have been guilty of 
 the flagitious Practices by which I am now suffering; and that I 
 shall do my utmost to bring them to condign Punishment.” Not 
 exactly the words used on such an occasion by a Milquetoast. Prob- 
 ably very shortly after this broadside was issued Goddard took him- 
 self over to the guardhouse for the protection of Captain Galbraith’s 
 
CHAPTER VII 159 
 
 
 
 company that night. At noon the next day Galbraith saw to it that 
 Goddard was able to ride out of town safely on his way to An- 
 napolis. Galbraith, worried about his role in the affair, at the same 
 time sent off two accounts of his actions to the Council of Safety. 
 In fact, probably a good many persons in Baltimore began to have 
 second thoughts on the twenty-sixth about their activities of the day 
 before. 
 
 Two days later Goddard prepared a memorial to the Committee 
 of Aggrievances giving his version of the events of the twenty-fifth. 
 On April 2 the committee met and took depositions from several 
 persons, including Goddard himself. Not until April 11 was the 
 legislature ready to act on the case of the Whig Club of Baltimore, 
 though the committee had made its report, including the various 
 depositions, on the afternoon of April 2. At the session of April 11 
 Samuel Chase, the unknown author of the original articles, was 
 present in the assembly and, in fact, was the guiding spirit in the 
 events of the day. 
 
 Thirty-five years later Benjamin Galloway, one of the members 
 from Ann Arundel County of the Maryland Assembly in 1777, 
 described what took place in the legislative halls in Annapolis. The 
 sergeant-at-arms had been sent to Baltimore to bring before the 
 house as many of the members of the Whig Club as possible. There- 
 fore, during the day’s proceedings these men (neither Galloway’s 
 letter nor the printed Votes and Proceedings provide us with any 
 of their names) “were placed at the bar of the House of delegates, 
 charged with high crimes and misdemeanors.” But let Galloway 
 tell us the story: 
 
 After a discussion and a very animated and truly imteresting one it was 
 [in the course of this discussion a resolution that “Mr. Goddard’s 
 memorial and letter be returned to him, and that he be desired in future 
 to give this house no more trouble” was voted down 51 to 6]: during 
 which, zo attempt was made by any member of that Whigg House of 
 Delegates, to suggest an idea even, that could be considered as intended 
 to operate on the PUBLIC MIND as a justification of so singular, and 
 abominable a proceeding as the Whigg Club was, as every side of that 
 House, agreed to have been guilty of, towards said William Goddart; but, 
 more especially said proceeding was animadverted on and reprobated by 
 divers members, of the house, in loudest tones of the sort of patriotism by 
 which the virtwous portion of the real Whiggs of that eventful day, were 
 moved: as a most alarming, daring usurpation of the powers of government 
 
160 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 by the Whigg Club. A feeble attempt was indeed made, for the purpose 
 of offering @ quasi apology for said misbehaviour on the ground, that tho 
 irregularity was discoverable im the mode, yet the act done ought to be 
 overlooked, as it was an ebullition of Whiggism. But, Old S Chase, with 
 that manly, that unbending firmness, and ardent love and attachment to 
 Law and Order, scouted, yes, he scouted the Idea, that it could, in any 
 degree, in amy situation, while the General Assembly were in Session, be 
 tolerable, by that Body, to wink at such an enormity! no! not even when 
 our army had been just beaten, kicked from Pillar to Post, from Dan to 
 Bersheba: and the most alarming circumstances seemed to (too well) 
 justify a serious apprehension by every one who was in possession of our 
 real situation, that these United States would in a few months, be reduced 
 to the miserable condition of a conquered people. The Whigs of July 4th 
 76, well knew, that if they suffered such shameful doings, and usurpings 
 to pass uncensured by them, instanter; the fundamentals of our free gov- 
 ernment, must be overturned. And, what I pray, did They do? Why! 
 a motion was preparing by S Chase Esqr in the H of Delegates (I was 
 sitting with him at the Clerk’s Table) he was drafting a number of 
 Resolutions, to be adopted by the House of D. and to be sent to the 
 Senate for their concurrence, requesting Governour Johnston to direct 
 the Attorney General to prosecute the persons who composed the said 
 Club, with the utmost rigour of Law. But, it being intimated to § Chase 
 Esqr and by him communicated to the House, that the characters belong- 
 ing to said illegal meeting, The Whig Club, who were then im custody 
 at the bar of the House, were duly sensible of the nature of the hetmous 
 offences that they had committed, were willing and ready to make any 
 acknowledgment, and render all the satisfaction in their power, to the 
 insulted and injured Sovereign of the state: The People: which was ac- 
 cepted, after due deliberation, by the house of delegates: but accompanied, 
 with and by, an express, the most positive, unqualified declaration, as- 
 severation, in their capacities, as the guardians and vimdicators of the 
 rights and liberties of a most grossly insulted, and offended free people, 
 That, such like conduct, would never again be so lightly passed over by the 
 ruling powers; The acknowledgment; The Constitution; and The 
 solemn promise of Amendment, contained in a paper as placed thereupon 
 in glowing language by S Chase Esqr and adopted by the General As- 
 sembly was pronounced by the Chairman [obviously Commodore Nichol- 
 son was among those present] of the offending Club, the members there- 
 of, being placed to his right and left hands, (The Ball Room, was the 
 Locus in quo) couched in language humiliating, and well calculated to 
 make a durable impression on the popular mind—His [Samuel Chase’s] 
 conduct on that occasion alone entitled him to a monument, to be placed 
 on the State House Hill. The Whig Club were liberated from their 
 state of imprisonment, and told to return to Baltimore and by their future 
 course of conduct, afford a satisfactory proof of the sincerity of their 
 
CHAPTER VII 161 
 
 
 
 declared deep sorrow for their past offence, as part of the very illegal 
 and dangerous combination, called The Whigg Club. They so did: but 
 Governor Johnson by recommendation of the Gen Assembly [by a vote 
 of 49 to 5] issued instanter, a proclamation grounded on said gross mis- 
 behaviour of said red-hot, wowd be thought Whiggs. 
 
 The governor, Thomas Johnson, did not issue his proclamation 
 instanter, as Galloway remembered, but waited until the seventeenth. 
 Goddard became impatient, particularly since he was advised not 
 to return to Baltimore until the governor released his proclamation. 
 On the fourteenth Goddard wrote a letter to the governor telling 
 his situation and requesting not only the statement but the prosecu- 
 tion of the members of the Whig Club, a list of whose names he 
 enclosed with his letter. 
 
 The Maryland Journal of the fifteenth printed the resolutions 
 of the assembly passed on the eleventh directed against the Whig 
 Club and requesting that the person and property of Goddard be 
 given the protection of the law. Finally the governor issued his proc- 
 lamation on the seventeenth, and Goddard could return to Baltimore. 
 The next day he released a broadside giving both the assembly resolu- 
 tions and the governor’s proclamation. Also he released a postscript 
 to The Prowess of the Whig Club dated April 18. Three versions 
 of this postscript exist, two in Goddard’s hand and the other in 
 print. In the John Carter Brown Library is the probable first of 
 these to be written. Never printed, this version is by far the most 
 vituperative, directed as it is primarily at Commodore Nicholson. 
 Goddard labeled this manuscript, thirty-four pages long with addi- 
 tional inserts, “Part 2.” The next version, also in Goddard’s hand, 
 is at the Library of Congress. Entitled “Part of the Whig Club,” 
 it is only eight pages long and much toned down. What is likely the 
 final version is a four-page printed text, dated April 18, 1777, at 
 the American Antiquarian Society. Two of the four pages are taken 
 up by the assembly resolutions and the governor’s proclamation. 
 The last page is a list of the most active Whig Club members, thirty 
 in all, leaving only one page of text written by the printer. Probably 
 Mary Katherine was the person responsible for the condensation and 
 softening of the tone. The first thirty-four-page text must have been 
 written in Annapolis while Goddard was waiting to return to Balti- 
 more. No doubt he appeared at Mary Katherine’s print shop with 
 Part 2 in hand wanting to have it set up immediately, but then the 
 
162 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 sister did her persuading. The copy in Worcester has marginal 
 notations and corrections by Goddard, indicating he had in mind 
 later expansion, but as far as we know nothing came of this. 
 
 The Council of Maryland on April 23 sent a formal letter to the 
 various justices in Baltimore County enclosing copies of the assembly 
 resolutions, memorials, and various depositions. The letter ended: 
 “I have the utmost Confidence that you will give Mr Goddard 
 every Protection, warranted by Law, in your Power.” 
 
 Goddard, now on top of the Whig Club, could not let matters 
 rest. Still smarting from the mob actions of March 25, he wrote on 
 May 26 a memorial to the Continental Congress relative to the 
 various officers in the army and navy who had been active in the 
 Baltimore mob—seven were named. Presumably Goddard was 
 expecting to demand disciplinary action, but at the moment all he 
 requested was permission to send proofs of his accusations. The 
 Congress did nothing about Goddard’s memorial, and so ended the 
 Whig Club affair. 
 
- VIII - 
 
 
 
 VEN though William Goddard, thanks to the assist from 
 
 Samuel Chase, had most of his own way with the Whig Club, 
 the conclusion of the case found him unhappy and discontented. 
 How much of this discontent was caused by his rheumatism aggra- 
 vated by his struggles with Commodore Nicholson is, of course, 
 impossible now to say. But for a year or so after the March, 1777, 
 riots Goddard went around with a chip on his shoulder. Indicative 
 of his attitude was a letter he wrote on August 30, 1777, to his old 
 friend Colonel John Lamb in New York. Placed in brackets at 
 the end of the letter (written to introduce a Dr. Fallon to Lamb) as 
 a kind of afterthought is this sentence: “I am too much dissatisfied 
 with my present Situation, to say any thing relative to myself further 
 than that I think I have been most infamously treated both by Whig 
 & Tory.” Instead of viewing the Whig Club affair as a victory for 
 freedom of the press—which it was—Goddard sullenly retreated 
 into his own shell, adopting the attitude that everybody was against 
 him. He must have at times much annoyed the busy, energetic 
 Mary Katherine as she ran the print shop, got out the Journal fairly 
 regularly each Tuesday, and administered the daily affairs of the 
 Baltimore post office. 
 
 Finally in February, 1778, Goddard reached the depths of his 
 despair. Through his mind had been running past sufferings, in- 
 cluding his frustrations about the postal system, for which he had 
 done so much and received so little. The animosity he always bore 
 Franklin came to the fore, and he conceived the design of publishing 
 a pamphlet attacking the then minister to France. In pursuit of 
 this design Goddard wrote to his former mentor and partner John 
 Holt, now in Poughkeepsie, telling him his proposal and requesting 
 information and advice. Holt, horrified at Goddard’s idea, wrote 
 a fourteen-page letter in reply, dated February 26, 1778. Holt 
 stated his agreement with Goddard’s sentiments but disagreed vio- 
 
164 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 lently with his tactics. To emphasize his dislike, Holt compared 
 Franklin’s attitudes to “a Thief’s cutting the Throat of the Man 
 that saved him from the Gallows.” Holt thought because of the 
 doctor’s role in the Stamp Act crisis that “he was either unfriendly 
 to the American Cause, and took an active part against it, at that 
 Period, or at least was totally inactive in its Favour.” Holt went 
 on to examine the actions of Franklin and his son William in some 
 detail. Summing up his opinion, he wrote: “As to his private 
 Character, I always greatly respected the Doctor... ; and asa 
 natural Philosopher, I have the highest Opinion of him; but I have 
 long thought his publick Conduct mysterious and suspicious, and 
 have been obliged to consider him as a dangerous Person.” But as 
 to Goddard’s proposed attack, Holt doubted that it would cause 
 Franklin’s dismissal anyway and suggested that publicizing such 
 criticisms of the minister to France might harm the American cause. 
 Also, Goddard’s many enemies would take an opposite position from 
 whatever Goddard took. About the Whig Club scandal Holt said: 
 “Tho’ you undoubtedly had the better in it, and, every one allows, 
 were right in opposing their arbitrary proceedings; yet, as it is 
 generally supposed that they meant well and were actuated by a 
 laudable Zeal, tho’ it transported them beyond their Knowledge,— 
 and that they were desirous of accommodating the Matter upon 
 amicable Terms, it has been thought by some of your real Friends, 
 was rather too severe and publick a Mortification to them; and too 
 expensive to yourself, in the Loss of so many Friends, who might 
 
 have been serviceable to you and the Publick.... I happened to be 
 at Philadelphia at the Time when your Narrative of the Affair, 
 made its first Appearance at that Place.... The sarcastic Strooks 
 
 of Wit and Humour it contained, never failed to produce a Laugh, 
 at the Expense of the poor Whig Club—But yet the Writer was 
 thought severe, and as little friendly to the American Cause, as to 
 the Whig Club.” (This criticism of his role in the recent affair 
 must have hurt Goddard very much. Probably it was this more than 
 any other argument that persuaded Goddard to give up his proposed 
 attack.) Towards the end of the long letter Holt asked Goddard, 
 should he go ahead with the publication, not to mention Holt’s name 
 in any connection with it. Fortunately for Goddard he followed the 
 advice of the Poughkeepsie printer and dropped his design of at- 
 tacking Benjamin Franklin. 
 
CHAPTER VIII 165 
 
 What slowly pulled Goddard out of his doldrums was the sheer 
 necessity to work. Getting out a newspaper during the Revolutionary 
 War was no easy task, and the editress needed all the help her 
 brother could give. The Maryland Journal had one of the best 
 publication records of the wartime newspapers. Conscientious as 
 Mary Katherine was, she could not by herself solve the most urgent 
 problem for the Revolutionary printer—paper. This item became 
 more and more scarce as the war went on. As early as 1773 the 
 American Philosophical Society had shown its awareness of the 
 problem by offering prizes for the collection of old rags for the 
 paper mills. During the war journeyman papermakers were usually 
 declared exempt from military duty because of the importance of 
 their craft. While still working as surveyor in the postal system, 
 apparently Goddard had started his plans to build his own paper 
 mill in the Baltimore vicinity. These plans bore fruition as early as 
 April 8, 1777, while William was still in Annapolis awaiting the 
 proclamation to be issued by Governor Johnson. As mentioned 
 before, Mary Katherine announced under the Baltimore date-line 
 in this issue, “The Paper on which this Journal is printed was manu- 
 factured at a Mill lately erected at Elk-Ridge Landing.” Beyond a 
 doubt the existence of this mill was one of the most important reasons 
 why the Journal could maintain its publication more nearly regularly 
 than its competitors. For example, Frederick Green had to stop 
 completely his Maryland Gazette in Annapolis because of the paper 
 shortage. 
 
 But starting a paper mill and keeping it going were two different 
 things. Two problems made difficult the continuous operation of 
 the mill. One was the supply of rags, particularly linen rags. A 
 notice in the Journal of May 26, 1778, shows this vividly. “The 
 Stoppage of the Paper-Mill, near this Town, for the Want of a 
 Supply of Rags, and the enormous Prices demanded at the Stores 
 here for Paper, constrains us to print the Maryland Journal on this 
 dark and poor Sort, which our Readers will, we are persuaded excuse, 
 for one Week at least, when they are assured, that rather than de- 
 prive them of the important Intelligence of the Times, by the Dis- 
 continuance of our Journal, we have given from Forty to Fifty 
 Pounds a Week for the Article of Paper alone, an equal Quantity of 
 which, might, formerly, have been purchased for Eight Dollars!” 
 
166 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 
 
 Later, Adam Waybill, likely the mill’s foreman, advertised for thirty 
 thousand pounds of rags at one time. 
 
 Of even more trouble to the owners of paper mills was person- 
 nel. To become a skilled papermaker demanded a long and arduous 
 training. Wartime conditions were not conducive to this training, 
 and the armies occasionally took away some of the journeymen. 
 Therefore it is not surprising to find frequent advertisements in the 
 Journal for apprentices and skilled craftsmen. By November 30, 
 1779, the desperateness of the situation is shown by a notice in the 
 Pennsylvania Packet. By this time Goddard was in partnership 
 with Eleazer Oswald, and the two were running the mill while 
 Mary Katherine continued the Journal. The advertisement re- 
 quested the services of a papermaker, whose desire for security was 
 appealed to by this N. B.: “A German, with a small family, would 
 be very agreeable. There is a house and a pretty meadow contiguous 
 and belonging to the mill.” 
 
 One of the inevitable economic results of the Revolutionary War 
 ‘ was a tremendous inflation. Frequently Miss Goddard had to raise 
 her subscription prices. Rates in 1773 were ten shillings a year. On 
 July 8, 1777, this price was doubled. By October, 1778, the rate was 
 set at fifty-two shillings a year, only to be doubled six months later. 
 By another six months, October, 1779, a charge of ten pounds was 
 announced. No doubt, the advertising rates went up with the sub- 
 scription costs, but these were not published. The difficulty in col- 
 lecting is revealed by a notice in the December 15, 1778, Journal. 
 Payment could be made either in cash or “country produce.” This 
 latter term included: “Beef, Pork, or any Kind of Animal Food, 
 Butter, Hog’s Lard, Tallow, Bees-Wax, Flour, Wheat, Rye, Indian 
 Corn, Beans, Buck-Wheat, Barley, Hops, Oats, Vegetables, Flax 
 Seed, Wood, Charcoal, tann’d Sheepskins, brown Linen, Linsey 
 Woolsey, Feathers, Linen and Cotton Rags.” 
 
 In spite of paper shortages and inflation Mary Katherine God- 
 dard managed a printing coup—the running off on her press of the 
 first copy of the Declaration of Independence with the names of the 
 signers attached. This was done in the latter part of January, 1777. 
 The colophon at the bottom reads: “Baltimore, in Maryland: Printed 
 by Mary Katherine Goddard.” A copy of this imprint, now in the 
 
CHAPTER VIII 167 
 
 Maryland Hall of Records in Annapolis, is certified by the signatures 
 of Charles Thomson and John Hancock. 
 
 On October 13, 1778, Mary Katherine announced that she had 
 added to her shop “a complete and elegant Bookbinding Room.” 
 A bookbinder had been engaged, and obviously she hoped to supple- 
 ment her income by this means. Thereafter she regularly advertised 
 for tanned sheepskins, as in the list of “country produce,” for the 
 use of her bookbinder. She had carried on this business before, but 
 only in a small way. Also she was actively pushing her bookselling 
 operations. For example, in the February 2, 1779, Journal she 
 printed a long list of books, headed by a Greek Bible, to be sold at 
 her shop, “cheap, for cash.” 
 
 Too easily we tend to think of the life of the Americans during 
 the Revolution as restricted to activities related to the war. This, of 
 course, was not true, yet the events of the war occupied the minds 
 of the people in a way that no later war this country has fought in 
 ever has. All this is well shown by a notice in the March 16, 1779, 
 Journal, A three-day horse race meeting was to be held with purses 
 of £500, £250, and £150. The promoters of the meeting thought it 
 necessary to preface their announcement with a rather apologetic 
 note: “The present War, in its dreadful Progress, hath not only 
 proved destructive to the human Species, but, amidst a Variety of 
 distressing Calamities, hath deprived this Continent of an immense 
 Number of its best Horses: particularly such as were suitable for 
 Cavalry—And as it is an acknowledged Fact that races under proper 
 Regulations and Restrictions, are conducive to the Pubic [sic] Good, 
 having a Tendency to promote and encourage the raising a valuable 
 Breed of that most useful and noble Animal; under that Idea a 
 Number of Gentlemen from Motives the most disinterested and 
 Public-spirited, have determined, occasionally to pay Attention to an 
 Object of that manifest Importance; and this they mean to do in 
 such a Way as shall not do Violence to the strictest Laws of Morality, 
 or in any Shape contravene the wise Purposes of the Rulers of our 
 State.” 
 
 In 1779 William brought into the Baltimore scene Eleazer Os- 
 wald, and it was in conjunction with him that Goddard roused the ire 
 of another Baltimore mob. Oswald, fifteen! Gyears younger than 
 Goddard, had come to the colonies from his native England in 
 
168 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 1770. Shortly after his arrival he was apprenticed to John Holt, 
 and eventually married Holt’s daughter. Influenced by Holt, he 
 became an ardent patriot, joining the military forces of the Revolu- 
 tion in 1775. In the army he served first under Benedict Arnold 
 (where he became a friend of John Lamb, Goddard’s associate in 
 the postal campaign in 1774) and later under Charles Lee. Perhaps 
 partly because of his displeasure at Lee’s court-martial and also be- 
 cause of a seniority dispute over his rank, he resigned his lieutenant- 
 colonelcy at the end of 1778. Oswald’s acquaintance with Goddard 
 dates at least from latter 1778, since in a letter to Colonel John 
 Lamb dated Philadelphia, October 15, he speaks of his intentions 
 to go to Baltimore to visit the printer and his regrets at “his [God- 
 dard’s] not being here as I promised myself much Satisfaction in his 
 conversation.” 
 
 On June 8, 1779, Goddard and Oswald announced their new 
 partnership in a notice in the Maryland Journal. They were going 
 to “carry on the PRINTING, BOOKSELLING, and sTATIONERY BUSINESS.” 
 The paper mill at Elk-Ridge Landing was under their control. They 
 had it “in Contemplation” to print an edition of the Bible. But this 
 new firm was not to interfere “in the smallest Degree” with that of 
 Mary Katherine Goddard, “who, it must be acknowledged, hath sup- 
 ported her Business with Spirit and Address, amidst a Complication 
 of Difficulties.” Thus to the truculent, embittered Goddard was added 
 the martial, also disappointed Oswald. (Later Oswald acquired 
 some notoriety for his feud with Mathew Carey.) 
 
 Next to enter the scene was General Charles Lee. A soldier 
 of fortune who early espoused the colonial cause, he was one of the 
 few experienced ofhcers Washington had during the first part of the 
 war. After various ups and downs in his military career he was 
 court-martialed for his role in the Battle of Monmouth on June 28, 
 1778. (For the details of this affair the reader can consult the 
 biography of Lee by John R. Alden.) Very much embittered by his 
 treatment, Lee retired to his plantation in Berkley County, Virginia, 
 there to nurse his grudges. 
 
 As early as December 8, 1778, the Maryland Journal, along with 
 many other newspapers, had published a lengthy statement defending 
 his position, written by Lee. Asa matter of fact, Mary Katherine had 
 merely clipped the defense from the December 3 Pennsylvania 
 
CHAPTER VIII 169 
 
 Packet. But it was with the issue of July 6, 1779, that all hell 
 broke loose. At his country estate Lee had written a series of 
 twenty-five rhetorical questions, which he called “Some Queries, 
 Political and Military.” First he tried to get them published in a 
 Philadelphia newspaper, but met with no success. Then he turned 
 to Goddard. Ina letter, apparently written before he knew that the 
 partnership between Oswald and Goddard had been formed, dated 
 June 7, Lee sent the Queries to Goddard for publication in the 
 Journal. Even then the Queries were not rushed into print, publica- 
 tion being delayed almost a month, and there must have been several 
 conversations among William, Mary Katherine, and Eleazer Oswald 
 before agreement to print was finally reached. But appear they did 
 on page one of the issue of July 6. The Queries asked pointed 
 questions about the conduct of the war by Congress and Washington, 
 including Lee’s own court-martial. Washington was especially casti- 
 gated, as in Query IX: “Whether it is salutary or dangerous, con- 
 sistent with or abhorrent from, the principles and spirit of Liberty 
 and Republicanism, to inculcate and encourage in the people an idea, 
 that their welfare, safety and glory depend on one man? Whether 
 they really do depend on one man?” Though printed anonymously, 
 the Queries were given a Philadelphia date-line. 
 
 Two days afterwards, late in the evening of Friday the eighth, 
 a group of men (Goddard said thirty) headed by some officers of 
 the Continental army—Thomas Cromwell, John Bayley, and Stephen 
 Shermandine—rushed into Goddard’s bedroom and demanded that 
 the printer immediately come with them to the local coffee house, 
 where the main body of the objectors were. This time there was no 
 hesitation about proceeding directly to William, and no question was 
 asked of his sister. After a struggle, which Oswald joined in, a 
 compromise was reached. Goddard promised to go to the coffee 
 house the next morning at nine o’clock, there to be questioned in 
 broad daylight. 
 
 The next morning Goddard, accompanied by Oswald, went for 
 protection to the four magistrates of Baltimore (appointed since the 
 Whig Club fracas)—William Spear, George Lindenberger, Abra- 
 ham Van Bibber, and James Calhoun. The first two agreed to help 
 maintain law and order, Lindenberger making the condition that 
 Goddard be unarmed. Van Bibber refused to have anything to do 
 
170 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 with the affair, alleging his inexperience and youth. Calhoun, the 
 former chairman of the Baltimore committee who had refused to 
 issue any orders on the occasion of the Whig Club riots, peremptorily 
 refused even to talk with the two partners. Returning to his house, 
 Goddard divested himself of his pistol and walked down the street 
 to the coffee house. Just opposite this he observed Calhoun standing 
 with Spear in the doorway of the former’s house and walked over 
 to them. Calhoun’s reaction was to order Goddard and Oswald 
 away, and Spear, noticing that his son-in-law Colonel Samuel Smith 
 was heading the mob, now in the street, turned away. 
 
 In the middle of the street in front of the coffee house an im- 
 promptu trial was held. A cart stood ready and waiting complete 
 with an adequate supply of rope. Van Bibber was among those who 
 testified at this trial about the lack of patriotism shown by the printer. 
 A search of the print shop was made to secure incriminating evidence, 
 but nothing was found. Completely overpowered by the mob and 
 seeing no help from any direction, Goddard yielded to their wishes. 
 First he admitted Charles Lee to be the writer of the Queries. Next, 
 he was forced to sign a statement including, “I have transgressed 
 against truth, justice, and my duty as a good citizen.” After agree- 
 ing to publish all this in the Journal, Goddard was released and 
 allowed to go home. Still in the company of his partner, he quickly 
 saddled his horse and set out for Annapolis. 
 
 Asa supplement the next week’s Journal, dated July 14, published 
 what the mob had won from Goddard. His signed statement was 
 given, along with two letters from Charles Lee, one of June 7 
 enclosing the Queries and the other of June 17 wishing the two 
 members of the new partnership success in their undertaking and 
 referring again to the Queries. 
 
 Though in Baltimore the mob of the ninth (almost conspicuously 
 none of the leaders of the former Whig Club were active in the 
 General Lee affair) seemed to have things its own way, Goddard 
 and Oswald busied themselves in Annapolis. Goddard presented a 
 memorial, dated July 13, to the governor and the council requesting 
 the protection of the law for himself and the impeachment of the 
 four magistrates of Baltimore. Mary Katherine Goddard followed 
 up this memorial by a letter of the fifteenth, in which she named 
 ten witnesses, including Oswald, who would appear in Goddard’s 
 
CHAPTER VIII 171 
 
 behalf at any hearing. As a result, on the seventeenth the council 
 sent out notices of a hearing to be held on the twenty-sixth. 
 
 Content with this stage of affairs, Goddard apparently returned 
 to Baltimore to prepare his memorial for publication in the Journal. 
 Almost the entire first page of the July 20 issue is taken up with it 
 together with a short introduction calling the members of the mob 
 “vermin” and a brief statement by Oswald attesting to the truth of 
 Goddard’s memorial. On the next page is a cryptic sentence: “Mr. 
 Goddard’s extorted Acknowledgment, and Negative voLUNTARY 
 Counter-Declaration, with an Introductory Letter to the Printer, 
 came to Hand too late for this Day’s Paper.” 
 
 All this, except the last sentence, was then printed verbatim in 
 an Annapolis Maryland Gazette Extraordinary of July 25. In 
 addition, an exchange of letters between Colonel Eleazer Oswald 
 and Colonel Samuel Smith, the leader of the Baltimore mob, was 
 printed. The exchange started on July 11, when Oswald challenged 
 Smith to a duel after loading him down with insults. Smith in a 
 reply the next day refused the challenge. He stated that if Oswald 
 had been defending his own rights, he would have felt obligated to 
 participate in a duel; but since Oswald was defending the rights 
 of his partner, he would not allow himself to be involved. 
 Oswald then threatened to publish the correspondence. Smith 
 asked for a delay to consider the matter, but Oswald terminated the 
 reconsideration by this exposé. The exchange was concluded by 
 some remarks of Oswald describing Smith’s character as “a worth- 
 less one.” 
 
 No record was made of the hearing of July 26. Presumably 
 the council sent everybody home on his good behavior in return for 
 his silence. No mention later was made of the hearing by any of 
 the participants, even though Goddard filled a good many columns 
 of his sister’s Journal relative to the affair. Seemingly the result 
 reasonably contented Goddard, because he returned to the fray even 
 more sure of himself than before. 
 
 However, Goddard retained some tact, which we can see in his 
 handling of a letter from Charles Lee. Lee had written to him on 
 July 14 a followup to the original Queries. This letter, less severe 
 in its strictures on Washington but more stringent on his subordinates, 
 Goddard, perhaps at the insistence of his sister, refused to publish. 
 
172 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 He must have recognized that another publication from the pen of 
 General Lee would add new fuel to the fire of the Baltimore mob’s 
 resentment and incite its members to more activities directed against 
 him. (Within a few weeks the Lee epistle was sent to various 
 Philadelphia editors, all of whom promptly rejected it.) 
 
 The statement promised in the July 20 Journal appeared on 
 schedule a week later. Goddard signed this at Annapolis on July 17. 
 The key passage vigorously denied the forced recantation previously 
 published. “By publishing certain ‘QUERIES, Political and Mili- 
 tary,’ in the Maryland Journal, on the 6th instant, I have NOT 
 ‘transgressed against Truth, Justice, or my Duty as a good Citizen,’ 
 and, as I have never given just cause of offence to ‘His Excellency 
 General Washington, or the good people of this town, I have NO 
 ‘reparation’ to make them, or ‘pardon’ to solicit.” Probably it was 
 a good thing this far from obsequious notice appeared after the 
 council hearing on the twenty-sixth. 
 
 The following week’s Journal, August 3, had two articles on the 
 ' affair. A brief one on page three was a purported “Extract of a 
 Letter from a Gentleman of Distinction, in a neighbouring State, 
 to the Printer.” This letter defended the importance of the liberty 
 of the press. Referring to the Baltimore situation only by implica- 
 tion, the anonymous writer (quite possibly Goddard himself) con- 
 cluded: “Restraints on the Press in any Cases, except Libels and 
 Treason, narrow and debase the liberal Sentiments of the Soul, and 
 curb the rising Efforts of Genius: It is a Mockery of the Under- 
 standing to call that Country free, where this Restraint is tolerated, 
 approved of, and supported.” 
 
 Though somewhat hidden on an inside page, this statement 
 could well have served to introduce the featured article on page one. 
 Joseph Reed, the President of Pennsylvania, felt himself insulted 
 by the original Queries and wrote a letter to Goddard defending his 
 role in the Lee court-martial, etc. This letter was promptly printed 
 in the Journal. Thereby Goddard in practice defended the right 
 of the press to print not only the unpopular but the remarks of those 
 disagreeing with the editor. Many years before, the Peter Zenger 
 case had resulted from the printer’s publishing articles critical of the 
 established authority but agreeable to the popular taste. And in the 
 Maryland of 1777 and 1779 the Baltimore printer won his case. 
 
CHAPTER VIII 173 
 
 Since those stalwart days more lip service than practice has been 
 applied to this aspect of freedom of the press, but the concept has 
 actively survived. 
 
 In the columns of the Maryland Journal the matter rested there, 
 but General Lee had not been vindicated by the affair and con- 
 tinued resentful. In a letter dated August 1, 1779, to the French 
 Consul in Baltimore Lee referred to the Baltimore mob as “low-bred 
 rufhans” and “banditti.” On August 24 Lee’s aide, Major John S. 
 Eustace, wrote to Lee telling of his efforts to place two of Lee’s 
 defenses in the Philadelphia papers. He had failed to do so in 
 spite of the help of Goddard and Oswald, who happened to be in 
 the city. Lee then wrote to Joseph Reed, challenging him to assist 
 in their publication “as a gentleman and one embarked in the com- 
 mon cause of the liberties of mankind (of which the freedom of the 
 press is the basis).” As late as October 24 Benjamin Rush wrote to 
 Lee about the refusals of the Philadelphia printers and asked for 
 Lee to be patient since the “Summer flies that now din our ears 
 must soon retire.” 
 
 The one long-lasting result of the Charles Lee affair for Goddard 
 was the friendship that sprang up between the retired general and 
 the printer. On December 24, 1779, Oswald in a letter to Lee 
 said that Goddard intended to pay Lee a visit at his Berkley County 
 seat. Thereafter Goddard must have made the trip south and 
 west to Lee’s estate, Hopewell, frequently, because Lee in several 
 letters used Mary Katherine Goddard in Baltimore as his mailing 
 address. In 1781 Lee was trying to fulfil Goddard’s request for a 
 good riding horse, but had to write his friend that at the moment 
 all he had on hand was “a worn out full Brother of Rosinante.” 
 
 Though Lee had a sufficiency of land and money in England, he 
 found himself short of ready cash in America now that his pay as a 
 general had ceased. Therefore he made an attempt to sell his 2800- 
 acre Virginia estate. This transaction enabled Goddard to render Lee 
 a much appreciated service. On November 10, 1780, Lee entered 
 into a contract with Edward and Ezekiel John Dorsey to sell his 
 property. In the original agreement, Goddard acting as go-between, 
 a price in hard cash was stipulated with a six months’ forfeiture if 
 the remainder of the money after the down payment was not given 
 to either William or his sister. Basically the dispute which followed 
 
174 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 resulted from the attempt of the Dorseys to pay for the land in 
 depreciated currency, which would have given Lee almost nothing. 
 General Lee was not extricated from his difficulties until early in 
 1782, but eventually he was, thanks to the efforts of Goddard. 
 Mary Katherine and William were given powers of attorney to 
 act in the affair by Lee, and with this authority Goddard managed 
 to persuade the Dorseys to accept the refunding of their down pay- 
 ment, cancel the original contract, and return the land to Charles 
 Lee. As the nineteenth-century editor of The Lee Papers for the 
 New-York Historical Society put it, Lee’s “Berkley Estate was 
 snatched like a Brand out of the Burning fire by the Exertions of 
 Wm Goddard.” In the final settlement Robert Morris of Phila- 
 delphia was used as a banker. The net result was not the complete 
 saving of Lee’s American fortune but an increase in the ties of friend- 
 ship between the two men. 
 
 In September, 1782, Lee, on his way to Philadelphia, stopped for 
 a few days in Baltimore to visit the Goddards. He went on to 
 Philadelphia, where he died October 2. Ironically, considering the 
 general’s pronounced deism clearly shown by one of the clauses in 
 his will, the body of Charles Lee was buried in Christ’s Church 
 Burying Ground. He had written: “I desire most earnestly, that I 
 may not be buried in any church, or church-yard, or within a mile 
 of any Presbyterian or Anabaptist meeting-house; for since I have 
 resided in this country, I have kept so much bad company when 
 living, that I do not chuse to continue it when dead.” 
 
 For Goddard a more important clause in the will was Lee’s be- 
 queathing of his Berkley County estate. This was divided into three 
 parts, the first two of which went to Jacob Morris and Evan Ed- 
 wards, former aides of Lee’s, and the third equally divided between 
 Oswald and Goddard. At first, it looked as though this bequest 
 would not amount to anything since Lee had left a good many debts, 
 including money lent to him at various times by the Continental 
 Congress. Lee’s sister, Sidney Lee, learned of the dilemma of the 
 four would-be recipients and sent to America £4500 to cover the 
 debts, so that the intent of Lee’s will could be fulfilled. She was 
 able to do this because his English property had greatly increased 
 in value during the Revolution. Eventually, probably in 1785, the 
 estate of Hopewell was sold and Goddard received his share. 
 
CHAPTER VIII 175 
 
 By this time Goddard was in partnership with Edward Lang- 
 worthy and the two men were printing the Maryland Journal. 
 Into Goddard’s possession had fallen the various papers of General 
 Lee, and the Baltimore printer was, in effect, serving as the literary 
 executor of the estate though no mention was made of this in the 
 will, but from a comment Goddard made in a letter Lee and the 
 printer had talked over eventual arrangements for the general’s 
 papers. Inevitably the partners decided to publish in book form 
 a selection from these papers. A general plan was sketched out and 
 proposals drawn up on that basis. But first Goddard, a bit more 
 aware of the necessity for tact than he had been six years before, 
 thought he had better write to George Washington and inform him 
 of the plans since obviously many of the published papers would be 
 critical of Washington’s conduct in Lee’s court-martial. In this 
 letter, dated May 30, 1785, the Baltimore newspaperman asked 
 Washington whether he had “any particular request, respecting the 
 said Work.” He enclosed a copy of a possible title page and prom- 
 ised to send one of the subscription proposals when it was printed—a 
 promise he fulfilled two weeks later. The title page revealed that 
 three volumes were proposed. Letters both to and from the general 
 were to be included as well as miscellaneous writings. Also a 
 biography of Lee, written presumably by one of the partners, was to 
 be incorporated. 
 
 Washington did not receive this letter until June 8, nine days 
 apparently then being required for the transit of a letter between 
 Baltimore and Mount Vernon. Therefore it was not until June 11 
 that he wrote his answer. For him, Goddard’s “own good judg- 
 ment must direct you in the publication of the manuscript papers of 
 General Lee. I can have no request to make concerning the work.” 
 Washington’s feelings at this time are well given in his own words: 
 “T am gliding down the stream of life, and wish, as is natural, that 
 my remaining days may be undisturbed and tranquil.” 
 
 On July 15, 1785, the Maryland Journal advertised the sub- 
 scription proposals for the three volumes of the “Miscellaneous 
 Collections, from the Papers of the late Major-General Charles 
 Lee.” No actual printing was to take place until enough subscrip- 
 tions had been received to make the project a paying proposition— 
 all this in typical eighteenth-century publishing fashion. The price 
 of the three octavo volumes was to be one guinea, half on subscribing 
 
176 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 and the other half on delivery. Subscriptions were to be received 
 not only by the Baltimore printing firm but by Frederick Green in 
 Annapolis and George Richards in Alexandria. 
 
 No doubt the printed proposals were circulated vigorously but 
 the hopes of the partners were not fulfilled by the number of half 
 guineas coming in. So there was never a Baltimore printing of the 
 papers of General Lee and there the matter rested for several years. 
 
 Goddard and Langworthy soon parted company, but the latter 
 took with him copies of many of the manuscripts and continued on 
 his own to write up a brief biography of Lee. Finally he secured the 
 publication of this volume, entitled Memoirs of the Life of the Late 
 Charles Lee, Esg., in London in 1792. This volume included a 
 varied selection from the general’s writings prefixed by Langworthy’s 
 biographical account, dated Baltimore, March 10, 1787. Then in 
 retirement, Goddard did not receive a copy of this publication until 
 the end of 1793. Incensed at the book, he wrote to Washington to 
 clear his own name of any connection with it, since after the 1785 
 proposals inevitably readers would have suspected his connivance. 
 Also, though Goddard said nothing of this, the originals of the Lee 
 manuscripts were still in his possession. In a mellow mood God- 
 dard talked about his “departed Friend,” General Lee, and his 
 desire in the 1785 proposed three volumes to include nothing “that 
 would wound the Feelings, or excite the Disapprobation, of a single 
 worthy Person, or cast the least Blemish upon the Reputation of 
 General Lee.” Revealing his Federalist approval of the President, 
 Goddard stated his desire “to exculpate myself from an Imputation 
 of Disrespect to a Character—for whom, with applauding Millions, 
 I feelingly accord my humble, tho’ sincere, Tribute of grateful 
 Veneration.” 
 
 Even though it is not part of the biography of William Goddard, 
 it is appropriate to tell the final outcome of the Lee papers that the 
 printer kept with him during all his years in retirement. Eventually 
 the grandson of the truculent printer, Colonel William Goddard, 
 gave permission to the New-York Historical Society to print them 
 in four volumes as The Lee Papers in the society’s Collections dur- 
 ing the 1870’s. Not too many years later the originals of the papers 
 were lost, and we are now dependent upon the printed versions as 
 edited by the society’s nineteenth-century editors. 
 
-IX- 
 
 ILLIAM could stew all he wanted to over the affairs of 
 General Charles Lee, but Mary Katherine had to keep the 
 kettle of the print shop boiling regularly—and this she did in her 
 own unobtrusive way. In early 1779 she witnessed the demise of 
 her only competing newspaper in Baltimore, the Maryland Gazette 
 of James Hayes, Junior, who had taken over the shop of John Dun- 
 lap in 1778. Even Frederick Green in Annapolis was forced by the 
 shortage of paper to discontinue his newspaper for four months. 
 Obviously the Goddard and Oswald monopoly of paper manu- 
 facturing in Maryland was paying off for the Maryland Journal. 
 Business for the Baltimore woman printer was undoubtedly 
 not too bad in 1779. Though the Lee affair may have cost William 
 some assorted bruises and increased rheumatic pains and Mary 
 Katherine no small loss of sleep, the circulation of the newspaper 
 quite likely expanded. In a notice in the November 2 Journal the 
 editress said it “circulates as extensively as any Paper in the Con- 
 tinent.” She was trying to maintain a regular Tuesday publication 
 and requested advertisers to have their copy in by ten o’clock Monday 
 morning. 
 Of similar import is the announcement in the Journal of October 
 5 of the imminent publication of The Maryland Almanack For the 
 Year of our Lord, 1780. Later advertisements reveal that the 
 calculations for the almanac were done by the Philadelphia astrono- 
 mer, David Rittenhouse. Almanacs were too dependable a source of 
 revenue to be overlooked as long as there was paper available. They 
 were priced at ten shillings a copy or twelve dollars a dozen. Be- 
 sides her own almanacs Mary Katherine sold those printed in German 
 by Matthias Bartgis in Fredericktown, Maryland. The sales of the 
 1780 almanac must have been satisfying, because the 1781 almanac 
 was printed as early as September 28, according to a notice in the 
 September 26 Journal. Now called The Maryland, Delaware, 
 
178 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 Pennsylvania, Virginia, and North-Carolina Almanack, and Ephem- 
 eris, ‘For the Year of our Lord, 1781, this version of the annual 
 best-seller featured the calculations of the Baltimore mathematician, 
 Andrew Ellicott. Though one may wonder how many sales there 
 were in North Carolina, apparently the financial returns of the 
 almanac, as well as succeeding ones, were more than adequate. 
 
 The grim days of the Revolution did not cause everybody to 
 lose his sense of humor. Thomas Jones in an advertisement of 
 May 2, 1780, closed his notice of the availability of the services of 
 his bull Pluto, who “will propagate . . . for one barrel of Indian 
 corn,” by this Shandean display of wit and erudition. “PLurTo is 
 supposed to be descended in an ~~~ line from the infamous 10, 
 for whose pedigree, I would refer the curious inquirer to the old 
 Roman poet Ovip, who will satisfy him fully on that head.” The 
 influence of Pope instead of Sterne can be seen in the couplet (the 
 rhymster may well have been William) appended to a notice by 
 Andrew Davidson in the February 6, 1781, Journal. He had the 
 not infrequent advertisement about a deserting wife with the usual 
 warning not to trust her financially. And then: 
 
 And if a wedded woman put to sale, 
 Deal not with her unless she brings her male. 
 
 The relative prosperity of the Goddard press may have been 
 the cause for Mary Katherine’s moving her print shop and post office 
 next door to “a more convenient Situation,” as the announcement in 
 the March 20, 1781, Journal read. More important than the moving 
 is our first evidence of strain between Mary Katherine and William. 
 The Baltimore printress inserted over her name almost a column- 
 long article on April 3. This “To the Public” stated that she had 
 heard there were designs to establish another press in Baltimore “in 
 Opposition to hers, with a View to diminish her Business, and compel 
 her to quit the same.” This notice may have been a method of 
 maneuvering against her brother, who had been discontented with 
 his background role during these years. Mary Katherine had been 
 unhappy over William’s difficulties in both the Whig Club and the 
 Lee affairs and was, no doubt, a bit weary of being involved in 
 troubles caused by someone else. All in all, she did not feel any 
 necessity of allowing William’s desires to interfere with her own 
 hard-earned prosperity. Forestalled by his sister’s article of the 
 
CHAPTER IX 179 
 
 third, a week later Goddard, with his partner Eleazer Oswald, 
 proposed to set up a press limited to the printing of inexpensive 
 editions of European writers, such as Sterne, Goldsmith, and Junius. 
 Though the advertisement by the partners is long and fulsome, it 
 bears evidence of being hastily written, or perhaps rewritten under 
 pressure. Mary Katherine must have argued her brother out of 
 his plans for another press, for the net result was that the firm of 
 Goddard and Oswald continued to run the paper mill and never did 
 any printing, and the two partners gradually resumed their assistance 
 in Mary Katherine’s print shop. However, from now on there is 
 a distinct coolness between the brother and the sister, who had done 
 so much for so many years for the Goddard family fortunes. It 
 must be given in William’s favor that his notice did say that the 
 partners would have “no Concern with any News-Paper, nor any 
 Profit therefrom; for they . . . wish the Printress of the MaryLanp 
 Journat, &c. may meet with that Encouragement from the Pustic, 
 which her Assiduity and Care shall merit.” 
 
 The surrender of Cornwallis and his forces at Yorktown on 
 October 19, 1781, and the subsequent limitation of the war to a 
 stalemate around New York City relieved many of the wartime 
 pressures on Baltimore. As early as June, 1781, Thomas Wall was 
 presenting theatrical entertainment under the guise of a “Lecture on 
 Heads” or a “Dissertation on Noses,” and the printing of play 
 handbills was added to the shop’s business. But it was in December 
 that we can more readily see evidence of the effects of the Battle of 
 Yorktown. For example, the Journal of December 18 is distinctly 
 whiter in color than its predecessors had been for several years. A 
 week later the regular listing of ship arrivals and departures in the 
 port of Baltimore was resumed. The commercial activities of the 
 city began to revert to a peacetime basis. This peacetime relaxation 
 and equanimity appear in a letter, signed Philo-Theatricus, published 
 in the March 19, 1782, Journal. This letter is interesting as one of 
 the few extant pieces of theatrical criticism we have from the eight- 
 eenth century. The performance discussed was the ever popular 
 Venice Preservd. Noteworthy about the letter is its limiting of its 
 comments to the acting performance with nothing said about the 
 virtues or non-virtues of the play itself. 
 
 During the later part of 1782 and early 1783 Americans were 
 
180 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 very much concerned over the negotiations going on in Paris between 
 the American and British commissioners. As a result, the demand 
 for news was greater than ever. Also, the increasing mercantile and 
 manufacturing activities of the port on the Chesapeake demanded 
 more advertising space than before. Once-a-week publication being 
 now insufficient, on March 14, 1783, Mary Katherine announced 
 that the Maryland Journal would add a Friday edition to its regular 
 Tuesday appearance. Given as an immediate reason was the now 
 twice-a-week postrider between Philadelphia and Baltimore, but 
 the unmentioned probable reason was the opening by John Hayes 
 of a new print shop in Baltimore. Within a couple of months Hayes 
 began to print on Fridays the Maryland Gazette, but by now the 
 community of Baltimore had expanded enough to maintain two 
 newspapers. 
 
 For over two years after what was more than likely a bitter 
 quarrel between the brother and sister over his proposed press 
 William remained in the background. After Oswald had departed 
 for Philadelphia probably about the end of 1781, Goddard was left 
 with the paper mill at Elk-Ridge Landing which must have pro- 
 vided him with a fairly comfortable income. Then in latter 1783 
 we again become aware of his presence in various small ways. A 
 notice in the July 15 Journal for a broadside of a public letter from 
 Washington tells the readers that purchase can be made of “W. 
 Goddard, at the Printing-Office adjoining the Dwelling-House of 
 Dr. Joun STEVENsoN.” On September 12 another notice in the name 
 of William Goddard advertised for a miller to run a “merchant- 
 mill.” The printing hand of Goddard is apparent in various minor 
 changes in the typography of the Journal in latter 1783. Typical 
 of these is the obituary of John Hancock printed on December 2 
 and enclosed at top and bottom with lines of skull and crossbones. 
 
 Finally, on January 2, 1784, the name of William appeared in 
 the colophon of the Maryland Journal, which read: “Printed by 
 William and Mary Katherine Goddard, at the Post-Office, in Market- 
 Street.” Four days later the colophon was: “Printed by William 
 Goddard, (in Dr. Stevenson’s Warehouse, adjoining his Dwelling 
 House) in Public-Alley, near Market-Street.” What kind of agree- 
 ment William entered into with his sister we do not know. From 
 subsequent events it is apparent that Mary Katherine did not think 
 
CHAPTER Ix 181 
 
 herself well treated by her brother. She continued as postmistress 
 of Baltimore and proprietress of a bookstore but no longer had any 
 connection with the print shop and newspaper unless she continued 
 silently to draw out some of the profits for her share of the business. 
 That Mary Katherine had been prospering reasonably well is shown 
 by a notice in the March 21, 1783, Journal revealing the theft of a 
 trunk from her. The trunk was “covered with black Leather, and 
 ornamented with Gold-Leaf.” Among the contents were fourteen 
 guineas and a half, four half-johans (a johan was a Portuguese coin 
 worth about nine dollars), thirty or forty dollars, and bank notes 
 for fifty, forty, and ten dollars. Mary Katherine had not done badly 
 as proprietress of the Maryland Journal. But even though she was 
 not suffering financially, the former editress never again resumed 
 friendly relations with her brother. Perhaps prosperity made both 
 Goddards arrogant and unforgiving, but Mary Katherine deserved 
 more from her brother, even if the more was merely brotherly af- 
 fection. 
 
 Mary Katherine’s methods as a newspaper editor contrast with 
 those of her brother. She was dependable and he brilliantly erratic. 
 She never allowed her personal affairs to intrude into her newspaper; 
 William’s various quarrels were always intruding, even into Mary 
 Katherine’s paper. The impersonal quality of her editing convinces 
 us that she was an excellent newspaperwoman but leaves little con- 
 crete or personal to say about her, no letters or other such material 
 of hers having survived. We do find in both The Partnership and 
 The Prowess of the Whig Club that in the 1770’s William went 
 out of his way to compliment his sister’s competence and loyalty. 
 
 William was riding high. The next decade was by far the most 
 prosperous one of his career. For so long had he been a “struggling 
 printer” that he too easily yielded to various grandiose schemes for 
 wealth, but he did continue to give Baltimore a well-edited news- 
 paper. In his notice “To the Public” announcing his sole assumption 
 of control of the Journal Goddard assured his readers that he had 
 new printing materials of many kinds and could do whatever was 
 requested of him. 
 
 During these flush times he tried his best to make investments 
 that would bring in a profit. One of these had its origins as far back 
 as January 26, 1779, when an advertisement in the Journal, signed 
 
182 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 Wm. Goddard and Comp., stated the new company’s expectations of 
 setting up a printing office in Alexandria, Virginia. Shortly there- 
 after Eleazer Oswald came along, and Goddard dropped for the 
 moment the Alexandria scheme. (The Journal of January 26 exists 
 at the Maryland Historical Society in two variants, one having the 
 advertisement referred to and the other omitting this in favor of a 
 strayed horse notice. This may indicate that the 1779 proposal 
 was mostly a feeler to try out public sentiment in the Alexandria 
 vicinity.) But Goddard did not forget his scheme. In the Journal 
 of May 28, 1782, there was an announcement, dated May 20, that 
 a new printing office had “just opened” in Alexandria under the 
 aegis of George Richards and Company. A year and a half later 
 proposals were given to start a newspaper to be called The Virginia 
 Journal and Alexandria Advertiser. (Note the similarity of the title 
 to The Maryland Journal and Baltimore Advertiser.) On February 
 5, 1784, the first issue of this paper appeared. It continued to July 
 4, 1789, when Richards’ death ended the enterprise. Many years 
 later, in a letter to Isaiah Thomas giving various corrections to The 
 History of Printing, Goddard specified his own connection with the 
 Alexandria firm. He had loaned a press and types to start the 
 business and from time to time had given money to Richards, who 
 was a “relative.” Before Goddard could get any return on his 
 money, Richards died and the Baltimore printer was out five hundred 
 pounds, according to his own statement. It is possible, though there 
 is no evidence to support this, that Goddard in the 1780’s lost more 
 money in similar investments. The Norfolk and Portsmouth Journal 
 in Norfolk, Virginia, may, for example, have had Goddard as one 
 of its financial backers during its brief career. 
 
 Unfortunate as Goddard was in his choice of printers to back, 
 he did make his Baltimore shop into very much of a going concern— 
 not that Mary Katherine had not turned over to him in January, 
 1784, a quite successful business. The Journal continued to appear 
 twice a week and had a generous quota of advertisements of all 
 sorts. One of these, in the issue of October 26, 1784, must have 
 amused many of its readers. “ABRAHAM SITTLER, requests that the 
 Woman, by the Name of Satty, who, some time ago, lived with 
 him, and now resides about Eight or Nine Miles from Baltimore- 
 Town, would return and live with him again.” 
 
CHAPTER Ix 183 
 
 Of more importance to Goddard than Abraham’s Sally in Oc- 
 tober and November, 1784, was the annual almanac. Regularly 
 since the 1780 one calculated by David Rittenhouse Mary Katherine 
 had published each year her Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland, and 
 Virginia Almanack (North Carolina was dropped from the title 
 after 1781). After the first one Andrew Ellicott had done the 
 calculations. In the settlement between the brother and sister ap- 
 parently each assumed he was to have the privilege of publishing the 
 annual almanac. This misunderstanding resulted in the appearance 
 in November, 1784, of two almanacs with identical titles except that 
 one is William Goddard’s . . . Almanack and the other Mary K. 
 Goddard’s ... Almanack. Unfortunately for the relations between 
 the two William was offended by the threat to his almanac monopoly 
 and leaped into print with an attack upon his sister’s publication, to 
 which Mary Katherine took great umbrage; she never forgave her 
 brother. William in his attack said, “Observing a spurious Per- 
 formance, containing a mean, vulgar and common-place Selection 
 of Articles . . . I find myself obliged to inform the Public, that the 
 above-mentioned spurious double-faced Almanack, is only a Penn- 
 sylvania one, under a Baltimore Masx, or Title-Page, and which 
 was printed in Philadelphia, and sent to this Market, by a certain 
 hypocritical Character, for the dirty and mean Purpose of Fraup 
 and Deception.” No wonder Mary Katherine felt hurt at the 
 attack! As far as we know, never again was there anything but 
 bitterness between the two for the rest of their lives. Mary Kath- 
 erine did occasionally advertise the wares of her bookstore in the 
 Journal after this and official notices under her name as postmistress 
 appeared, but otherwise the two avoided each other. 
 
 Still seeking to expand his business, Goddard on January 25, 
 1785, announced his partnership with Edward Langworthy. The 
 latter had been a member of the Continental Congress from Georgia 
 and claimed to be a well-read scholar, later proposing to write a 
 history of Georgia. Langworthy’s partnership was secured for two 
 purposes. One was the editing of the Charles Lee papers discussed 
 in the last chapter. The other was revealed in the announcement 
 of the partnership. A new magazine, The American Spectator, was 
 to be founded as soon as there were sufficient subscriptions. It is 
 much to be regretted that the plan did not go through because part 
 
184 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 of the original prospectus called for “the History of every CoLLEcE, 
 AcaDEMy or SEMINARY” in this country. Such a series of accounts 
 would be invaluable to the cultural historian. Neither the proposal 
 to print the Lee Papers nor The American Spectator coming to any- 
 thing, the partnership was abandoned after a year’s duration in 
 January, 1786, Langworthy becoming the head of the newly founded 
 Baltimore Academy. 
 
 By comparing an itemized receipt for advertising with the actual 
 newspaper we can deduce the space rates of the Maryland Journal 
 in these days of its “extensive circulation.” We have such a receipt 
 preserved at the Maryland Historical Society made out to Archibald 
 Moncreiff for various insertions in 1785. For advertisements re- 
 peated between three to six times there is a uniform rate of two 
 shillings and sixpence. (Seven and six was then computed as equal 
 to a dollar.) Each advertisement is one column wide and about an 
 inch long. Most of these contain line drawings of ships, but a few 
 do not, and the rate is the same with or without the drawings. (The 
 line drawings were from a generous supply of stock cuts, such sup- 
 plies being essential for any newspaper of this period.) These rates 
 are undoubtedly higher than those of most papers of the 1780’s 
 since the Journal had such a large circulation. 
 
 During all his career as a printer Goddard was a great traveler 
 up and down the Atlantic seaboard. His postal duties had, of course, 
 provided a reason for the many journeys, but these trips were con- 
 tinued long after he had quarreled with Bache and quit his job as 
 surveyor. One of his favorite trips was through New England, 
 particularly to his old home in Providence. John Carter, who had 
 bought the Providence Gazette from Sarah Goddard, continued as 
 one of William’s best friends. Baltimore, in spite of the almost 
 twenty years of Goddard’s stay, never was home to him as Provi- 
 dence was; probably the Baltimore mobs of 1777 and 1779 intensified 
 this feeling. As a quite eligible bachelor of forty-five and a rather 
 prosperous one, Goddard found the attractions of Miss Abigail 
 Angell of Providence most appealing. And so we read in the May 
 27, 1786, Providence Gazette this news item: “Thursday last [May 
 25] was married at Cranston (by the Rev. Mr. Ortver) WILLIAM 
 Gopparb, Esq; of Baltimore, Printer, to Miss Abigail Angell, eldest 
 Daughter of the late Brigadier-General AncELL; a Lady of great 
 
CHAPTER IX 185 
 
 
 
 Merit, her mental Acquirements, joined to a most amiable Disposi- 
 tion, being highly honourable to her Sex, and are pleasing Presages 
 of connubial Felicity.” Abigail Angell was the daughter of James 
 Angell and was born December 3, 1758. Her father had died in 
 1785, and now as a twenty-seven-year-old heiress and belle of one of 
 Providence’s oldest families (her great-great-grandfather Thomas 
 Angell had been one of the original settlers of Providence in 1636) 
 she provided one of the most important weddings of the social year 
 in Providence. 
 
 The day after John Carter published his account of the wedding 
 in his newspaper he sat down and wrote a charming letter to Mary 
 Katherine Goddard telling her of the events and expressing the hope 
 that the affectionate qualities of Abigail would serve to bring together 
 the brother and sister. As an old friend and a courteous eighteenth- 
 century gentleman, he felt he could take certain liberties that some- 
 one else could not. 
 
 Dear Miss Katy 
 
 ... The marriage took place at Col Bowen’s Villa, three miles from 
 town, on Thursday afternoon, the 25th, at two O’clock. The morning 
 had been appointed, but it being Ascension Day, the Reverend Mr. Oliver, 
 who joined their hands, was under a necessity of devoting the forenoon 
 to duties of a more sacred and indispensable nature. “There were present 
 ... [a list of twenty-seven guests, including John Carter, is given]. 
 
 The Bride was clad in an elegant white Lutestring, and made a 
 charming appearance: she behaved lke herself on the occasion, though 
 the solemnity of the ceremony caused a momentary embarrassment. ‘The 
 motto for the Ring, having been directed by the Bride, I must give you, 
 as it evinces her elegance of mind, and good judgment, “This joims im 
 blissful bands consenting hearts.”—Col. Bowen’s good lady being out of 
 health, the pageantry of a public celebration was purposely avoided; but 
 though the guests were few in number, mirth and conviviality prevailed. 
 Excepting my own, it was the most pleasing scene of the kind I ever 
 attended, your absence being the only alloy. On the two following days 
 they were visited by all the genteel inhabitants of Providence, and to- 
 morrow they leave Col Bowen’s to reside by invitation at Mr. Whitman’s 
 [Mrs. Whitman was a sister of Abigail] till their departure for Baltimore, 
 which will take place too soon. 
 
 Brigadier-General Angell having left four sons and two daughters, 
 and having lived long on his paternal estate, retired from business, the 
 fortunes of the ladies are consequently not large. The part assigned to 
 Mrs. Goddard is estimated at about 2500 Dollars; but was she destitute 
 of a shilling, such a wife would prove a fortune in herself; and your 
 
186 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 Brother, in the opinion of every one here, is amply compensated for re- 
 maining so long a Bachelor.... Friends may differ, and the fell demon 
 of discord intrude to interrupt the felicity of families, but I will never for 
 a moment believe that Miss Goddard can be implacable... . Allow me 
 to enjoin, with all the warmth of my heart, an immediate settlement of 
 every matter in dispute between you and your brother.... Mrs. Carter 
 joins in congratulations and compliments—She has procured a small 
 portion of the wedding Cake for Miss Goddard’s pillows, which shall ac- 
 company the present hasty scrawl, and we hope may induce pleasing 
 dreams. ... 
 
 Miss Katy was not reconciled though her bitterness undoubtedly 
 mellowed from what it had been in 1785, when she was reported 
 to have in one day instituted five law suits against her brother. 
 
 Abigail at first found Baltimore a bit difficult to adjust to, especial- 
 ly the diet. She wrote to John Carter soon after her arrival about 
 her first reactions to the city. Carter in his reply of July 24 teased 
 her for complaining of “the want of fish” and told her to “be a 
 good girl, bear in mind the interesting word odey, eat your ‘hominy 
 and pone’ with a contented mind.” We can safely assume that these 
 worries were trivial, and Abigail soon adjusted to eating Baltimore’s 
 crabs and snapper turtles. 
 
 Courtship and marriage had kept Goddard away from Baltimore 
 so much during the first half of 1786 that he found it necessary in 
 the August 18 Journal to assure his readers the editor “now conducts 
 his Business in Person, and gives the most constant Attendance.” 
 
 John Hayes, publisher of the Maryland Gazette in Baltimore, 
 had watched with considerable envy Goddard’s tremendous success 
 with his annual almanacs, and so he resolved to try to break the 
 Goddard monopoly. He first hired away Andrew Ellicott, who had 
 been doing the calculations for Goddard, and then published Elii- 
 cott’s Maryland and Virginia Almanack, and Ephemeris, For the 
 Year of our Lord 1787. Goddard, of course, quickly learned of 
 this defalcation and turned to Benjamin Workman of the University 
 of Pennsylvania faculty to prepare his own almanac, which Goddard 
 prefaced by a bitter attack upon his imitators. Finally, Edward 
 Langworthy, who may have been nursing a grudge against his 
 former partner, joined in the fray in the November 7 Maryland 
 Gazette with over a page of attack, which he signed Juvenal. The 
 fight was on, and Baltimore in November and December of 1786 
 
CHAPTER IX 187 
 
 witnessed a tremendous struggle between the two printers for the 
 almanac trade. No holds were barred as the two newspapers filled 
 their columns with invective for several weeks. The new bride 
 must have had several doubtful moments about the gentility of the 
 newspaper profession as she read some of these scurrilities. There 
 is, however, one difference in the exchange of abuse between Hayes 
 and Goddard and the dirt-shoveling Goddard had participated in be- 
 fore. The competitive fight for the almanac trade, no matter how 
 bitter it was, did not affect the personal friendship between the two 
 printers. The almanac wars of the eighteenth century are compar- 
 able to today’s ritualized feuds among radio and TV comedians. The 
 conventionalized quarrels in both centuries deliberately seek to drum 
 up more trade. Practiced as Goddard was by this time in exchanges 
 of personal invective, he could turn to impersonal exchanges with 
 some adroitness. And, in fact, we find in this campaign some of 
 Goddard’s best-written abuse. 
 
 The first blow was struck by Goddard in the preface to his 
 almanac. But even before this was released for publication, Lang- 
 worthy in the Gazerte under his pseudonym of Juvenal poured the 
 coals of fire on Goddard’s head. Obviously neither printer could 
 keep any trade secrets from the other, and so on the same day God- 
 dard said in the Journal that some kind of vituperation was to be 
 expected from a “DIVINITY-HUNTER, the Reverend and—— 
 worth, NEDDY CROCODILE,” who had been working on his 
 attack for two weeks. The printer continued his defense by as- 
 suring his readers that several thousand copies of his almanacs had 
 already been sold, including one order for three thousand. 
 
 During the next weeks of the campaign Juvenal was joined by 
 somebody signing himself J. C. and by Ellicott, who printed a list 
 of errata in Goddard’s almanac. Goddard was assisted by A. B. 
 and by an Impartial Observer. The Journal’s two appearances 
 a week compared to the Gazette’s one gave the older paper some 
 advantage because most of the time the quantity of mud was more 
 important than the quality. Hayes got sidetracked from the main 
 issues of the struggle by a personal vendetta with one James Mann, 
 and these two laid it on thick. Goddard called on the aid of Lex 
 Talionis and Jack Retort before he was through, rightly figuring 
 that the Baltimoreans of the 1780’s would not be familiar with the 
 
188 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 exchanges of abuse in Philadelphia twenty years earlier. The 
 Journal of December 19 featured a play in four scenes, whose chief 
 characters were Crocodile (Langworthy), Tycho (Ellicott), and 
 Jack Turnspit (Hayes). 
 
 Perhaps two samples of the Goddard abuse should be given. 
 The first one is an alleged advertisement in the Journal of November 
 28: 
 
 Literature 
 
 Preparing for the Press, and will be speedily published, if sufficient En- 
 couragement should be given by the deeply-interested Public, An Im- 
 provement on Chesterfield; 
 
 AN ENTIRE NEW WORK, 
 ENTITLED, 
 MODERN ELOQUENCE; 
 
 OR, 
 The Phrase in Fashion. 
 
 COMPRISING, 
 
 A Variety of profound, moral, graceful, liberal, and truly urbane EX- 
 AMPLES, for the Improvement of the rising Generation, and more 
 particularly to adorn the Manners, refine the Taste, ornament the Style, 
 and mend the Hearts of the Author’s Pupils in Town, and his young 
 Hearers in the Country;—or, to speak more imtelligibly, to prepare 
 them for “active Life,” by teaching them how to throw Dirt scientif- 
 ically, give the Lie emphatically, and to intersperse their Conversation and 
 Writings with all the fime Tropes and Figures of the Bilingsgate Semi- 
 
 nary, where the Author received his refined and most sublime Education. 
 
 By EDWARD CROCODILE, 
 
 Haberdasher of Pronouns, and Auctionier of Divinity—pro Tempore. 
 
 The Author flatters himself that he need not attempt to illustrate 
 the vast Utility of the above Work, as it must be obvious to all whose 
 Minds are moderately illuminated by similar Rays of Science—and as a 
 Proof of his transcendent A bilities, he need only, he is persuaded, refer 
 to his Performances, under the Signature of Juvenal, which have lately 
 dignified Mr. Hayes’s Gazette, the Poignancy of which, he verily believes, 
 have “pierced,” through and through, and done, quite done for, the 
 tough Vitals of “Will. Goddard.” 
 
 N.B. If the above Essay of CROCODILE’s masterly Genius should be 
 patronized, he will, it is thought, bring forward some other Works of 
 
CHAPTER IX 189 
 
 equal Worth, with which, it is said, he is now heavy ladened.—Pro 
 Bono PuBLIco. 
 
 “No CraB more active in the dirty Dance, 
 
 Downward to climb, and backward to advance.” 
 
 The quotation from Goddard’s favorite “Dunciad” appropriately 
 leads us to the second sample of the printer’s writing abilities. This 
 was a poem printed in the January 2, 1787, Journal. After this 
 date no more attention was given to the dispute in either of the two 
 Baltimore newspapers. Probably the determining factor in ending 
 the exchange was not so much the efficacy of the poem but the normal 
 dwindling of almanac sales with the start of the new year. The 
 Marquis of Queensberry rules for an almanac war were those of 
 almanac sales and newspaper circulation, and the rules were rigidly 
 adhered to. But let us turn to Goddard’s poetic strictures on the 
 occasion: 
 
 A DEscrIPTION OF SCANDAL 
 
 Around the world [? ] Sprite 
 
 Speeds undiscern’d to poison pure delight: 
 Amidst the foremost of this haggard band, 
 Unwearied poster of the sea and land, 
 
 Wrapt in dark mists, malignant SCANDAL flies, 
 While Envy’s poison’d breath the buoyant gale supplies. 
 Tho’ Sheridan, with shafts of Comic wit, 
 Pierc’d, and expos’d her to the laughing Pit, 
 Th’ wmmortal hag still wears her paper crown, 
 The dreaded Empress of the idle town: 
 O’erleaping her prerogatives of old, 
 
 To sink the noble, to defame the bold; 
 
 In chase of worTH to slip the dogs of strife, 
 Thro’ all the ample range of public life; 
 
 The Tyrant now that sanctuary burst 
 Where HAPPINEss by PRIVACY Is nurst, 
 
 Her fury rising as her powers increase, 
 O’erturns the ALTARS of DOMESTIC PEACE. 
 Pleas’d in her dark and gall-distilling cloud, 
 The sportive form of INNocENCE to shroud: 
 BEauTy’s young train her baleful eyes survey, 
 To mark the FaiREsT as her fav’rite prey. 
 
 For SCANDAL, restless fiend, who never knows 
 The balmy blessing of an hour’s repose, 
 
 Worn, yet unsated with her daily toil, 
 
 In her base work consumes the midnight oil. 
 
190 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 O’er fiercer fiends, when heavy slumbers creep, 
 When wearied AvaricE and AMBITION sleep, 
 SCANDAL is vigilant, and keen to spread 
 
 The plagues that spring from her prolific head: 
 On Trutn’s fair basis she her falsehood builds, 
 With tinsel sentiment its surface gilds; 
 
 To nightly labour, from their dark abodes, 
 The Demons of the groaning Press she goads; 
 And smiles to see their rapid art supply 
 
 Ten thousand wings to every INFANT LIE. 
 
 In January, 1787, Benjamin Franklin made an attempt through 
 a Baltimore agent to collect the sixty-pound bond of almost twenty 
 years before that Goddard and his sister had signed. Considering the 
 circumstances of the printer at the time, the reply of Goddard to 
 Franklin’s agent, David Lenox, is rather equivocating. While ob- 
 jecting to paying the heavy burden of accumulated interest, he 
 promised his good intentions for the future, though he pointedly 
 reminded Lenox of the Pennsylvania Assembly act of March, 1775, 
 releasing him legally from all debts prior to that date. In spite of 
 his statement, “I shall ever consider myself morally bound to pay my 
 Debts,” Goddard probably had little if any intention to pay this 
 particular debt, despising Franklin as he did. 
 
 The publication of the 1788 almanacs by the Hayes and Goddard 
 presses in the fall of 1787 led to another exchange between the two 
 editors. But the 1787 fight lasted only a short while and was never 
 as violent as the one a year before. The only exception to this was 
 a remark by Andrew Ellicott (the principal attacker of Goddard) 
 about the Baltimore printer’s marriage “on the wrong side of forty.” 
 Perhaps this hurt him and his recent bride more than he would admit 
 since beginning about this time the couple began to think more and 
 more of retiring from the printing business and returning to Provi- 
 dence. Goddard in his notices “To the Public” every so often refers 
 to his having given the “prime of his life” to the people of Baltimore. 
 And Abigail was probably encouraging her husband in this attitude. 
 Perhaps she never entirely overcame her lack of enthusiasm for 
 “hominy and pone.” 
 
 During latter 1787 and early 1788 the leading topic of discussion 
 in all the states was the ratification of the new constitution proposed 
 by the convention held in Philadelphia. Among those seeking 
 
CHAPTER IX 191 
 
 ratification in Maryland was William Goddard, who printed several 
 essays in the Journal in support of his opinion. On April 26, 1788, 
 Maryland became the seventh state to ratify, and Baltimoreans de- 
 cided this called for a celebration on Sunday, May 1. The inevitable 
 parade meandered through the main streets of the city, featuring a 
 band followed by representatives of forty-five different trades. 
 Among the trades was printing with both John Hayes and William 
 Goddard walking, who had gotten together for a float topped by a 
 figure of Gutenberg. Alongside the two editors “Mercuries” dis- 
 tributed copies of the new constitution to what the Journal estimated 
 as three thousand people witnessing the parade. In the middle of 
 the procession the place of honor was held by the crafts associated 
 with the sea. Leading this group was a miniature, fifteen-foot-long 
 fully rigged ship on wheels, called The Federalist. The procession 
 ended on a hill, ever since that day known as Federal Hill, where 
 speeches were made. At the conclusion of these Commodore Joshua 
 Barney, who had superintended the building of The Federalist, 
 launched the vessel. That evening there was a huge bonfire and a 
 banquet on Federal Hill and a ball at Starck’s Tavern. Commodore 
 Barney, later to acquire fame in the War of 1812, afterwards sailed 
 the vessel to Annapolis, where more festivities were held. From the 
 capital he sailed The Federalist down the Chesapeake and up the 
 Potomac River to Mount Vernon, where he docked on June 9g in 
 time for breakfast with Washington, to whom the ship was presented. 
 
 The banquet on Federal Hill, attended by four hundred persons, 
 was under the supervision of Goddard and George Salmon, first 
 president of the Bank of Baltimore. William Evans, afterwards pro- 
 prietor of the Indian Queen Hotel, served as caterer for the occasion. 
 His bill for £200 included such items as 560 pounds of bacon and 
 ham, 9% gallons of peach brandy, 15% barrels of beer, a separate 
 barrel of beer “for the committee,” and more miscellaneous beer, 
 grog, and “teddy.” Obviously Goddard, active as he was on this 
 occasion, was regarded as one of the city’s leading citizens. 
 
 In 1789 Goddard started to move his financial interests from 
 Baltimore to Providence. James Angell, Abigail’s younger brother, 
 had been in Baltimore since latter 1786 and had interested himself 
 in the printing business. On July 24, 1787, he announced the 
 setting up of a print shop, though we have no record of any im- 
 
192 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 
 
 prints from his shop. Angell made himself a part of the 
 Baltimore community by marrying Mary Barney, sister of Joshua, on 
 Christmas Day, 1788. A letter to Moses Brown, executor of General 
 Angell’s estate, on April 7, 1789, reveals the plans being discussed 
 by James and his brother-in-law. James Angell was turning over 
 to Goddard all his property in Rhode Island in exchange for a 
 partnership in the Goddard press in Baltimore. The letter actually 
 said that the veteran printer was about to set out for Providence to 
 settle the arrangements there. This visit lasted for two months 
 since a letter dated June, 1789, to Horatio Gates, a friend acquired as 
 a result of the Lee affair, speaks of his recent return from Rhode 
 Island, along with his expectation of visiting Gates at his Virginia 
 estate. Doubtless Goddard set a good price for a partnership, be- 
 cause the June 26, 1789, Journal says it “hath the most extensive 
 INLAND and seEa-coasr Circulation of any Paper in the United 
 States.” Finally, on August 7, 1789, the Goddard and Angell part- 
 nership was announced. In the announcement Goddard referred to 
 _ the “Labours of an otp Servant.” He was weary of his many 
 struggles. 
 
 During the next few years Goddard and his wife spent almost 
 as much time in Providence as they did in Baltimore. They stayed 
 with her relatives, such as the Jacob Whitmans, or with his friends, 
 such as John Carter. On one of these trips in June and July of 
 1790 the first child of Abigail and William died after a long illness 
 while the family was visiting the Whitmans. On November 29 
 of the same year the first of the five children to live to adulthood 
 was born—Ann Elizabeth. 
 
 In 1790 Christopher Hughes and Leonard Harbaugh engaged 
 in an epistolary exchange of insults through the columns of the 
 Maryland Journal. Commonplace as such exchanges were in the 
 eighteenth century, this one would not merit our mention here but 
 for two things. One is that Goddard and Angell were taken into 
 court for printing one of the letters—for which they were promptly 
 acquitted. And the other is that a broadside was printed during the 
 course of the controversy with this colophon: “Printed at P. Hassen- 
 clever’s Iron-Works.” Goddard in an attempt at anonymity was 
 reviving memories of his role in the turbulent days of the Stamp 
 Act struggle and the Constitutional Courant, for which Lawrence 
 
CHAPTER IX 193 
 
 Sweeney had given the New York authorities the iron-maker’s name 
 as the source. 
 
 While William was becoming more involved with his friends and 
 interests in Providence, Mary Katherine had been operating her 
 bookstore and running the Baltimore post office. Ever since 1775, 
 when the Continental Congress took over her brother’s Constitutional 
 postal system, she had served as the only woman postmaster in this 
 country, thereby giving her a certain claim to posterity. She was 
 among the most efficient of the various postal officials of her day. 
 Ebenezer Hazard, then postmaster general, in a 1786 letter to 
 General Horatio Gates described her extreme punctuality in re- 
 mitting her accounts to his ofice. During the Revolution postmasters 
 were fortunate if at the end of each quarter they did not have to 
 dig into their own pockets. Not until peace and more settled condi- 
 tions did the post office in communities such as Baltimore start to 
 provide any income for those in charge. In 1789 the new govern- 
 ment under the presidency of Washington was busy setting aside 
 many of the appointees of the days of the Articles of Confederation. 
 Ebenezer Hazard found himself replaced as postmaster general by 
 Samuel Osgood, who then proceeded to appoint his own postmasters. 
 Towards the end of October, 1789, Mary Katherine was much 
 surprised during the course of a seemingly routine visit to Baltimore 
 by Burrell, the assistant to Osgood, to receive a note telling her to 
 turn over her office to John White. The postmistress was enough of 
 a Goddard not to take this lying down. She first objected probably 
 in person to Burrell, who told her she was replaced because a person 
 of more physical vigor was needed who could ride horseback fre- 
 quently and superintend the postal activities of the states below 
 Baltimore, it being intended to make the city a regional headquarters. 
 (Even if seriously suggested, which is doubtful, nothing was ever 
 done in this direction.) Then Mary Katherine, as an experienced 
 newspaperwoman, gave her case verbal publicity in Baltimore, and 
 soon a petition signed by more than two hundred of the leading 
 businessmen of Baltimore was sent to Osgood. This petition to re- 
 tain Miss Goddard in her old position, dated November 12, 1789, 
 was signed by several of the former attackers of Goddard in 1777 
 and 1779. Apparently the sister was held in greater affection than 
 the brother. On December 23 no reply from Osgood yet forth- 
 
194 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 coming, she addressed a memorial to President Washington. Wash- 
 ington replied on January 6, 1790, that he would not interfere with 
 the affairs of any department and had referred the matter to Osgood. 
 Osgood defended his position in a reply to the Baltimore merchants 
 on January 7. Five days later Mary Katherine petitioned the 
 United States Senate, asking that she be restored to her former 
 position. On February 18 receipt of this petition was recorded in 
 the Senate Journal, but no action was taken. And so Mary Katherine 
 lost her place as postmistress. 
 
 Mary Katherine Goddard continued to reside in Baltimore for 
 the rest of her life. The 1790 census records her as owning four 
 slaves and having one “other free person” in her household. For 
 many years she continued her bookstore (William never resumed 
 this branch of the business after the separation of the two in January, 
 1784). In 1803 she moved her shop from 80 Baltimore Street to 
 smaller quarters at 28 Chatham Street. About 1809 or 1810 she 
 retired from her business, and the 1810 Baltimore directory lists 
 . her as a gentlewoman at the latter address. She died on August 12, 
 1816, at her last home at 18 Conewago Street. Her will makes no 
 mention of her brother, from whom she had so long been alienated. 
 During the last years of her life she had lived alone except for a 
 Negro slave, Belinda Starling. As a reward for the years of care 
 and affection Mary Katherine gave Belinda her freedom and “all 
 the property of which I may die Possessed all which I do to recom- 
 pence the faithful performance of duties to me.” No other person 
 is mentioned in the brief will, made on May 21, 1816. Seemingly 
 these last years of her life were lonely ones for America’s first 
 postmistress and editress for practically a decade of Baltimore’s first 
 newspaper. 
 
 In seeking to comprehend the life of our Federalist ancestors, we 
 find many difficulties. They had refinement, elegance, taste, and 
 discrimination, but their practice of these qualities was much dif- 
 ferent from ours. For instance, today’s Baltimore Sun would prob- 
 ably not carry such an advertisement as did its predecessor, the 
 Maryland Journal, on November 12, 1790. “James Bryden, Hair- 
 Dresser and Perfumer, at the Civet-Cat, in Market-Street, Baltimore, 
 has imported, in the last Vessels, from London, a large and general 
 Assortment of Perfumery, &c. &. ... Also just received, from 
 
CHAPTER Ix 195 
 
 Kentucky, A large and fresh quantity of Bear’s Grease, which is much 
 esteemed for its efficacy in thickening and hastening the growth of 
 the hair, nourishing its roots, and preventing its turning gray, at Is. 
 1oVd. and 3s. 9d. per bottle.” James Bryden and Elizabeth Arden 
 may have many things in common, but bear’s grease is probably not 
 one of them. 
 
 The Maryland Journal continued to be the most popular news- 
 paper of its day. At one time Goddard spoke of sending out each 
 week “Seven Reams of this Journal.” However many customers 
 this means, the Journal during the early days of Washington’s ad- 
 ministration became one of the staunchest supporters of the Federalist 
 party in its struggles against the anti-Federalists. Douglas Southall 
 Freeman in his biography of Washington comments, “Highly 
 esteemed also for conspicuous gallantry in the crucial years [was] 
 . .. William Goddard’s important Maryland Journal at Baltimore.” 
 
 Publication of an almanac continued each year. For his 1792 
 almanac Goddard, with much ado, called upon the astronomical 
 services of Benjamin Banneker. In Evans’s American Bibliography 
 there is a note about this 1792 almanac. “The first publication of 
 Benjamin Banneker, a free negro, born in Baltimore County, fifty- 
 nine years of age at this performance, which he accomplished, un- 
 aided, from books loaned to him by the Ellicott family—themselves 
 remarkable for scientific achievement. The Publishers’ preface 
 makes clear that in selecting Banneker’s calculations for their Al- 
 manac, which they did at the instance of James M’Henry, they were 
 actuated by a mingled feeling of deference for Mr. M’Henry, and 
 Mr. David Rittenhouse’s opinions, of philanthropy, and for the busi- 
 ness effect it would have on the sale of the Almanac.” Regular 
 advertisements in the Journal informed the readers about Banneker’s 
 efforts as the Goddard and Angell firm pushed the sales in its usual 
 vigorous fashion. 
 
 For some time now Goddard and his wife had found the manage- 
 ment of their Rhode Island properties requiring more and more time- 
 consuming trips in spite of the assistance of their friend Moses 
 Brown. There were now two girls in the family—Mary Angell 
 Goddard having been born May 24, 1792—and Abigail’s importuni- 
 ties to quit the hurly-burly printing business carried more weight than 
 ever before. That the abruptness of Goddard’s retiring is apparent 
 
196 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 and not real comes out in a letter the Baltimore printer wrote to his 
 old friend and fellow craftsman in Providence, John Carter, on 
 November 26, 1791. Goddard had just returned from Philadelphia 
 and wrote primarily to felicitate Carter on the recent marriage of his 
 daughter. Afterwards he added: “In the Spring I shall, probably, see 
 you at Providence—but whether to take up my ‘permanent Residence’ 
 there, or in its vicinity, I cannot, as yet, conclusively determine—It 
 depends much on the Punctuality of Mr. Angell—in a certain affair 
 now on the Tapis.” Apparently what precipitated the retirement was 
 a speculation, in what we don’t know, of twenty-five hundred pounds. 
 Goddard lost on the speculation, and in order to repay the person 
 who had backed him he sold his interest in the Journal to his young 
 partner, James Angell. Though Goddard was not quite as poor 
 as his announcement of his retirement in the August 14, 1792, 
 Journal implied, he still took away from Baltimore very little capital. 
 The twenty-five hundred pound loss added to the five hundred lost 
 a few years before to George Richards & Co. did not leave the 
 Goddard family wealthy, yet the parents obviously saw their way 
 ~ clear for future sustenance and a graceful old age. Goddard wrote 
 his farewell to the readers of the Maryland Journal at some length. 
 He requested those who owed him to make payment so that he could 
 have “a Pittance wherewith, in humble Mediocrity, I may cultivate 
 my little Farm.” He concluded his article by revealing that his 
 “little Retreat” would be “near the Town of ProvipEnce, in the 
 Srate of Ruope-Istanp.” Among those who heeded the request 
 to pay their back bills was the French consul in Baltimore, Chevalier 
 d’Anemours, who accompanied his payment with a letter wishing 
 Goddard “every sort of happyness; and [the Chevalier] assures him 
 —it will contribute to his own to hear—that he has found it in the 
 alluring occupations of a rural Life.’ The much mellower, much 
 less truculent, Goddard of the 1780’s and 1790’s made many more 
 friends than the fierce defender of his rights in the 1770’s. Though 
 Goddard’s name was not dropped from the colophon of the Journal 
 until February 22, 1793, the Goddard family sailed for Rhode Island 
 shortly after the August announcement, and William Goddard thus 
 ended his thirty-year career as a printer and newspaperman. 
 
Xe 
 
 NTIL this point the task of writing William Goddard’s bi- 
 
 ography has been one of recording events, actions. Now the 
 manner of living changes. With many people the placid Indian 
 summer of life after pronounced activity is brief and decidedly 
 anticlimactic. Not so with Goddard. He still had over twenty-five 
 years of a contented existence to live. His two extant portraits, now 
 in the drawing room of the home of Mrs. C. Oliver Iselin in Provi- 
 dence, graphically show these two manners of living, each meaningful 
 in itself. The first painting—the one almost always reproduced— 
 reveals a relatively young man not much past forty who stubbornly 
 stares at the viewer from the canvas. The unknown painter has 
 brought out an implacable, confident character with certain overtones 
 of gentleness. The second portrait, done by James Frothingham, 
 is that of a gentle, genial soul whose eyes twinkle in enjoyment. 
 The implacability is now only the overtone to a basic contented 
 confidence instead of the previous urgent self-assurance. Frothing- 
 ham’s portrait, painted probably when Goddard was in his late 
 sixties or early seventies, reveals the person whom a fellow printer, 
 William McCullough, could describe in these terms in a letter to 
 Isaiah Thomas: “Goddard, whom you also mention, was truly 
 facetious. He was the soul of conviviality, at a dinner of friends, 
 and had a fund of laughable entertainment. I have heard some of 
 his jokes, but they would scarcely be thought modest in print. He 
 Was a poet.” 
 
 We are fortunate in having still standing the house in which the 
 Goddard family lived near Providence for the next eleven years. 
 Called the Clemence-Goddard-Irons house, it is now owned by the 
 Society for the Preservation of New England Antiquities and is 
 located at 38 George Waterman Road in Johnston. Now surrounded 
 by rows of suburban homes, the house in 1792 was the focus for a 
 
 two-hundred-and-fifty-acre farm. This farm had belonged to Gen- 
 
I 98 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 eral Angell, and a year after his death Abigail and James purchased 
 the shares of the other heirs for £398. Then in 1789, probably as 
 part of the partnership agreement, James relinquished to his sister 
 his interest in the farm. Thus the way was prepared for Abigail, 
 William, and the two children to settle there in August, 1792. 
 
 The house was old even then, having been built about 1680 
 (and 112 years do lend a patina of age to any house) by Thomas 
 Clemence, a friend of Roger Williams. A simple, unostentatious, 
 weathered saltbox, it would have provided comfortable, though not 
 luxurious, quarters for the growing family. The outside dimensions 
 are only approximately 24 by 27 feet, but in 1792 there may have 
 been an additional leanto besides various buildings not now standing 
 appropriate to the maintenance of a farm. Almost all of one end 
 wall of the dwelling is a huge fieldstone chimney, which provided a 
 large cooking fireplace for the kitchen-dining room and another 
 similarly large one for heating purposes in the parlor. The first 
 floor consists of four rooms—the kitchen-dining room, in size about 
 15 X 15; the parlor or front room, about 9 X 15; a bedroom, 
 about 9 X 15; and a second bedroom, about 9 X 9. A steep 
 stairway in one corner of the kitchen leads up to a loft running 
 all the way across the house. There is also underneath the 
 entire building a cellar entered by a trap door in the parlor. 
 Without difficulty we can visualize the retired printer and his family 
 spending most of their evenings in what I have called the kitchen- 
 dining room watching logs burn in the huge fireplace as the father 
 reminisced about his past experiences to the children or to the not 
 infrequent visitors, most of whom would have had their after-dinner 
 port or brandy in the parlor. 
 
 In this relaxed mood Goddard on August 17, 1793, wrote to his 
 friend General Horatio Gates, the conqueror of the British army 
 under Burgoyne at Saratoga, now living on his Virginia plantation, 
 Traveler’s Rest. Gates and his wife were invited to visit the God- 
 dards in their Johnston retreat, where, as Goddard phrased it, “I 
 expect to pass the remaining days that may be allotted me by Divine 
 Goodness.” In comparison with the bustling scene in Baltimore, he 
 hoped “to enjoy the happiness of more tranquil scenes amongst the 
 affectionate Friends & Companions of my youth.” Gates happened 
 to be then near New York, and so Goddard reminded him of the 
 
CHAPTER X 199 
 
 packets which “furnish such convenient & delightful Means of passing 
 from New York to Providence.” 
 
 For the next few years Abigail was busy with her expanding 
 brood of children. To the two daughters born in Baltimore a son, 
 William Giles, was added January 2, 1794, and then two girls, 
 Abbie Angell, in early 1795, and Sarah Updike, June 9, 1796. 
 Caring for five children and acting as hostess for her convivial hus- 
 band would have kept Abigail busy. 
 
 For William there was the round of activities necessary to the 
 management of the farm plus some properties within the city of 
 Providence, particularly a group of lots across the street from the 
 Baptist church. The stature of Goddard in the community is 
 indicated by his joining a Providence merchant, Cyprian Sterry, as 
 sureties for the “Sum of Twenty Thousand good Spanish milled 
 Dollars” to provide a bond for William Peck as district United 
 States marshal. In 1797 the town meeting of Providence appointed 
 a committee, probably favorable to Goddard since it included Moses 
 Brown, to “enquire into the Title which William Goddard possesses 
 to a certain Lot of Land situated at the North End of this Town 
 and now in the possession of Simeon Thayer.” In 1798 the three 
 lots at the corner of North Main and Thomas streets had a taxable 
 valuation of $1660, $1500 of which pertained to the lot at 79 North 
 Main, where there were some store buildings. Occasionally William 
 traveled down to Baltimore to see about liquidating his various 
 interests there in the press and the paper mill. One such trip is 
 mentioned in a letter to Moses Brown in June, 1799, and Goddard 
 wrote to his brother-in-law, Jacob Whitman, Jr., that he had used 
 some of the proceeds of the sale of his Baltimore establishment for 
 the purchase of property in Providence. So it is not surprising to 
 find the 1800 census listing not only the seven members of the 
 Goddard family but including four other persons, probably farm 
 hands or tenants, under the household of William Goddard. 
 
 But Goddard was not really a farmer, and the isolation of the 
 farm must have drastically limited the number of guests who could 
 be entertained. Also, the children were growing up and needing 
 more space than the picturesque old farmhouse could provide. No 
 doubt, Abigail wanted to see more of her Providence friends and 
 relatives now that the children no longer demanded intimate super- 
 
200 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 vision. So the Goddard family in 1803 moved from the Johnston 
 farm toa larger dwelling at the corner of Main and Thomas streets. 
 There were three bedrooms now plus a loft containing a spare bed- 
 stead. The dining room, or keeping-room, was separate from the 
 kitchen, and Abigail would not have to worry about the grit and 
 smoke from the fireplace getting into her damask table linen. The 
 front parlor now had room for a Pembroke table, two card tables, 
 and ten chairs, so that the father could entertain his friends after 
 dinner much more spaciously. Though the Goddards were not 
 living in anything like plush circumstances, still they were com- 
 fortable and could take their place among the Providence gentry 
 with few qualms. 
 
 Among these gentry of Providence were the Carters. One of 
 them, Dr. Benjamin Carter, had in 1804 asked Goddard if he wished 
 to invest any money in a trading expedition to Canton, China. God- 
 dard had to turn down this opportunity, not having, as he described 
 it, the “Mexican Means.” In spite of this refusal he still ordered 
 - luxuries such as silk and China tea. “Should you remain at Canton, 
 as you intimated, I may possibly have a Chance of sending you a 
 few Dollars—equal to the Purchase of a Piece of Silk, of the first 
 Quality, for my Wife and Daughters, or a Coat for myself & Son, 
 with a handsome Tea Cady filled with Imperial.” Three years later, 
 in 1807, Goddard wrote again to Dr. Carter, then in Canton, about a 
 desk he had ordered. 
 
 One of the close friends in these calm days was Moses Brown. 
 The Brown brothers were the leading merchants and property 
 owners of the city of Providence. Moses, the most active in busi- 
 ness of the four brothers, had been one of the two executors of the 
 estate of Abigail’s father. Afterwards he served as a kind of 
 financial adviser to the Angell and Goddard families. In this era 
 merchants frequently performed the functions of banks for their 
 customers. And so it was with Moses Brown for the various Angells 
 and Goddards. Therefore we find many memoranda going back 
 and forth between the merchant and the retired printer. Most of 
 these notes, frequently undated, relate to routine items of business. 
 Sometimes Goddard takes the liberty of an old friend and asks 
 Brown to make sure that the financial affairs of a relative are in 
 order. An example of this is a letter, dated May 27, 1812, written 
 
CHAPTER X 201 
 
 after Jacob Whitman, Jr., had died, and Goddard wanted to make 
 sure the wife’s affairs were properly settled. But quite apparently 
 the relationship between Moses Brown and William Goddard was 
 more than business. At some time (the note from Goddard to 
 Brown relative to this is undated) Moses must have tried his hand at 
 printing, perhaps solely as a means of saving his firm money, and 
 he called on the old printer’s assistance as technical adviser. The 
 note implies that Goddard was searching among his possessions for 
 stray bits of printing apparatus to send to the old Quaker merchant. 
 Probably the most important service Brown rendered the Goddard 
 family was on July 24, 1813, when he canceled the remainder of a 
 mortgage he held against Goddard in return for some old and not 
 too valid claims against him. Brown’s friendly generosity did much 
 to make the last years of Goddard’s life and his widow’s (she lived 
 until 1845) more comfortable. 
 
 John Carter was another of the Providence friends of Goddard, 
 if not the closest of them all. William Giles Goddard, William’s 
 son, many years later spoke of this “truly fraternal” friendship. 
 Almost every day, now that the Goddards were living in Providence, 
 Goddard made the short walk over to the Shakespeare’s Head 
 printing shop of Carter, and the two friends would talk about the 
 present affairs of the Providence Gazette, founded by William so 
 many years before, and exchange reminiscences and maledictions on 
 that terrible Mr. Jefferson or Mr. Madison, staunch Federalists 
 that both printers were. 
 
 Through John Carter the former acquaintanceship with Isaiah 
 Thomas was revived. On March 29, 1800, Carter wrote to Thomas, 
 and Thomas enthusiastically responded a few days later, suggesting 
 that Carter and Goddard come together to visit him in Worcester. 
 Whether this particular trip was made or not, many other trips back 
 and forth between Worcester and Providence were made by all 
 three men and their families. Thomas, whose acquaintance with 
 Goddard went back to the days of the Constitutional post offices, 
 in his reply to Carter on April 5, 1800, mentioned that the three of 
 them were New England’s only surviving printers from pre-Revolu- 
 tionary days. Thomas had turned over the running of his large 
 printing establishment to his son and was beginning to interest 
 himself in other affairs. One result of this freedom was the pub- 
 
202 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 lishing in 1810 of his History of Printing in America. Obviously 
 many of the conversations among the three veterans of the printing 
 wars during the years before 1810 were about the materials to go 
 into the book. As so frequently happens with individuals in God- 
 dard’s situation, antiquarian interests provided a genuine zest for 
 living. Thomas in his preface acknowledged the help of four 
 “elder brethren of the type, Witt1am Gopparp and Joun Carrer, 
 esqrs. of Providence; and mr. THomas Braprorp, and the late mr. 
 James Humpnureys, of Philadelphia.” Because of Thomas’s close 
 connection with Goddard his character-sketch of the retired printer 
 merits attention: “Goddard, although considerably advanced in life 
 still retains his maiveté, and the pleasantness and facetiousness of his 
 disposition, which qualities render him a remarkably pleasant com- 
 panion.” 
 
 Thomas must have let his friends soon know that he was hoping 
 to collect new material along with corrections to the old for a 
 revised edition of his History of Printing. (This second edition was 
 * not to be published until 1874.) Goddard busied himself in writing 
 down in letters what he could for his Worcester friend. One of 
 these was a revealing letter of April 15, 1811. To understand, we 
 must remember first the Stamp Act crisis of 1765, when Goddard as 
 a vigorous patriot distrusted Benjamin Franklin’s role in that affair. 
 The Pennsylvania Chronicle quarrels had added to Goddard’s 
 personal animosity towards the successful Philadelphian, which was 
 increased by Goddard’s sojourn as surveyor of the postal system 
 under Franklin and Richard Bache. After Franklin’s death his 
 name became a symbol of liberal anti-Federalism, and the Federalist 
 Goddard found this role as repulsive to him as the real Franklin 
 had ever been. In 1778 Holt had discouraged him from printing a 
 pamphlet against the elder statesman, but now he was not to be 
 deterred from expressing his dislike in a private letter to the Worces- 
 ter editor. Franklin had entered into a “conspiracy” with Gallo- 
 way and Wharton to overturn the old proprietary government in 
 Pennsylvania so that they could acquire “Wealth & Power for them- 
 selves & Connexions.”” When this plan failed, “from a Royalist he 
 insidiously turned into a dark Republican. ... When he arrived in 
 America [in 1775], he was considered a suspicious doubtful character 
 —and Mr S. Adams, & other Patriots, asked me my opinion of him, 
 
CHAPTER X 203 
 
 at Philadelphia being very suspicious of him. I told them if they 
 could convince him that it would redound to his InTEREsT to support 
 the American Cause, he would soon declare himself in its Favour, 
 and not otherwise. This they did, & Franklin became, as they ad- 
 vised me, an unsuspected confidential Patrior.” The letter con- 
 tinues with an account of Franklin’s “sinister” maneuvering in the 
 postal system and pushing of Goddard aside for his son-in-law, 
 Richard Bache. Concluding the commentary on Franklin is this 
 sentence: “After all, as I have said before, as applied to John Calvin 
 by the celebrated Dean Berkeley, afterwards Bishop of Cloyne ‘To 
 give the Devil his Due’—Doctor F. ‘was a very great Man.’” The 
 old rancors were still in Goddard after all these years of peaceful 
 retirement. 
 
 A few letters now at the Rhode Island Historical Society, mostly 
 undated, show the affectionate father and husband. When his 
 children were away for visits of a few days to relatives Goddard 
 wrote his beloved Eliza, Mary, Sally, Abby, and William entertain- 
 ing notes filled with the chitchat of a fond parent. To Eliza and 
 Mary he says, “Your Absence hath demonstrated your great Im- 
 portance in our Family.” Another time he writes to “‘my Mary’ 
 and ‘my Sally’ ” a note teasing them about the possible date of their 
 return from Dedham and enclosing four dollars. A letter written 
 September 5, 1814, to “My ever dear Abigail” starts out, “Tho’ 
 you have been absent but a few Hours, yet the Days appear to have 
 lengthened, occasioned by the want of your Presence and Society—so 
 essential to my Happiness.” With this letter one of the daughters 
 had written a brief epistle, to which the father added this wry re- 
 mark, “Ann Eliza’s Proof Sheet, carefully revised and corrected by 
 an old Corrector of near 74.” 
 
 William Giles Goddard, the only son, attended Brown Uni- 
 versity, from which he graduated in 1812. In October the recent 
 graduate paid a three-day visit to Isaiah Thomas. Arrangements 
 were probably made then for young Goddard to study law in the 
 office of Francis Blake in Worcester. On the first of November 
 the prospective lawyer arrived for his longer stay in Worcester. 
 William Giles found the pull of a newspaper, aided no doubt by 
 the friendship of Isaiah Thomas, too strong and he began working 
 on the Worcester Spy, then published by Thomas’s son. In early 
 
204 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 1814 he returned to Providence, where he joined a three-way partner- 
 ship in publishing the Rhode Island American. The former news- 
 paperman reported in obvious pleasure and pride in his letter to 
 Abigail of September 5, 1814: “William is steadily labouring in his 
 Vocation, and I am pleased to find ‘bears his Faculties meekly.’ 
 About 7 this Eve, I read a Proof of his 2d Page, to facilitate his 
 Business, and I hope he will be able seasonably to repose alongside 
 his watchful anxious Father.” 
 
 During all these years of retirement the papers of General 
 Charles Lee remained in Goddard’s possession. In 1810 he must 
 have felt as though a skeleton were being dug out of a closet when 
 Daniel Carthy of New Bern, North Carolina, wrote to him. Carthy 
 was trying to prove that the unknown author of the famous Junius 
 letters was Charles Lee. Goddard sent Carthy a box of Lee’s 
 manuscripts pursuant to the North Carolinian’s request and argument 
 that if Lee’s authorship could be proved the manuscripts in God- 
 dard’s possession would become valuable. The only result, of 
 . course, was a correspondence and the acquiring of a new friend. 
 Carthy in a letter to Major Thomas Coles, a Providence mutual 
 acquaintance, on March 21, 1811, talked about Abigail’s qualities: 
 “You give me such an high idea of the literary taste, talents, and 
 accomplishments of Mrs. Goddard, that, although I should dread 
 her censures, I could wish to be near her, that my work might re- 
 ceive the preenings of her criticism and the stamp of her approba- 
 tion.” Later Carthy revealed his current literary enthusiasm: “Last 
 fall a friend of mine was going to New York. He asked me the 
 common place question, whether I had any commands. I answered 
 none, unless he should meet Diedrick Knickerbocker in his travels, 
 in which event, I entreated him not to forget to present my 
 respects and acknowledgments for the very great pleasure I had 
 received from a perusal of his incomparable History of New York, 
 my native Country.” Earlier Carthy had published an open letter 
 to Knickerbocker in the United States Gazette. Washington Irving 
 must have enjoyed the open letter and would have appreciated the 
 compliments for Diedrich Knickerbocker. 
 
 At this stage of his life Goddard took much pleasure from his 
 membership in the American Antiquarian Society, founded by Isaiah 
 Thomas in 1812. At the meeting of the Society on September 29, 
 
CHAPTER X 205 
 
 1813, fourteen people were added to the membership rolls, including 
 William Goddard, Yale’s President Timothy Dwight, and the 
 renowned scientist, Benjamin Silliman. Goddard became quite in- 
 terested in the Society’s activities and wrote many letters to Thomas 
 with suggestions for new members and the like. All this did much 
 to take away the sting of the loss he felt in the death of John 
 Carter on August 12,1814. The removal of such a close friend made 
 the old printer aware of his own age and declining strength. 
 
 The affairs of another old friend intruded themselves on God- 
 dard’s attention during these last few years. Evidently while still in 
 Baltimore he had become acquainted with Lighthorse Harry Lee, 
 of Revolutionary War fame and the father of Robert E. Lee. Lee 
 had been badly mauled by a Baltimore mob in 1812 and never 
 recovered his health thereafter. In search of relief from physical 
 pain in 1816 and 1817 he was in various islands in the Bahamas. 
 His eldest son, Charles Carter Lee, was a student at Harvard, and 
 the father wrote many letters of paternal advice to his son in care of 
 William Goddard in Providence, vessels from the Rhode Island 
 port putting in frequently for salt near where Lee was staying. On 
 August 29, 1816, Lee wrote directly to Goddard telling him of his 
 current activities and hopes for surcease from his constant pain. Lee 
 also requested Goddard to suggest the name of a school near Provi- 
 dence for the crippled son of a friend of his in the Bahamas. Since 
 Lee sent three copies of this letter by various vessels, Goddard 
 forwarded one of these to Carter Lee at Harvard. 
 
 But time was running out for the old newspaperman. On Sep- 
 tember 25, 1817, Isaiah Thomas spent the night with the Goddards 
 and recorded in his diary that his friend was “very infirm.” On 
 Tuesday evening, December 23, 1817, the seventy-seven-year-old 
 printer died. William Giles Goddard had the filial duty of writing 
 his father’s obituary for the Rhode Island American. In the brief 
 notice he appropriately said at one point: “The first years of his 
 long life were passed amid the turmoil of useful activities—the last 
 in the bosom of domestic quiet.” Three days later the weary bones 
 of William Goddard found their last rest in the North Burying 
 Ground in Providence. 
 
 In perspective, the major personal flaw of Goddard is, no doubt, 
 the quarrel with the reliable Mary Katherine. Because this is so 
 
206 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 crucial to a full comprehension of both brother and sister, it would 
 help us to have at least some tangible evidence at this point on the 
 attitudes of the two. As a result of this lacuna we are forced to 
 suspend our judgment. We do know from the remarks of various 
 people that as a person Goddard was jovial, affectionate, and fond of 
 telling a good story. What these contemporaries called his naiveté 
 we would term his refreshing enjoyment of the life immediately 
 around him. Perhaps this sense of wonderment contributed to the 
 abrupt bellicosity he presented so often to the world’s view. God- 
 dard had the ability to organize something new, be it the postal 
 system or another newspaper, but too frequently his chip-on-the- 
 shoulder attitude lost him all that he had or might have gained. 
 
 However much we speculate about why Goddard was tactless 
 at the very moments when tact was most needed, we must not ignore 
 his quite genuine achievements. He did succeed in doing exactly 
 what he set out to do—supplant the existing British postal system 
 with another one that the Continental Congress could take over. 
 . Granted that some of the success came from the manipulative and 
 propagandistic skill of Sam Adams and other members of the Boston 
 committee, still the original idea was Goddard’s and he did the work 
 to get things going. For this accomplishment he deserves an im- 
 portant place in the history of the beginnings of this country. Our 
 present postal system descends directly from the Goddard or Consti- 
 tutional post offices. But more important than this descent is the 
 advantage early control of communications gave the colonists in the 
 Revolution. Many of the factors involved in the struggle—armed 
 forces, morale, sentiment of the people—balance out roughly equal 
 between the two sides. In contrast, the propaganda war was one- 
 sided, not only because of the skills of Paine and others like him 
 but because of the virtual disappearance of the British postal system 
 in latter 1774, thanks to the efforts of the young printer from Balti- 
 more. 
 
 Nor should we forget Goddard’s contributions as a printer and 
 newspaperman. His knowledge of and skill at the craftsmanship of 
 his trade make him one of the outstanding printers in eighteenth- 
 century America. Besides having good typography and layout of 
 the page, he edited well-run newspapers. In his era this meant 
 having, as Goddard so frequently phrased it, “extensive corre- 
 
CHAPTER X 207 
 
 
 
 spondence.” The coverage of the Pennsylvania Chronicle was one 
 of the most thorough in the colonies, both in quantity and quality. 
 Though Goddard was on the defensive in both the Whig Club and 
 Charles Lee affairs and on neither occasion did he exhibit tact, the 
 principle successfully defended each time merits his having an im- 
 portant niche in the history of American journalism. 
 
 What might be called the rhythmical pattern of the career of 
 William Goddard makes us wish we knew more about the human 
 personality. Approximately between the ages of twenty-five and 
 thirty-five he was most affirmative in his actions. From then on his 
 role is more often defensive. Yet both cycles are active, not passive, 
 with the possible exception of the winter of 1776-1777. So easily 
 the final phase of a life like Goddard’s could have been tawdry and 
 squalid, but instead he mellows, becomes the affectionate and loving 
 husband and father, and finds contentment in simplicity. No doubt 
 Abigail contributed a good deal to this final phase, yet we must 
 admire and envy the personal resources within Goddard that made 
 this possible. Yes, being a listener to the raconteur William God- 
 dard in front of his fireplace in the old farmhouse is a pleasure 
 we would love to have shared with Abigail and the children. Then 
 we could have summoned up remembrances of the patriotic founder 
 of our postal system, the militant defender of freedom of the press, 
 and the belligerent editor of newspapers—yet there would have 
 lingered with us an intensely human personality. 
 

 
NOTE ON SOURCES 
 
 The most important sources for this book have been the files of the 
 Providence Gazette in the Rhode Island Historical Society, the Pennsyl- 
 vania Chronicle in the Historical Society of Pennsylvania, and the Mary- 
 land Journal in the Maryland Historical Society. Before such a biography 
 as this could be written, the listing of imprints in each colony and state 
 had to be done. Fortunately here I was able to call upon the work of 
 John E. Alden, Rhode Island Imprints, 1727-1800 (New York, 1949); 
 Charles R. Hildeburn, 4 Century of Printing: the Issues of the Press in 
 Pennsylvania, 1685-1784 (Philadelphia, 1885-1886); Lawrence C. 
 Wroth, 4 History of Printing in Colonial Maryland, 1686-1776 (Balti- 
 more, 1922); Joseph Towne Wheeler, The Maryland Press, 1777-1790 
 (Baltimore, 1938); and A. Rachel Minick, 4 History of Printing in 
 Maryland, 1791-1800, with a Bibliography of Works Printed in the 
 State during the Period (Baltimore, 1949). “That Maryland’s printing 
 history has had the most thorough coverage and that each of the three 
 volumes named devotes a chapter to the Goddard press have been of 
 tremendous value. 
 
 The bulk of the manuscript letters to, by, and about Goddard are to 
 be found in the collections of the John Carter Brown Library (the most 
 important single source), the Rhode Island Historical Society, and the 
 Maryland Historical Society. “These three libraries also possess copies of 
 most of the Goddard imprints. 
 
 A word of appreciation should be expressed here to Lawrence C. 
 Wroth, whose work on Maryland printing in 1922 first pointed out the 
 importance of Goddard not only as a printer but as a founding father 
 of our postal system. Dr. Wroth’s meticulous research has made the task 
 of the Goddard biographer much simpler. His book, The Colonial 
 Printer, 2nd ed. (Portland, Maine, 1938), is the best presentation of 
 everything the title implies. The printer is here seen not only as a 
 follower of a particular trade but as a human being affecting social, 
 economic, political, and cultural conditions of his day. 
 
 Two volumes that have been much pored over in the course of the 
 research for this book are Clarence S. Brigham’s History and Bibliography 
 of American Newspapers, 1690-1820 (Worcester, 1947). 
 
210 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 CHAPTER II 
 
 Information about Giles Goddard and his forebears is to be found in 
 the manuscript by Kingston G. Hadley, “Giles Goddard and His De- 
 scendents,” at the New-York Historical Society and in various records 
 at the New London Historical Society. The diary of Joshua Hempstead 
 has been published in the Collections of the New London Historical 
 Society (1901). Dr. Alexander Hamilton’s journal was edited by Carl 
 Bridenbaugh, Gentleman’s Progress: the Itinerarium of Dr. Alexander 
 Hamilton 1744 (Chapel Hill, 1948). The church records are in Wilkins 
 Updike, A History of the Episcopal Church in Narragansett Rhode Island 
 Including a History of Other Episcopal Churches in the State, 2nd ed., 
 edited by Daniel Goodwin (Boston, 1907). Two articles by Beverly 
 McAnear in the New Jersey Historical Society Proceedings, LIX (1941), 
 on James Parker provide information on Parker’s activities in the 1760's. 
 The letter to Isaiah Thomas is in the library of the American Antiquarian 
 Society. Isaiah Thomas’s History of Printing in America (Worcester, 
 1810, and 2nd ed., Albany, 1874) tells us much about Goddard’s activities 
 in these early years, including his journeyman work for Samuel Farley. 
 That Goddard himself assisted Thomas in the preparation of the History 
 of Printing makes the book particularly valuable for our purposes. 
 
 CHAPTER III 
 
 The sketch of Gregory Dexter is summarized from Bradford F. 
 Swan, Gregory Dexter of London and New England 1610-1700 
 (Rochester, N. Y., 1949). The £120 figure comes from Worthington C. 
 Ford, ed., “Letters from James Parker to Franklin,” Proceedings of the 
 Massachusetts Historical Society, Second Series, XVI (1902), 186-232. 
 For an estimate of the role Goddard’s new press played in Providence, 
 see Lawrence C. Wroth, “The First Press in Providence, a Study in 
 Social Development,” Proceedings of the American Antiquarian Society, 
 n.s.. LI (October, 1941), 351-383. The remark by the Providence 
 printers of 1907 is found in Printers and Printing in Providence, 1762- 
 1907 [Providence, 1907], p. 9. The printed records of the Rhode 
 Island Colony and the archives in the state capitol in Providence provide 
 some of the material upon which this chapter is based. The letter to 
 Josias Lyndon is in the Peck MSS, Rhode Island Historical Society. ‘The 
 comparative printing figures between Goddard and his Newport com- 
 petitors are based on a study of records in the state archives, for which the 
 assistance of Miss Mary Quinn was valuable. 
 
NOTE ON SOURCES 21 
 
 CHAPTER IV 
 
 The Parker letters and Isaiah Thomas’s History of Printing are help- 
 ful for the New York period. Goddard’s name as a member of the 
 Sons of Liberty is to be found in the Belknap Papers, 1745-1776 (120), 
 in the Massachusetts Historical Society. Goddard’s Constitutional Courant 
 is reproduced in Albert Matthews, “The Snake Devices, 1754-1776, 
 and the Constitutional Courant, 1765,” Publications of Colonial Society 
 of Massachusetts, XI (December, 1907), 409-453. This is supplemented 
 by a now lost letter by Goddard given by William R. Staples, Annals of 
 the Town of Providence, in Collections of the Rhode Island Historical 
 Society, V (1843), 542-544. The data given by Staples are corroborated 
 by a letter from Goddard to Isaiah Thomas reprinted in Clarence S. 
 Brigham, Journals and Journeymen: A Contribution to the History of 
 Early American Newspapers (Philadelphia, 1950), p. 101. The God- 
 dard letter to Parker is in the Franklin Papers at the American Philosophi- 
 cal Society, XLVII, 30. 
 
 CHAPTER V 
 
 The most important source for the Goddard-Galloway story is 
 William Goddard, The Partnership: or the History of the Rise and 
 Progress of the Pennsylvania Chronicle (Philadelphia, 1770). The 
 William Bradford 1766 broadside is in the collections of the New-York 
 Historical Society. The David Hall Letter Book 1764-1767 at the 
 American Philosophical Society provides much material, Hall’s letters to 
 Strahan coming from that source. The letter from William Franklin to 
 his father is in the Franklin Papers at the American Philosophical Society, 
 XLII, 3. The April 14 letter from Franklin to David Hall exists at the 
 Salem County Historical Society, Salem, New Jersey. For calling at- 
 tention to this letter, gratitude is expressed to Dr. Whitfield J. Bell of 
 the American Philosophical Society. The Nathaniel Shaw letter to Wharton 
 is reproduced in the Collections of the New London Historical Society, II 
 (1933), 191. The career of Benjamin Mecom is discussed in Carl Van 
 Doren, Jane Mecom (New York, 1950), passim. The records of the 
 Pennsylvania Assembly of this period are in Pennsylvania Archives, 8: 
 VII and VIII. The original of the letter from Sarah Goddard to her 
 sisters is at the Providence Public Library. “Though actual quotations are 
 from the manuscript Minute Books in possession of the Library Company 
 of Philadelphia, the story of Goddard’s printing of the Company’s book 
 
212 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 labels derives from Edwin Wolf, “The First Books and Printed Cata- 
 logues of the Library Company of Philadelphia,” Pennsylvania Magazine 
 of History and Biography, LXXVIII (January, 1954), 45-55. The 
 letters from Goddard to John Smith of Burlington are in the Library Com- 
 pany of Philadelphia. Strahan’s 1772 letter to Franklin is in the American 
 Philosophical Society’s Franklin Papers, III, Part II, 117. Valuable 
 material on the colonial newspapers of this period is supplied in Arthur M. 
 Schlesinger, Prelude to Independence: The Newspaper War on Britain, 
 1764-1776 (New York, 1958). 
 
 CHAPTER VI 
 
 The most important sources for the story of Goddard’s post offices 
 are the Minute Books of the Boston Committee of Correspondence now 
 in the Manuscript Collection, New York Public Library. The dating 
 of Goddard’s trip north so closely is possible because of these papers and 
 the many items appearing in the newspapers as he went along. Hugh 
 Finlay’s journal, now in the National Archives, is available as Journal 
 Kept by Hugh Finlay, Surveyor of the Post Roads on the Continent of 
 North America (Brooklyn, 1867). For the early history of our postal 
 system, see Wesley E. Rich, The History of the U.S. Post Office to the 
 Year 1829, Vol. XXVII of Harvard Economic Studies (Cambridge, 
 1924). Peter Force’s American Archives (Washington, 1837-1853) 
 reproduces several informative newspaper clippings. The letter to John 
 Lamb is in the Lamb Papers at the New-York Historical Society. John 
 Foxcroft’s letter to his superior is from the Public Records Office, London. 
 The Titus Hosmer letter is in the Yale University Library. 
 
 CHAPTER VII 
 
 The early printing history of Baltimore derives from the account given 
 by Wroth in A History of Printing in Colonial Maryland, 1686-1776. 
 Valuable in spite of its undigested quality is John T. Scharf, Chronicles of 
 Baltimore (Baltimore, 1874). The statement by William Eddis is in 
 his Letters from America, Historical and Descriptive; Comprising Oc- 
 currences from 1769, to 1777, Inclusive (London, 1792), p. 304. The 
 Whig Club account is based, in addition to the broadsides and newspaper 
 stories mentioned in the text, on official records, some published, in the 
 Hall of Records, Annapolis, and on depositions at the same place and at 
 
NOTE ON SOURCES 213 
 
 the Maryland and Rhode Island Historical Societies. The original of 
 the letter from Benjamin Galloway is also at the Hall of Records. 
 
 CuHaPTeErR VIII 
 
 The Holt-to-Goddard letter is to be found at the American Anti- 
 quarian Society. The best modern biography of Charles Lee is John R. 
 Alden, General Charles Lee: Traitor or Patriot? (Baton Rouge, 1951). 
 The Lee Papers were collected and published as volumes IV to VII of the 
 Collections of the New-York Historical Society, 1871-74 (New York, 
 1872-1875). As with the Whig Club affair, records and depositions found 
 at the Hall of Records and the Maryland and Rhode Island historical 
 societies provide much of the story. Lorenzo Sabine on the basis of the 
 Whig Club and Charles Lee incidents included Goddard (pp. 326-328) 
 in The American Loyalists, or Biographical Sketches of Adherents to the 
 British Crown in the War of the Revolution (Boston, 1847). I hope 
 the accounts given in this book will make any need for defending God- 
 dard from this imputation superfluous. 
 
 CHAPTER IX 
 
 Copies of the almanacs mentioned in the chapter may be found at the 
 Maryland Historical Society. The originals of the letters from John 
 Carter to Mary Katherine and Abigail Goddard are at the John Carter 
 Brown Library. The account of the Federal Hill episode is based on 
 papers at the Maryland Historical Society. The various petitions to the 
 government by and about Mary Katherine Goddard’s plea to retain her 
 postal position are now in the National Archives. A copy of her will is 
 in the Hall of Records, Annapolis. 
 
 CHAPTER X 
 
 The final phase of Goddard’s career derives primarily from letters in 
 the possession of the Rhode Island Historical Society and the John Carter 
 Brown Library and records in the Rhode Island State Archives. The 
 William McCullough letter is at the American Antiquarian Society, as 
 are the letters from Goddard to Isaiah Thomas. The letters to General 
 Gates were printed in The Lee Papers, as were those from Daniel Carthy. 
 
214 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 The correspondence with Lighthorse Harry Lee was partially printed 
 in Henry Lee, Memoirs of the War in the Southern Department of the 
 United States, rev. ed., by Robert E. Lee (New York, 1869). One 
 unpublished letter in this correspondence is at the Henry E. Huntington 
 Library and Art Gallery. The Diary of Isaiah Thomas, 1805-1828 was 
 published by the American Antiquarian Society (Worcester, 1909). 
 
INDEX 
 
 Adams, Samuel, 118, 120, 121, 
 126, 135, 146, 202, 206 
 
 Aikman, William, 144 
 
 Alden, John R., 168 
 
 Alexandria, Va., 182 
 
 Allen, Timothy, 48 
 
 Almanac wars, 186-189, 190 
 
 Almanacs: possible Providence one in 
 1644, 20; importance in colonial 
 print shop’s business, 28; WG prints 
 one for Providence, 30-31, 38, 39, 
 48; role in colonial household, 30-31; 
 Baltimore almanacs from Goddard 
 press, 177-178, 183, 186, 195 
 
 American Antiquarian Society, 99, 100, 
 161; WG member of, 204-205 
 
 American Chronicle, 16, 37 
 
 American Philosophical Society, 165 
 
 American Spectator, The, 183-184 
 
 Americanus (pseudonym for Joseph Gal- 
 loway), 60, 64, 74, 99, IOI, 102, 
 108 
 
 Anemours, Chevalier d’, letter to WG, 
 quoted, 196 
 
 Angell, Abigail; see Goddard, Abigail 
 
 Angell, James (great-grandfather of 
 Abigail Goddard), 20 
 
 Angell, James (father of Abigail God- 
 dard), 55, 185 
 
 Angell, James (brother of Abigail God- 
 dard): comes to Baltimore, 191; 
 partnership with WG, 192; buys out 
 WG, 196; sells share in Angell farm 
 to Abigail, 198 
 
 Angell, John, 20 
 
 Angell, Nathan, 46, 55 
 
 Angell, Thomas, 185 
 
 Annapolis, 131, 137, 
 MGM LOS W7Oy e777 
 
 Aplin, John, 52 
 
 Appleton, Nathaniel, 126 
 
 Arnold, Benedict, 168 
 
 123, 
 
 143, 144, 159, 
 
 Bache, Richard, 92, 135, 184, 202, 203; 
 appointed comptroller of postal sys- 
 
 tem, 147; appointed postmaster gen- 
 eral, 149; quarrels with WG, 149- 
 150 
 
 Backus, Isaac, 35 
 
 Bailey, Francis, 138 
 
 Ballau, Jonathan, partner of WG in 
 Providence paper mill, 39, 50, 55 
 
 Baltimore, in 1773, 137 
 
 Banneker, Benjamin, 195 
 
 Barney, Joshua, 191, 192 
 
 Barney, Mary, 192 
 
 Bartgis, Matthias, 177 
 
 Bayley, John, 169 
 
 Bickerstaff, Isaac; see West, Benjamin 
 
 Birkett, John, 38 
 
 Blake, Francis, 203 
 
 Bolles, Joseph, 35 
 
 Book advertisements, 29, 167 
 
 Bookbinding, 58, 150, 167 
 
 Bookselling, 28, 29, 144, 150, 167, 168, 
 181 
 
 Borrows, John, 69, 112, 115 
 
 Boston Gazette, 119, 120, 124, 125, 126, 
 129 
 
 Boston News-Letter, 91 
 
 Boston Tea Party, account of, in Mary- 
 land Journal, 113-114 
 
 Bower, John, 37 
 
 Bowley, Daniel, 157 
 
 Bradford, Andrew, 5 
 
 Bradford, Thomas, 81, 202 
 
 Bradford, William, 5, 13, 39 
 
 Bradford, William (son of Andrew), 
 46, (605) (625) 64509685.) 182,002.) D5, 
 1303 newspaper quarrel with WG, 73- 
 76, 80-81, 84-85; defends WG against 
 Pennsylvania Assembly resolution, 102 
 
 Bridenbaugh, Carl, quoted, 136 
 
 Bristol Journal, 16 
 
 Bristol, N. J., 90 
 
 Brown, Joseph, 18, 55 
 
 Brown, Justus, 154, 156, 158 
 
 Brown, Moses, 18, 55, 192, 195, 1993 
 friendship with WG, 200-201 
 
 Brown, Obadiah, 20 
 
216 
 
 Brown, William, 38 
 
 Brown University, 18, 19, 39, 203 
 
 Bryden, James, advertises perfumes and 
 bear’s grease, 194-195 
 
 Burlington, N. J., 13, 90 
 
 Burr, Thaddeus, 134 
 
 Calhoun, James, 157, 169, 170 
 
 Carey, Mathew, 4, 168 
 
 Carter, Benjamin, 200 
 
 Carter, John, 37, 55, 85, 89, 184, 192, 
 195; buys Providence shop from 
 Sarah Goddard, 84; letter to Mary 
 Katherine Goddard, quoted, 185; 
 friendship with WG, 201; assists 
 Thomas with History of Printing, 
 202; death, 205 
 
 Carthy, Daniel, 204; letter about 
 Diedrich Knickerbocker, quoted, 204 
 
 Chase, Samuel, 155, 156, 163; writes 
 articles signed Tom Tell-Truth and 
 Caveto in Maryland Journal, 152- 
 153; leads Maryland Assembly in at- 
 tack on Whig Club, 159-160 
 
 Church, Benjamin, 118, 126 
 
 Clemence, Thomas, 198 
 
 Cocumscussuc, 11 
 
 Colden, Cadwallader, 51-52 
 
 Cole, John, 55; succeeds WG as post- 
 master of Providence, 42 
 
 Coles, Thomas, 204 
 
 College of Rhode Island; see Brown 
 University 
 
 Collins, Isaac, 79 
 
 Connecticut Gazette, 15 
 
 Constitutional Courant, 50-52, 56, 102, 
 116, 192 
 
 Constitutional Post Office, 114, 115, 122, 
 130, 131, 147, 201; arguments for, 
 126-127; in operation from Virginia 
 to Maine, 133 
 
 Cooke, Nicholas, 38 
 
 Cooper, William, 118, 119 
 
 Cossart, Theophilus, 91 
 
 Cotton, John, 19 
 
 Cox, James, 157 
 
 Crawford, Ann, 20 
 
 Cromwell, Thomas, 169 
 
 Crouch, Charles, fellow journeyman with 
 WG, 16 
 
 Cruikshank, Joseph, 87 
 
 Dancing school in Providence debated, 
 32 
 
 Davidson, Andrew, advertises about de- 
 serted wife, 178 
 
 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 Dawkins, Henry, 140 
 
 Daye, Stephen, 3, 20, 26 
 
 Dexter, Abigail, 20 
 
 Dexter, Gregory, 19-20 
 
 Dexter, Knight, 24, 46; advertisement 
 in Providence Gazette, 47 
 
 Dexter, Mary, 20 
 
 Dickinson, John, 5, 60, 61, 82, 83 
 
 Dickinson, Jonathan, 35 
 
 “Distressed Maid, The,” 57-58 
 
 Dixon, John (partner with Alexander 
 Purdie), 117, 127, 130, 132, 133 
 
 Doolittle, Isaac, 91 
 
 Dorsett, James, 147 
 
 Dorsey, Edward and Ezekiel John, 173- 
 174 
 
 Douglas, David, 15-16, 21, 22, 70 
 
 Dunciad, The, quoted by WG, 42, 189 
 
 Dunlap, John, 89, 146-147, 177 
 
 Dunlap, William, 146 
 
 Dunlap’s Maryland Gazette, 147 
 
 Durfey, Richard, lawsuit against Giles 
 Goddard, 10 
 
 Dwight, Timothy, 205 
 
 Dyck, Gysbert op, 10-11 
 
 Eddis, William, 150-151 
 
 Eddy, Samuel, 27 
 
 Edes, Benjamin, 120, 125 
 
 Edwards, Evan, 174 
 
 Eliot, John, 19 
 
 Ellery, William, 134 
 
 Ellicott Andrew, 178, 183, 186, 187, 
 190 
 
 Eustace, John S., 173 
 
 Evans, William, 191 
 
 Evitt, William, 104-107 
 
 Falmouth (now Portland), Me., 124, 
 131 
 
 Farley, Samuel, 16-17, 37 
 
 Federal Hill Celebration, 190 
 
 Finlay, Hugh, 135; journal, 133, 
 quoted, 111 
 
 Fosdick, Thomas, 11 
 
 Foxcroft, John, 123, 134; letter to 
 
 Anthony Todd, quoted, 124 
 Franklin and Hall (Newport), 25 
 Franklin and Hall (Philadelphia), 3, 
 
 25, 62, 63 
 Franklin, Ann (Widow), 25, 26, 34 
 Franklin, Benjamin, 3, 5, 6, 13, 14, 
 
 15) 25, 34, 46, 52, 60, 61-62, 64, 
 
 98, 101, 103, 109, 120, 129, 1353 at- 
 
 tacked by William Bradford for role 
 
 in Stamp Act, 65; replies to David 
 
INDEX 
 
 Hall in 1767, 70-713; articles by are 
 reprinted in Pennsylvania Chronicle, 
 733; receives bond from WG, 91-92; 
 dismissed as postmaster general, 123, 
 128; postmaster general under Con- 
 tinental Congress, 147; WG proposes 
 critical pamphlet, 163; Holt replies, 
 163-1643; tries to collect bond from 
 WG, 190; letter by WG in 1811 de- 
 scribing, 202-203 
 
 Franklin, Deborah, 67, 79 
 
 Franklin, James, 25 
 
 Franklin, James, Jr., 15, 25 
 
 Franklin, William, 60, 62, 63, 70, 103; 
 letter to father Nov. 13, 1766, quoted, 
 66-67; exchange of letters with Wil- 
 liam Hicks, 77; reports Benjamin 
 Mecom’s activities, 79; reports WG’s 
 campaign against British postal sys- 
 tem, 129 
 
 Freedom of the press, 3, 23, 24, 35, 66, 
 74) 102, 139, 150, 163, 172-173, 207 
 
 Freeman, Douglas Southall, quoted, 195 
 
 Frothingham, James, 197 
 
 Gaines, Hugh, 14 
 
 Galbraith, William, 157, 158, 159 
 
 Galloway, Benjamin, letter from, quoted, 
 159-161 
 
 Galloway, Joseph, 60, 62, 70, 72, 88, 
 96, 97, 98, 100, 115, 132, 134, 2023 
 attacked by William Bradford, 61, 
 64-65, 74, 763; interviews WG in 
 June, 1766, 63; enters into partner- 
 ship with WG and Wharton, 65-66; 
 refuses to allow WG to print pamphlet 
 of John Dickinson’s “Letters,” 82-83; 
 persuades WG to sell out Providence 
 shop, 84; offers to buy out or sell 
 out WG’s interest in Philadelphia 
 shop, 89-90; tries to buy out Mary 
 Katherine Goddard, 92-93; election to 
 assembly fought by WG, 99-100, 1o1- 
 103, 108-109; 5 Mile Stone incident, 
 104-107 
 
 Gates, Horatio, 192, 193, 198 
 
 Gerry, Elbridge, 123 
 
 Giles, Nathan, 39 
 
 Gill, John, 120, 125 
 
 Glover, Jose, 26 
 
 Glover, Widow, 3 
 
 Goddard, Abbie Angell, 199 
 
 Goddard, Abigail, 199, 200, 203; mar- 
 riage to WG, 184-186; encourages 
 WG to retire, 190, 195; birth of 
 children, 192, 195, 1993 secures sole 
 
 ont 
 
 possession of Angell farm, 198; com- 
 plimented on literary abilities, 204 
 Goddard, Ann Elizabeth, 192, 203 
 Goddard, Catherine, 11 
 Goddard, Giles (ca. 1648-ca. 1729), 8 
 Goddard, Giles, 8-10, 12, 89, 113 
 Goddard, Mary Angell, 195, 203 
 Goddard, Mary Katherine, 12, 47, 163, 
 205; birth, 11; works in Providence 
 ship, 21, 26, 37; works with Sarah 
 Goddard in Providence, 56, 58; moves 
 to Philadelphia, 85; inoculated for 
 smallpox, 87; signs bond with WG to 
 Benjamin Franklin, 91-92; works 
 with WG in Philadelphia shop, 92; 
 assumes mother’s interest, 93; defends 
 WG against Towne, 94; manages shop 
 while WG in jail, 102; supervises 
 Pennsylvania Chronicle while WG in 
 Baltimore, 109, 110, 139-140, 1413 
 transfers from Philadelphia to Balti- 
 more, 114; assumes editorship of 
 Maryland Journal, 115, 144; per- 
 sonality, 145; appointed postmistress 
 of Baltimore, 147; troubles with 
 paper supply, 150; abused by George 
 Somerville, 150; refers Whig Club 
 members to WG, 154; tries to rescue 
 WG from mob, 157; softens tone of 
 WG’s postscript, 161-162; success as 
 wartime editress, 165; prints Declara- 
 tion of Independence, 166-167; adds 
 bookbinding and bookselling to print 
 shop, 167; complimented by WG and 
 Oswald in advertisement, 168, 179; 
 prints “Queries” in Maryland Journal, 
 169; assists WG in Lee fracas, 170; 
 used as mailing address by Charles 
 Lee, 173; acts with WG as attorney 
 for Lee, 174; activities as printer in 
 1779-1781, 177-178; first strain be- 
 tween WG and Mary Katherine, 178- 
 179; leaves Maryland Journal, 180- 
 181; theft of money from, 181; quali- 
 ties as editor, 181; almanac dispute 
 with WG, 183; John Carter writes 
 letter to, 185-186; removed as Balti- 
 more postmistress, 193-194; last years 
 and death, 194 
 Goddard, Sarah, 184; marriage, 8; 
 birth, 11; children, 11; finances WG’s 
 Providence shop, 20; works in Provi- 
 dence shop, 37; revives Providence 
 Gazette, 40, 573; continues Providence 
 print shop after WG leaves, 47, 48, 
 553 organizes Sarah Goddard and 
 
218 
 
 Company, 56; career as printer in 
 Providence, 56-58; reprints Pennsyl- 
 vania Chronicle advertisement, 68; 
 letter of 1767 to WG, quoted, 
 75-76; urges WG to print pamphlet 
 of John Dickinson’s “Letters,” 82; 
 moves to Philadelphia, 85; attempts 
 to operate press in home, 86; letter to 
 sisters, quoted, 87; supervises shop 
 during WG’s absence, 89; death, 92- 
 
 93 
 Goddard, Sarah Updike, 199, 203 
 Goddard, William (b. 1678), 8 
 
 Goddard, William: paternal ancestors, 
 
 8; maternal ancestors, 10-113; birth, 
 11; childhood, 12; education, 12; 
 apprenticeship, 12-16; postal survey 
 in 1755, 15; first journeyman work, 
 16; starts press in Providence, 20-22; 
 starts Providence Gazette, 22-27; at- 
 titude towards printing, 28-29, 45; 
 opens bookshop in Providence, 29-30; 
 tries to secure Rhode Island colony 
 printing, 33-34; moves shop in 
 Providence, 36-37; sets up paper mill 
 near Providence, 39-40; quarrels with 
 Henry Ward and Samuel Hall, 41- 
 42; postmaster of Providence, 42; op- 
 poses Stamp Act, 44, 49-52; financial 
 difficulties in Providence, 44-45; his 
 ideal of a newspaper, 45-46; suspends 
 Providence Gazette, 46; becomes 
 partner with Holt, 48, 56; prints 
 Constitutional Courant, 50-52; tries 
 to revive Providence Gazette, 53-55; 
 seeks opportunities in Philadelphia, 
 55, 633 enters into partnership with 
 Galloway and Wharton, 65-66; starts 
 Pennsylvania Chronicle, 67-70; re- 
 prints Benjamin Franklin’s articles 
 from English papers, 73; quarrels 
 with William Bradford and_ others, 
 74-77; fights in London Coffee House, 
 76-77; sells paper to other printers, 
 81; quarrels with Galloway and 
 Wharton over John Dickinson’s “Let- 
 ters,” 82-83; persuades Sarah God- 
 dard to move to Philadelphia, 84; fi- 
 nancial troubles in Philadelphia, 88; 
 trips to New England in 1768 and 
 1769, 89, 91; bargaining with Gallo- 
 way and Wharton ends in Towne 
 partnership, 89-90; tries to buy out 
 Towne, 91; orders first printing press 
 made in America, 91; signs bond to 
 Benjamin Franklin, 91-92; quarrels 
 
 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 with Towne, 93-97; publishes The 
 Partnership, 98; fights Galloway’s 
 election to assembly, 99-100, 101- 
 103, 108-109; put in Philadelphia 
 jail in 1771 as debtor, 101; 5 Mile 
 Stone incident, 104-107; almost 
 elected to assembly, 108-109; ends 
 Pennsylvania Chronicle, 110; diffi- 
 culties with postal system, 112-1143 
 campaigns against British postal sys- 
 tem, 114-136; placed in Philadelphia 
 jail as debtor in 1775, 134; opens 
 print shop in Baltimore, 138-139; 
 starts Maryland Journal, 138-141; 
 appointed surveyor of postal system, 
 1473 petitions for commission in Con- 
 tinental army, 148-149; quarrels with 
 Bache, 149-150; returns to Baltimore, 
 150; quarrels with Whig Club, 153- 
 162; despairing mood, 1777-1778, 
 163; proposes pamphlet attacking 
 Franklin, 163-164; becomes partner 
 with Oswald, 167-168; accepts Lee’s 
 “Queries” for publication, 168; trou- 
 bles resulting from publication of 
 “Queries,” 169-172; friendship with 
 Lee, 173-174; Lee papers, 175-176; 
 first strain between Mary Katherine 
 and WG, 178-179; takes over from 
 Mary Katherine as editor of Mary- 
 land Journal, 180-181; partnership 
 with George Richards, 181-182; al- 
 manac dispute with Mary Katherine, 
 183; partnership with Langworthy, 
 183-184; marriage to Abigail Angell, 
 184-186; almanac war against John 
 Hayes, 186-190; role in Constitution 
 ratification celebration, 191; partner- 
 ship with James Angell, 192; retires 
 from printing, 195-196; portraits of, 
 197; description of Clemence-God- 
 dard-Irons house, 197-198; moves 
 from farm into Providence, 199-200; 
 friendship with Moses Brown, 200- 
 201; friendship with John Carter, 
 201; friendship with Thomas, 2o01- 
 2023; assists Thomas with History of 
 Printing, 202; letter in 1811 char- 
 acterizing Franklin, 202-203; affec- 
 tion for family, 203; correspondence 
 with Carthy, 204; member of Ameri- 
 can Antiquarian Society, 204-205; as- 
 sists Lighthorse Harry Lee, 205; death, 
 205; poor relationship with Mary 
 Katherine major flaw in WG’s char- 
 
INDEX 
 
 219 
 
 
 
 acter, 205-206; characterized, 
 207; accomplishments, 206-207 
 
 Goddard, William (grandson of WG), 
 176 
 
 Goddard, William Giles, 4, 199, 201, 
 203-204; writes obituary of WG, 
 quoted, 205 
 
 Goddard’s post offices, 130, 134 
 
 Goldsmith, Oliver, 179 
 
 Gray, George, 106 
 
 Green, Anne Catherine, 137 
 
 Green, Frederick, 137, 165, 176, 177 
 
 Green, Jonas, 137 
 
 Green, Samuel, 137 
 
 Green, Thomas, 20, 50 
 
 Green, Timothy, 50 
 
 Greenleaff, Joseph, 118, 126 
 
 Groton, Conn., 8, 10, 11 
 
 205- 
 
 Hagey’s paper mill (Philadelphia), 81 
 
 Hall and Sellers, 61, 62, 80, 82 
 
 Hall, David, 62, 66, 67, 68; difficulty 
 with Joseph Galloway in 1764, 61; 
 complains to Benjamin Franklin, 70; 
 letters to Strahan, 71-72 
 
 Hall, Samuel, 25, 26, 34, 41-42, 44 
 
 Hall of Records (Annapolis), 149, 167 
 
 Hamilton, Alexander (Annapolis phy- 
 sician), Itimerarium, 10, quoted, 9 
 
 Hamilton, Andrew, 111-112 
 
 Hamilton, John, 112 
 
 Hancock, John, 167, 180 
 
 Harbaugh, Leonard, 192 
 
 Hasselbach, Mrs., 140 
 
 Hasselbach, Nicholas, 138 
 
 Hassenclaver, Peter, 51, 192 
 
 Hayes, James, Jr., 147, 177 
 
 Hayes, John, 180, 191; almanac war 
 with WG, 186-190 
 
 Hazard, Ebenezer, 149, 193 
 
 Hempstead, Joshua, diary, quoted, 9, 10 
 
 Hicks, William, 76, 77 
 
 Hobby, Wensley, 134 
 
 Hodge, Robert, 138 
 
 Holt, John, 6, 13, 15, 16, 49, 62, 92, 
 103, 116, 132, 134, 168, 202; career, 
 143; partnership with WG, 48, 52, 
 56; letter in 1778 replying to WG, 
 163-164, quoted, 164 
 
 Hononcrononthotontologus, 141 
 
 Hopkins, Stephen, 18, 19, 21, 25, 26, 
 34, 36, 49; “The Planting and 
 Growth of Providence,” 27, 45; The 
 Rights of Colonies Examined printed 
 by WG, 44 
 
 Horace, quoted by WG, 140 
 
 Horse races in Maryland during Revo- 
 lution, 167 
 
 Hosmer, Titus, 134 
 
 Hubbart, Tuthill, 123 
 
 Hughes, Christopher, 192 
 
 Hughes, John, 65 
 
 Humphreys, James, 202 
 
 Hunter, Elizabeth, 14 
 
 Hunter, William, 14 
 
 Hutchinson, Thomas, 120 
 
 Inslee, Samuel, assists Sarah Goddard in 
 Providence, 56, 57 
 Irving, Washington, 204 
 
 James, Abel, 109 
 
 John Carter Brown Library, 126, 161 
 
 Johnson, Samuel, 85 
 
 Johnson, Thomas, 161, 165 
 
 Johnston, Augustus, 49 
 
 Johnston, Christopher, 144 
 
 Johnston, R. I., 197, 198, 200 
 
 Jones, Thomas, advertises services of 
 bull Pluto, 178 
 
 Junius, 179, 204 
 
 Keith, Sir Basil, 16 
 Kennedy, Murdock, 157 
 
 Kennicut, Sally, invited to petticoat 
 frisk by WG, 42-43 
 
 Knickerbocker, Diedrich; see Irving, 
 Washington 
 
 Kollock, Shepard, 79 
 Kraus, Michael, 5, 143 
 
 Lamb, John, 114, 116, 121, 129, 134, 
 140, 163, 168 
 
 Langworthy, Edward, 175; Memoirs of 
 . . . Lee, 176; partnership with WG, 
 183-1843; role in almanac war against 
 WG, 186-189 
 
 Lechmere, Nicholas, 9 
 
 Lee, Charles, 153, 168, 177, 183, 204, 
 207; “Queries,” 169, 170; follow-up 
 to “Queries” not published, 171-172; 
 friendship with WG, 173; death, 174 
 
 Lee, Charles Carter, 205 
 
 Lee, Henry (Lighthorse Harry), 205 
 
 Lee, Richard Henry, 133, 135 
 
 Lee, Robert E., 205 
 
 Lee, Sidney, 174 
 
 Lenox, David, 190 
 
 Letter from a Gentleman at Halifax, A, 
 
 44 
 “Letters from a Pennsylvania Farmer,” 
 5, 82, 83 
 
£ 
 
 220 
 
 Lex Talionis, 74, 76, 77, 187 
 
 Libraries, colonial, 37, 87, 143-144 
 
 Library Company of Philadelphia, WG 
 prints labels for, 87 
 
 Library of Congress, 161 
 
 Lindenberger, George, 169 
 
 London Chronicle, 68, 97 
 
 London Coffee House, 76, 103 
 
 Lord, Benjamin, 35 
 
 Lyndon, Josias, 33 
 
 McCullough, William, letter to Isaiah 
 Thomas, quoted, 197 
 
 M?’Henry, James, 195 
 
 McMechan, David, 157 
 
 McMurtrie, Douglas, 79 
 
 McSparran, James, 8 
 
 Magazines, colonial: failures, 3; com- 
 pared with newspapers, 45-46 
 
 Manchester, Job, 48 
 
 Marblehead, Mass., 121, 123 
 
 Marvel, Andrew: named as editor of 
 Constitutional Courant, 50-51; named 
 as author of article in Pennsylvania 
 Chronicle, 102 
 
 Maryland Gazette (Annapolis), 85, 137, 
 138, 139, 165, 171 
 
 Maryland Gazette (Baltimore), 
 180, 186 
 
 Maryland Historical Society, 143, 182, 
 184 
 
 Maryland Journal, 109, 113, 131, 146, 
 USi, 182, L6x, LG8,) 170,171, er7e5 
 175, 182, 186, 194; proposals an- 
 
 177) 
 
 nounced, 138-139; first issue, 140- 
 141; Mary Katherine Goddard as- 
 sumes editorship, 145; publication 
 
 record during Revolution, 165; sub- 
 scription rates raised, 166; circula- 
 tion, 177, 184, 192, 1953; contains 
 theatrical criticism, 179; twice-a-week 
 publication, 180; WG assumes editor- 
 ship, 180-181; advertising rates, 1843 
 WG retires from, 196 
 
 Massachusetts Gazette, 120 
 
 Massachusetts Spy, 119, 127 
 
 Matthews, Albert, 51 
 
 Mecom, Benjamin, 6, 
 WG, 79 
 
 Milton, John, 19 
 
 Moncrieff, Archibald, 184 
 
 Montague, Mary Wortley, Letters of, 
 first American printing by Sarah God- 
 dard, 56-57 
 
 Morris, Jacob, 174 
 
 Morris, Robert, 174 
 
 15; works for 
 
 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 Mumford, Benjamin, 111, 135 
 Mumford, Peter, 111, 135 
 
 Narragansett, R. L., 8 
 
 Neale, Thomas, 111 
 
 Newbury, Mass., 125 
 
 Newburyport, Mass., 121, 125 
 
 New Haven, Conn., 13, 14, 15) 20, 91, 
 116 
 
 New Jersey Journal, 79 
 
 New London, Conn., 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 
 15, 20, 116 
 
 Newport, 15, 18, 21, 24, 25, 26) 27, 
 33, 34) 35) 41, 44) 55, 81, 117, 123 
 
 Newport Mercury, 21, 25, 26, 41 
 
 Newspapers: 18th-century ones compared 
 to today’s rural papers, 4; subscrip- 
 tion rates, 23, 68, 84, 166; process 
 of printing colonial newspaper, 26; 
 as entertainment, 27; editing of co- 
 lonial newspaper, 31; contents of typi- 
 cal issue, 38-39; difficulties in getting 
 subscribers to pay, 38, 84; function 
 of magazines assumed by newspapers, 
 46; financial break-even point in 
 circulation, 55; circulation, 55, 77, 
 78, 80, 83, 85, 177, 184, 192, 1955 
 subscription agents, 69; average circu- 
 lation, 85; advertising rates, 184 
 
 Newton, Abigail, 11 
 
 New-York Gazette, or, Weekly Post- 
 Boy, 14, 52, 92 
 
 New-York Historical Society, 176 
 
 New-York Journal, 103, 116, 130, 132 
 
 New-York Weekly Post-Boy, 13 
 
 Nicholson, Benjamin, 156 
 
 Nicholson, James, 163; career, 151-152; 
 presides at Whig Ciub meeting, 154; 
 heads mob in Baltimore, 156-158; 
 forced to apologize, 160 
 
 Norfolk and Portsmouth Journal, 182 
 
 Norfolk, Va., 182 
 
 North-Carolina Gazette, 146 
 
 Oliphant bookshop (Providence), 28 
 
 Olney, Jonathan, partner of WG in 
 Providence paper mill, 39, 50 
 
 Osgood, Samuel, 193 
 
 Oswald, Eleazer, 166, 169, 177, 179) 
 180, 182; career, 167-168; assists 
 WG in Lee fracas, 169-172; shares in 
 Lee estate, 174 
 
 Paget, Henry, 24, 36 
 Paper: England and Holland source of 
 quality paper, 20-21; difficulties in 
 
INDEX 
 
 221 
 
 
 
 obtaining supplies, 39, 150; problems 
 during Revolution, 142, 165, 1793 
 cost of, to Maryland Journal, 165 
 
 Paper mills: location in colonies, 6; 
 Providence, 39-40, 50, 55, 583 Balti- 
 more, 147, 165, 168, 180; advertise- 
 ments for rags, 40, 50, 53-54) 147, 
 166; difficulties in obtaining rags, 
 165-166 
 
 Papermakers, during Revolution, 166 
 
 Parker, James, 3, 20, 28, 46, 48, 51, 
 52, 56, 66, 67, 90, 92, 113; career, 
 13-14; employs WG as apprentice, 
 14-16 
 
 Parks, William, 13 
 
 Partnership, The, 54, 63, 65, 82, 85, 
 88, 92, 93, 103, 181; publication an- 
 nounced, 96-97; published, 98-99 
 
 Pearson, Isaac, 106 
 
 Peck, William, 199 
 
 Penn, John, 72, 81, 104 
 
 Penn, William, 59, 60 
 
 Pennsylvania Chronicle, 5, 6, 73, 745 
 79, 84, 90, 94) 95, 96, 97, 98, ToT, 
 103, 104, 105, 107, 112, 113, 138, 
 139, 140, 144, 202, 2073; advertised 
 as forthcoming, 67-68; first issue, 69- 
 70; circulation, 77, 78, 80, 83, 85; 
 contains John Dickinson’s “Letters 
 from a Pennsylvania Farmer,” 82, 
 83; reduced from folio to quarto in 
 1768, 83; cut of royal arms dropped 
 from flag, 100; ended, 110; farewell 
 statement, 114 
 
 Pennsylvania Evening Post, 88 
 
 Pennsylvania Gazette, 3, 62, 68, 69, 73; 
 76, 77, 82, 102, 104 
 
 Pennsylvania Journal, 60, 64, 68, 69, 
 73, 76, 77, 80, 82, 84, 102, 104, 121 
 
 Pennsylvania Packet, 146, 166, 169 
 
 Philadelphia: center of papermaking, 6, 
 81; in 1766, 59-60 
 
 Pickering, Timothy, 125 
 
 Pitts, John, 122 
 
 Plunket, David, 154 
 
 Pope, Alexander, 12, 41, 81, 85, 1783 
 quoted by WG, 42, 189 
 
 Rostal riders), 155) 20g) Wz rg esir5 5 
 124, 131, 141, 180 
 
 Postal system: Giles Goddard postmaster 
 of New London, 13, 113; WG’s postal 
 survey trip in 1755, 15, 1133 New 
 York as center of colonial system, 16; 
 WG postmaster of Providence, 42, 91, 
 1133 situation in 1773, 111-1123 his- 
 tory of colonial system, 111-112; 
 
 WG’s campaign against British sys- 
 tem, 114-136, 206; WG surveyor of 
 system, 147-149; Mary Katherine 
 Goddard removed as postmistress of 
 Baltimore, 193-194 
 
 Portsmouth, N. H., 121, 124, 125 
 
 Pownall, Thomas, 128 
 
 Printers: role of, in colonies, 3, 5-73 
 sources of income, 4; apprentice sys- 
 tem, 15, 16, 79 
 
 Printing: letter in Providence Gazette 
 praises art of, 28-29; rates, 33, 87 
 
 Printing press, first one made in America 
 purchased by WG, 91 
 
 Print shop, colonial: business of, 3; 
 equipment in shop, 26; importance of 
 government printing for shop, 33-34 
 
 Prior, Matthew, 85 
 
 Pritchard, William, 150 
 
 Providence, in 1762, 18-19 
 
 Providence Gazette, 18, 41, 42, 43, 44, 
 G2 O25 (OS; oO SR OZ, LE Lo4s, 2ORs 
 prospectus, 22-24; first issue, 26-28; 
 second issue, 28-29; contents of typi- 
 cal issue, 37-39; suspended by WG, 
 46; Extraordinary August 24, 1765, 
 49-50; Extraordinary and Suppfle- 
 ment March 12, 1766, 53-55; Tre- 
 vived by Sarah Goddard, 57; sold to 
 John Carter, 84 
 
 Providence Library Company, 37, 87 
 
 Prowess of the Whig Club, The, 181; 
 released, 155-1563; postscript, 161- 
 162 
 
 Purdie, Alexander (partner with John 
 Dixon), 117, 127, 130, 132, 133 
 
 Ramsay, Nathaniel, 154 
 
 Rathell, Joseph, 143-144 
 
 Reed, Joseph, 172, 173 
 
 Rhode Island American, 204, 205 
 
 Rhode Island Historical Society, 22, 42, 
 203 
 
 Richards, George, 176, 182, 196 
 
 Rind, Mrs. Clementina, 130, 132 
 
 Rittenhouse, David, 177, 183, 195 
 
 Rittenhouse, William, 6 
 
 Rivington’s New-York Gazetteer, 146 
 
 Rush, Benjamin, 81, 173 
 
 Rusk, David, 157 
 
 Salem, Mass., 121, 123, 125 
 Salmon, George, 191 
 Scharf, John T., 140 
 Seabury, Samuel, 12 
 
 Sellers, Joseph, 104, 106 
 
222 
 
 Shakespeare, William, 12, 16 
 
 Shakespeare’s Head sign, 37, 201 
 
 Shaw, Nathaniel, Jr., letter to Wharton, 
 quoted, 78 
 
 Sheaf, Henry, 156-157 
 
 Shermandine, Stephen, 169 
 
 Shober, Frederick, 138 
 
 Silliman, Benjamin, 205 
 
 Sittler, Abraham, advertises for Sally 
 to live with him again, 182 
 
 Slaymaker, John, 154 
 
 Smith, John, go 
 
 Smith, Katherine, 11 
 
 Smith, Nathaniel, 157 
 
 Smith, Richard, 11 
 
 Smith, Samuel, leader of Baltimore mob, 
 170, 171 
 
 Somerville, George, abuses Mary Kath- 
 erine Goddard and reprimanded, 150 
 
 Sons of Liberty, 14, 52, 116, 124; WG 
 member of Providence group, 49 
 
 South-Carolina Gazette, 38 
 
 Sower, Christopher, 138 
 
 Spear, William, 169, 170 
 
 Stamp Act, 14, 34, 42) 44) 53) 57) 62, 
 64, 202; WG’s campaign against, 49- 
 52, 60, 63, 116 
 
 Stanly, John, 85 
 
 Staples, Jonathan, advertises activities of 
 wife Freelove, 32 
 
 Starling, Belinda, 194 
 
 Stenson, William, 114, 131 
 
 Sterne, Laurence, 178, 179 
 
 Sterry, Cyprian, 199 
 
 Stevenson, John, 180 
 
 Stewart, Andrew, 146 
 
 Stigars, Andrew, 157 
 
 Stiles, Ezra, 15, 149; diary quoted, 117, 
 147-148 
 
 Story, Enoch, 138 
 
 Strahan, William, 6, 14, 61, 71-723 sup- 
 plies type for WG’s Philadelphia shop, 
 63, 66; tries to collect from WG and 
 Joseph Galloway, 97-98 
 
 Sweeney, Lawrence, seller of Constitu- 
 tional Courant in New York, 51, 52, 
 192 
 
 Swift, Jonathan, 12, 41; quoted by WG, 
 155 
 
 Thayer, Simeon, 199 
 
 Theater: in New York, 16; Rhode Is- 
 land ban, 21; WG prints playbill 
 for Douglas troupe, 22; playbills in 
 Baltimore printed by Goddard press, 
 179; theatrical criticism, 179 
 
 WILLIAM GODDARD, NEWSPAPERMAN 
 
 Thomas, Isaiah, 4, 6, 15, 20, 21, 50, 
 93> 99) 119, 127) 134, 138, 140, 197, 
 203, 204, 205; friendship with WG, 
 201-202; History of Printing in 
 America, 202 
 
 Thomson, Charles, 83, 167 
 
 Thomson, James, 38 
 
 Thurston, Luke, 43 
 
 Todd, Anthony, 123 
 
 Towne, Benjamin, 72, 98; career, 88- 
 89; manages shop during WG’s ab- 
 sence, 89; becomes partner with WG, 
 90; WG tries to buy out, 91; threatens 
 to start own newspaper, 92; inter- 
 feres with printing of Pennsylvania 
 Chronicle, 93-95; ends partnership 
 with WG, 95; final quarrel with WG, 
 95-97 
 
 Treen, Henry, advertises activities of 
 wife Catherine, 144 
 
 Tristram Shandy, quoted by WG, 78, 
 81 
 
 True and Faithful Narrative... , A, 
 100-101 
 
 Turnbull, George, 154 
 
 Tweedy, James, Jr., 43 
 
 United States Gazette, 204 
 
 Updike, Daniel, 11 
 
 Updike, Daniel Berkeley, 11 
 
 Updike, Esther, marriage to Thomas 
 Fosdick, 11 
 
 Updike, John, 20, 55 
 
 Updike, Lodowick, 11 
 
 Updike, Wilkins, 11 
 
 Van Bibber, Abraham, 169, 170 
 
 Vandervoort, Peter, 129 
 
 Vernon, Daniel, tutor in Updike house- 
 hold, 11 
 
 Vernon, Thomas, 111 
 
 Virginia Gazette (Purdie and Dixon), 
 117, 127) 130, 132) 133 
 
 Virginia Gazette (Mrs. Rind), 130, 132 
 
 Virginia Journal and Alexandria Ad- 
 vertiser, 182 
 
 Wall, Thomas, 179 
 
 Ward, Samuel, 21, 25, 35, 41 
 
 Warren, James, 123 
 
 Washington, George, 148, 149, 168, 
 169, 171, 172, 175) 176; 1915 194, 
 195; advertises in Maryland Journal, 
 I41 
 
 Waterman, John, partner with WG in 
 Providence paper mill, 39, 50 
 
INDEX 
 
 223 
 
 
 
 Waybill, Adam, 166 
 
 West, Benjamin, 30 
 
 Weyman, William, 16 
 
 Wharton, Thomas, 60, 70, 74, 78, 88, 
 96, 97, 98, 108, 202; enters into 
 partnership with WG and Galloway, 
 65-66; refuses to allow WG to print 
 pamphlet of Dickinson’s “Letters,” 
 82-83; persuades WG to sell out 
 Providence shop, 84; dialogue with 
 WG, quoted, 86; offers to buy out 
 or sell out WG’s interest in Phila- 
 delphia shop, 89-90; appointed agent 
 of East India Company and resigns, 
 109 
 
 Whig Club, 150, 163, 164, 207; method 
 of operation, 151; tries to find author 
 of Tom Tell-Truth, 153-154; ban- 
 ishes WG from Baltimore, 154; at- 
 tacked by WG in The Prowess of the 
 Whig Club, 155-156; members cause 
 riot, 156-158; members forced to 
 apologize, 159-161 
 
 White, John, successor to Mary Kath- 
 
 erine Goddard as postmaster of Balti- 
 more, 193 
 
 Whitman, Jacob, Jr., 192, 199, 201 
 
 Wilkes, John, 44, 85 
 
 Williams, Roger, 18, 19, 198 
 
 Wilson, Andrew, 157 
 
 Wilson, James, 60 
 
 Witherspoon, John, 88 
 
 Woodbridge, N. J., 13; WG _ prints 
 Constitutional Courant on Parker’s 
 press in Woodbridge, 50, 51 
 
 Worcester Spy, 204 
 
 Workman, Benjamin, 186 
 
 Wrentham, Mass., 147, 148 
 
 Wroth, Lawrence C., 6, 40 
 
 Yale College, 13, 15 
 
 Yale University Library, 74 
 Yardley, William, 100 
 
 Yates, Jasper, 84 
 
 Young, Thomas, 118, 126, 125 
 
 Zenger, John Peter, 3, 172 
 
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