About this Item
Newspaper. The New-England Chronicle, or the Essex Gazette. August 31-September 7, 1775 (Vol. 8, No. 371). Printed at Stoughton Hall, Harvard College, Cambridge, Massachusetts: Samuel Hall and Ebenezer Hall. Includes front-page printing of Opinion of Congress in Response to Lord Norths Conciliatory Proposal (July 31, 1775), written by Thomas Jefferson, signed in type by John Hancock; and Resolution of Congress Clarifying Non-Importation Agreement (August 1, 1775). The original subscriber to this issue was Dr. John Wingate (1743-1819) of Hallowell, Maine (Massachusetts), who served as an army surgeon in the Revolutionary War. 4 pp., 10 x 15 1/2 in. "The colonies of America are entitled to the sole and exclusive privilege of giving and granting their own money.It is a high breach of this privilege for any body of men, extraneous to their constitutions.to take to themselves the authority of judging of their conditions.""it is the DESPOTISM of the CROWN and the SLAVERY of the people which the ministry aim at. For refusing those attempts, and for that only the Americans have been inhumanly murdered by the King's Troops."Historic backgroundOn the night of April 18, 1775, Paul Revere rode to Lexington to warn that the British were coming. 700 British troops were met on Lexington Green by local minutemen; the skirmish left eight Americans dead. As the British continued to the armory at Concord, hundreds of minutemen and militiamen responded. The British were forced to march back to Boston; on the way, American snipers took a deadly toll. The war had begun in earnest. Convening in Philadelphia in September and October 1774, the First Continental Congress met to consider a unified response to the British Parliament's Intolerable Acts. Delegates agreed to boycott British goods beginning on December 1, 1774, and threatened to boycott the West Indies if those islands did not agree to non-importation of British goods. Congress also declared that if the Intolerable Acts were not repealed by September 10, 1775, the colonies would cease exports to Britain. They also called for a second meeting the following spring.The Second Continental Congress convened on May 10, 1775, in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, with delegates from twelve of the thirteen colonies present; Georgia's delegates arrived in mid-July. On June 14, the Congress created the Continental Army out of militia units besieging the British army in Boston and appointed George Washington to command it.On July 6, Congress approved a Declaration setting forth the Causes and Necessity of their taking up arms, and two days later, extended the Olive Branch Petition to the British Crown to seek reconciliation.Meanwhile, in February, Prime Minister Lord North (1732-1792) had taken an unexpectedly conciliatory tone, which he proposed to the House of Lords on February 20 and dated February 27. Parliament sent it to the individual colonies in North America. The resolution read: "Resolved, That it is the opinion of this Committee, that when the Governour, Council, and Assembly, or General Court, of any of his Majesty's Provinces or Colonies in America, shall propose to make provision, according to the condition, circumstances, and situation of such Province or Colony, for contributing their proportion to the common defence, (such proportion to be raised under the authority of the General Court, or General Assembly of such Province or Colony, and disposable by Parliament,) and shall engage to make provision also for the support of the Civil Government, and the Administration of Justice, in such Province or Colony, it will be proper if such proposal shall be approved by his Majesty and the two Houses of Parliament, and for so long as such provision shall be made accordingly, to forbear, in respect of such Province or Colony, to levy any Duty, Tax, or Assessment, or to impose any farther Duty, Tax, or Assessment, except only such Duties as it may be expedient t. (See website for full description).
Seller Inventory # 30034.05
Contact seller
Report this item
