SOCIETY NEWS AND ACCESSIONS ARTICLES AND PUBLICATIONS The Council of the Historical Society recently appointed Mr. Charles B. Montgomery Curator of Business Manuscripts for the Society. Business rec- ords—mercantile and industrial, papers relative to mining operations, to ship- ping and fishing interests, to railroads, turnpike companies, and other agencies engaged in developing the transportation facilities of the —are indispensable to the writing of the social and economic history of a community. The Historical Society of Pennsylvania is fortunate in possessing an important collection of account books, ledgers, letter books, and other records of the like character which make up the papers of any business house. It is hoped that these collections may be greatly increased by the deposit of similar records with the Society by those who have such in their possession. Thus a mass of highly important material which has been inaccessible hitherto will be made available for scholars.

Although Franklin's autobiography has been ranked among the classics of American literature for more than a hundred years, the definitive text of these memoirs has not yet been published. Consequently, the announcement by Dr. Max Farrand that the is preparing such a text is of the greatest interest and importance. In his article in the Huntington Library Bul- letin (Number 10), Dr. Farrand reviewed the circumstances of the composi- tion of the Autobiography and the subsequent history of the manuscripts—the original, now in the Huntington Library, and the two fair copies made during Franklin's lifetime, which apparently are no longer extant. Furthermore, he has evaluated the various early editions from the point of view of their usefulness in helping the editor to arrive at the closest possible approximation of Frank- lin's ultimate intentions in regard to his manuscript. A more tangled biblio- graphical problem is not often to be met with, but Dr. Farrand appears to have unwound its principal threads. The sum of his conclusions will be em- bodied in two forthcoming editions. In one, the original manuscript, which Bigelow used in preparing the 1868 text, will "be accurately transcribed and notes added wherever Franklin made important changes affecting the meaning. This transcript will be confronted with, or placed parallel to, the best version of a fair copy in existence—namely, the William Temple Franklin text. The French translation of 1791 will be used to show support for one or the other reading. Where the Robinson edition of 1793 and le Veillard's transla- tion throw any light on doubtful readings or offer additional information, exact records will be supplied." This edition is intended for students; for the gen- eral reader there will be a popular edition of that version which, "from the evidence available, seems most probably to have been Franklin's last inten- tion."

349 350 SOCIETY NEWS AND ACCESSIONS July

When the first volume of Hermann Eduard von Hoist's Verfassung und Demokratie der Vereinigten Staaten von Amerika appeared in 1876 it created a great stir. Von Hoist was not only a foreigner but he was also a German writing at a time when American reverence for German scholarship was at its zenith. Moreover, it was published when very little had been written on the subject of American constitutional history. By the time the last volume came out in 1892 the situation had changed considerably. Bancroft, Schouler, McMaster and had entered the field; antipathy to slavery and to states rights which permeate the text of Von Hoist had ceased to animate his readers. Historiography had moved on and American history was no longer interpreted from the nexus of the Civil War. As a result, Von Hoist's work which was dedicated to the illumination of Bismarck's dictum: "Sovereignty can only be a unit and it must remain a unit—the sovereignty of the law," was out of date before it was finished, according to Eric F. Goldman in his essay "Hermann Eduard von Hoist: Plumed Knight of American Historiography" published in the Mississippi Valley Historical Review for March, 1937. Al- though his interpretation of the constitution is not valid today, Von Hoist and his work cannot be dismissed as of no importance. He was one of the first to make extensive use of the Congressional Record and of newspapers (for political material only) and there is evidence in his works of the coming tendency towards an economic interpretation of history. The Journal of the Friends' Historical Society, XXXIII (1936), continues to print extracts from the "A. R. Barclay Mss" which are in the Library at Friends House, London. Among these letters to George Fox are several from correspondents in the New World. One from Thomas Jordan relates the discouragements of the Friends in Virginia: "Many ther be y* are Convinced of ye truth & will com to meetings when frends of ye ministri from other Cuntries Come amongst us but few will come & sett & waight wth us when they are gon." There is also a group of letters from Friends in Barbadoes. "Benjamin Lay (1681-1759) of Colchester, London, Barbadoes, Philadel- phia" is the subject of an essay contributed to the same journal by C. Bright- wen Rowntree. Lay seems always to have been a storm center, a person who went to the heart of the matter before him with all the singleminded enthusi- asm of an Old Testament prophet. He had, moreover, a sort of genius for the bizarre and the extravagant dramatic gestures used to point his arguments were a constant source of irritation to Friends. Mr. Rowntree declares it his pur- pose to penetrate the cloud of legend and disapproval surrounding Benjamin Lay and discover something of the real man beneath. In so doing he has re- vealed the zealot, the man given to extremes, one who was a great friend to the slaves and active in anti-slavery agitation, a lover of children, of books, and of mankind. There is also in this Journal an article by Henry J. Cadbury on "Christian Lodowick," a continental scholar who was for a time accepted by the American Friends, although subsequently repudiated by them when his clear-sighted criti- 1937 SOCIETY NEWS AND ACCESSIONS 351 cisms of Keith and other "Semi-Foxians" involved him in widespread contro- versy over Quaker doctrine. The eighteenth century English interest in agriculture and the resultant improvement in agricultural methods is well known. "In America, agriculture was also the fashion, albeit to a more limited extent, among men of leisure, wealth or education." Doubtless, the American enthusiasm sprang Irom the English source. The Philadelphia Society for Promoting Agriculture, founded in 1785, and the Massachusetts society, founded in 1792, both depended on England for material for their publications. Sheep-shearings were the fashion in New York and in Virginia in imitation of the vogue set by Thomas Coke of Holkham. The writings of Arthur Young were greatly esteemed; blooded cattle were imported from England; and some attempt was made to introduce root crops as winter forage for cattle. However, "the difference in needs and economic conditions existing in England and America prevented any wholesale imitation of English experiments by American farmers," and the greatest contri- bution made to American farming by the English at this time was the im- proved breed of livestock resulting from British importations, in the opinion of Rodney C. Loehr presented in "The Influence of English Agriculture on American Agriculture, 1775-1825" in Agricultural History for January, 1937. The credit for the capture of Fort Ticonderoga in May, 1775 has long been disputed by the partisans of Benedict Arnold, Ethan Allen, and Colonel John Brown. The editor of The Bulletin of the Fort Ticonderoga Museum has gathered the pertinent documents and published them in the Bulletin for January, 1937. He concludes that "Allen and Arnold both claimed command, and they took the Fort together. Allen had the men, Arnold the commission and military knowledge." "The Letters of Charles Carroll, Barrister," have been edited for the Maryland Historical Magazine for December, 1936. Of this Charles Carroll, "one of the most trusted and active leaders of the patriotic party" in Mary- land, little is known. In a measure the lack of knowledge about the man, himself, will be supplied by these letters, which are especially interesting for the light they throw on the Maryland iron industry, "perhaps the most neg- lected subject in the history of colonial Maryland." The major portion of the correspondence published consists of letters to various English merchants who acted as Carroll's bankers and business agents. "Yet more than the iron business is involved. Significant facts are revealed concerning colonial commerce, ship- building, insurance rates and procedure, the effects of the Seven Years War on colonial commerce, and technical financial practices." An adverse fate dogged the footsteps of Baron Palisot de Beauvois (1752- 1820), to an unusual degree. He assembled three great botanical collections, all of which were destroyed in whole or in part: his African collections were burned when the trading station at Owara was destroyed by the English in 1791; his Haitian collections were lost in the slave insurrection of 1793; and 352 SOCIETY NEWS AND ACCESSIONS July his collections dealing with the flora of the United States were lost in a ship wreck near Halifax in 1798. For this reason Palisot de Beauvois has no place in the annals of early American botany, although he was a member of the American Philosophical Society, and resided in Philadelphia at four different times between 1791-98, and although his first technical papers were prepared in Philadelphia and published by the American Philosophical Society. E. D. Merrill attempts to rectify this situation in "Palisot de Beauvois as an Over- looked American Botanist" published in the Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society, 1936, Number 6. The January, 1937, issue of The Filson Club History Quarterly is devoted chiefly to a review of the publications of the Filson Club, and of the contents of the first ten volumes of The Filson Club History Quarterly. The Filson Club was organized in 1884 and named in honor of John Filson, a native of Pennsylvania who emigrated to Kentucky and who published the first history of that region in 1784. Edward R. Barnsley writes of the "Founding of Newtown" in the George School Bulletin for December, 1936. Although a Newtown record of 1727 states that William Penn "Proprietor & Governor of the Province of Pennsylvania, did . . . contrive . . . our town of Newtown," it does not give any more spe- cific details of the manner in which this was done. Mr. Barnsley has surveyed the early land records in an attempt to fill in the details of the settling of this town. The Dickinson Lazv Review for January, 1937, contains an article by Lewis C. Cassidy on "The Elder Brewster of Pennsylvania." In this article Mr. Cassidy gives a brief summary of the career and legal opinions of Benjamin H. Brewster, a leader of the Pennsylvania bar of the post-Civil War era. A small pamphlet containing a brief history of the Hayes Mechanics Home illustrated with portraits of the founders, George Hayes and Ferdinand J. Dreer, has just been published. The Hayes home is the outgrowth of the be- quest of George Hayes made "for the purpose of founding and supporting an institution to furnish a retreat and home for disabled or aged or infirm and de- serving American mechanics." Chester County Collections, No. 4, contains articles on the "Architects of Memorial Hall," the building just purchased by the Chester County Historical Society; on "The Indian Reservation in Wiltshire," by Dorothy B. Lapp; and on the "Goshen Baptist Burial Ground." The Bulletin of the Institute of Historical Research for February, 1937, notes the recent acquisition by the National Library of Scotland of 12 letters of General Wolfe, 1749-58; and of the journal of J. Ker, surgeon's mate in the royal navy, which describes the fighting in the West Indies, the loss of the Royal George and similar events of the year 1778. Old Hellebergh by Arther B. Gregg comprises sketches written over a four 1937 SOCIETY NEWS AND ACCESSIONS 353 year period for the Altamont Enterprise. These sketches deal with the history of the West Manor of Renssalaerswyck, the anti-rent wars in New York, and other similar material relative to the Revolution, and the Loyalists. There is a description of a slave auction and information relevant to the domestic economy of colonial New York. More than seventy years ago, on December 5, 1866, Joseph Sabin issued a prospectus announcing his intention of preparing A Dictionary of Books Relat- ing to America, From Its Discovery to the Present Time. This dictionary was to give bibliographical information about books dealing with the political, constitutional, military, economic, social and religious history of the New World from the time of its discovery to the date of the completion of each several part. Sabin died in 1881 after having finished the first 82 parts of his monumental work. After his death the task was continued by Dr. Wilber- force Eames, under whose direction 34 additional parts were published. From 1893 to 1924 nothing was done. At that time work was resumed and in 1930 R. W. G. Vail became joint editor. Now, with the distribution to sub- scribers of the final part, a monumental task of the greatest value to scholars and bibliographers has been brought to completion. The scope of the Dictionary as completed is not quite as Mr. Sabin had planned. As work progressed it became evident to the editors that the limits set by Sabin would have to be restricted if the task was to be brought to a conclusion. Consequently, a more and more restricted program was adopted. In general, early newspapers were omitted inasmuch as they are fully de- scribed in the Brigham bibliography; with Volume 21 no book published after 1876 was mentioned; after the publication of Part 130 almost all titles published since i860 were omitted; and after Part 141 no material of a later date than 1840, except such as relates to early Texas, California an3 the Pacific Coast, was included. Thus a difficult and arduous task has been com- pleted. May the librarians, research workers, collectors and all other men who make frequent use of Sabin not forget the quotation from Anthony Wood which appears on the title page: "A painful work it is I'll assure you, and more than difficult, wherein what toyle hath been taken, as no man believeth, but he hath made the triall." Joseph Sabin; Wilberforce Eames, beloved dean of American bibliographers; and R. W. G. Vail, scholarly Librarian of the American Antiquarian Society, have made all scholars in American history their debtors. The American Book Company has begun to publish a series of reprints of early American novels under the general supervision of Professor H. H. Clark. Five novels (unabridged) have appeared so far: John Brockden Brown's Ormond, first published in 1799; Hugh Henry Brackenridge's Modern Chiv- alry, a satire on American politics which appeared in sections from 1792 to 1815 > James Fenimore Cooper's Satanstoe; William Gilmore Simms' The Yemassee; and John Pendleton Kennedy's Horse Shoe Robinson, Each of these novels is edited by a man who is an acknowledged authority on the writer in 354 SOCIETY NEWS AND ACCESSIONS July question, and the edition contains a "scholarly preface, a biographic chronology, and a selected bibliography. It was a pious act to make these books easily available, for they are the works of the fathers of American literature, the men who were bold enough to throw off the literary apron strings of Great Britain and cease to write of English lords, ladies and like polite subjects, to become the Minute Men of our literary revolution and to brave public opinion by writing of their own United States and her patriots and pioneers." Among those contenders for the honor of having been the first to conceive the possibility of operating a boat by means of a steam engine is James Rum- sey. Some of his letters written to George Washington and relating to this matter, and others, have been edited for the Maryland Historical Magazine for March, 1937, by James A. Padgett. Rumsey came to Philadelphia in the winter of 1787-88 and was fortunate enough to gain the interest of a group of influential persons. The Rumseian Society was formed with Franklin as president and in May, 1788, with the aid of this society Rumsey was enabled to go abroad to stir up interest and to find capital to further his undertaking. An "Index of Estates of the Upper Ohio Valley" prepared by E. B. lams is contained in the April, 1937, issue of The New York Genealogical and Biographical Record. "This index covers wills, administrations, marriage rec- ords, and Orphan Court proceedings for Western Pennsylvania, North West Virginia, and Eastern Ohio" and is based on the abstracts of records to be found in the files of the Upper Ohio Valley Genealogical Association. This index should be of great service to genealogists inasmuch as "the area of the Upper Ohio Valley has been a great stumbling block to genealogists by reason of the confusion that surrounds early records, partly because of the lack of organization that is always present in frontier government, and partly because of the conflicting jurisdiction of Pennsylvania and Virginia over the same ter- ritory. . . ." M. Le Maire's description of the Lower Louisiana territory is not so well known as the accounts of some other Europeans who came to the New World and subsequently wrote down their impressions thereof. Le Maire's first account of this colony was a long letter apparently written in 1714 to M. Bobe one of the chaplains of the palace of Versailles, and it is this letter which has been edited and translated by Jean Delanglez for the April, 1937, issue of Mid- America. The section devoted to "Notes and Queries" in American Literature for March, 1937, contains "A Further Note on Thomas Godfrey in England" contributed by C. Lennart Carlson. Mr. Carlson attributes the recognition given this Pennsylvania poet of the colonial era to his friendship with Provost William Smith. Smith was a friend of Ralph Griffiths, the editor of The Grand Magazine of Universal Intelligence, in which several of Godfrey's poems appeared accompanied by editorial remarks which "not only show a toler- ant and polite interest in the work of the young Colonial writer," but also furnish evidence indicating that the editor of an English review was willing to encour- age colonial literary efforts, amateurish though they might be. 1937 SOCIETY NEWS AND ACCESSIONS 355

"A Theatrical Family," printed in Miscellanea Genealogica et Heraldica and the British Archivist for March, 1937, offers a vignette of the life of one family of actors and actresses known to the Philadelphia stage of the early nine- teenth century. This article is in the main a catalogue of the packet of papers offered as proof of the claim of the manager of the Chestnut Street Theatre to the English estate of his actress mother-in-law. Juliana Westray, the actress in question, emigrated to America in 1796. After having had some connection with the New York theatre she came to Philadelphia. Here, two of her three daughters married gentlemen described as "comedians," and in this fashion perpetuated the family connection with the world of the stage. John T. Horton has written an article on "The Western Eyres of Judge Kent" for New York History for April, 1937. In this essay the acute observa- tions on conditions of frontier life, on political questions, and on Indian affairs of Chancellor James Kent, that ardent Federalist who was one of the most famous lawyers of the early Republic, are set forth. Mr. Horton is of the opinion that Kent's administration of the common law was so successful as to fully justify the remark of Mr. Justice Story that Chancellor Kent had so ad- ministered the law of the land "as to make New York the land of the law." "Success to the Railroad" contributed by E. Douglas Branch to The West- ern Pennsylvania Historical Magazine for March, 1937, reviews the history of the building of the railroad from Philadelphia to Pittsburgh in the mid- nineteenth century. The Bishop White Prayer Book Society has reprinted (April, 1937) The Case of the Episcopal Churches in the United States Considered. This pam- phlet composed by William White in 1782 is reprinted now in connection with the celebration of the 150th anniversary of the consecration of William White and Samuel Provoost in Lambeth Palace Chapel, February 4, 1787. In the same connection, The General Magazine and Historical Chronicle for April, 1937, carries an article "Bishop White Remembered." The career of Shepard Kollock, "A Pioneer New Jersey Printer," who learned his trade in Philadelphia in the office of his uncle, William Goddard, is related by Elmer T. Hutchinson in The Proceedings of the New Jersey Historical Society for April, 1937. The same journal contains a brief sketch of Henry Armitt Brown, the young Philadelphia orator of the i87o's whose public addresses won for him the reputation of being one of the most brilliant speakers of his time. In the February, 1937, issue of The Catholic World there is an article by Helen M. McCadden on Mathew Carey, "The Father of the American Book Fair." In view of the present vogue of the book fair it is not without interest to Pennsylvanians to be reminded that Mathew Carey, Philadelphia publisher and economist, was instrumental in organizing the first of such fairs in 1802. ACCESSIONS From Mr. Harrold E. Gillingham, the Society has received: the letter book of William Meredith and William Smyth, assignees of Benjamin Wilson, and 356 SOCIETY NEWS AND ACCESSIONS July a group of papers belonging to this estate; grocer's account books for the Burd Orphan Asylum, and for Mrs. Edward Shippen Burd, 1856-58; a docu- ment signed by Andrew Hamilton; some papers of the Jonathan Dickinson estate, 1714-46; n manuscripts pertaining to Chief Justice William Allen; 79 manuscripts of Hamilton and Hood, Philadelphia merchants; 16 manu- scripts of Eli Kirk Price; 29 manuscripts of Edward Burd, Edward Shippen Burd, and Daniel W. Coxe; and about 150 miscellaneous manuscripts of economic interest. The Howard M. Jenkins collection of manuscripts, newspaper clippings and pamphlets has been given to the Historical Society by Mr. Charles F. Jenkins. Twenty-four manuscripts relating to the affairs of the Pennsylvania, Dela- ware, and Maryland Steam Navigation Company have been received from Mr. Lawrence J. Morris. These papers include a statement of the company's account with Hugh McElderry, December 1, 1830-June 18, 1831; a state- ment of the company finances, 1832; other financial statements; and a number of letters from company officials discussing the purchasing of steamboats, the desirability of securing a mail contract, and the complaints of stockholders that the dividends were too small. From Mr. Herbert Welsh, the Society has received a very large collection of papers and documents (approximately 30,000 items) which will be of great interest to the student of Indian affairs. Mr. Welsh was an organizer, and for 34 years the corresponding secretary of the Indian Rights Association and the letter books and general correspondence relevant to the work of this association are included in the gift. Since Mr. Welsh took an active interest in civil service reform, in the Negro problem, and in the municipal government of Philadelphia his papers will afford a mine of information on these and re- lated topics. There are also numerous diaries, and letters illustrative of the cultural interests of Philadelphians. The Society has received about 1500 miscellaneous newspapers, mostly Phil- adelphia papers of the Civil War period, from Mrs. I. Pearson Willets; Neal's Saturday Gazette, January 4, 1845-December 27, 1845; Tri-Weekly Penn- sylvanian, December 1, 1860-February 28, 1861; Alexander s Express Messen- ger, January 4, 1843-November 29, 1843; The Columbia County Register, December 25, 1838, from the Library of ; three account books of John Harrison, 1800-03; 15 letters and documents of Margaret Cope and Hannah Jones from Mrs. Walter Nordhoff; an autograph document of Michael Billmeyer's militia fines for 1802, 4 letters of Michael Billmeyer, as well as books, manuscripts, and photographs relating to Germantown history have been given by Miss Mary W. Shoemaker. Among other interesting items which have recently come into the possession of this Society is the manuscript of the memoirs of John Bach McMaster.