Hopestill Capen from the Cornfields to the Jail

On 6 Aug 1776, 250 years ago today, authorities in Boston locked merchant Hopestill Capen (1731–1807) in jail for “aiding and abetting those called enemies to the Colonies.”

For decades Capen had run his dry goods business at the sign of the Cornfields in a building he owned, now known as the Union Oyster House. He served as a militia officer and held minor town offices.

Late in 1769 Capen took on Benjamin Thompson as an apprentice, but that arrangement didn’t last long. The merchant later reportedly told the teenager’s mother “he oftener found her son under the counter, with gimblets, knife, and saw, constructing some little machine, or looking over some book of science, than behind it, arranging the cloths or waiting upon customers.”

from 1771 until just before the war, one of Capen’s tenants in the building was the Whig printer Isaiah Thomas.

During that time, Capen had become known as a mild Loyalist. He signed the complimentary addresses to Gov. Thomas Hutchinson and Gen. Thomas Gage, and he joined the protest against the Solemn League and Covenant.

Capen chose not to evacuate with the British military in 1776, however. Unlike many Loyalists, he had deep family roots in Massachusetts, and all his property was there.

In April 1776 the Massachusetts House directed the Suffolk County justices and sheriff to detain and question dozens of individuals suspected of disloyalty. Capen was fifth on that list, showing his prominence in town.

But it wasn’t until the summer, after Massachusetts had declared independence from the Crown, that the Council ordered those authorities to lock Capen up. No one ever appears to have ever produced evidence of him “aiding and abetting” Crown forces, but he did refuse to pledge allegiance to the new state.

Capen presented himself as a conscientious objector, motivated by religion. In the 1760s he had joined Boston’s small Sandemanian sect, and he said that his faith required him to stay out of the war.

Some analysts have described the Sandemanians as pacifist because of statements like Capen’s. But he wasn’t opposed to military action in principle. He’d been an active member of the Ancient and Honorable Artillery Company as well as the colonial militia, and during the siege he became a sergeant in a Loyal Associated Volunteers under Capt. Adino Paddock.

Rather, the Sandemanian creed said believers should be loyal to the government in control on the grounds that it must be divinely ordained. With the war still going on, and thus divine will not yet clear, Capen insisted that he couldn’t promise his allegiance to the U.S. of A.

“Transmitted to us, their Posterity, a fair and rich Inheritance”

The American Scholar just published Robert A. Gross’s essay “Gratitude Isn’t Everything,” considering the start of the American Revolution in contrast to Vice President J. D. Vance’s one-way demands for gratitude.

American Patriots felt obligations to their ancestors who established the colonies, and to their further ancestors who established the British constitution as they understood it. But to them those obligations called for resistance to Parliament’s new laws, not simple loyalty to the government.

In the Revolutionary movement it was a mark of militancy to appeal to the ancestors in protests against British policies. Such statements rehearsed the history of New England from the Puritans’ first settlements down to the latest generation.

Lexington elaborated on this narrative in January 1773. The saga opened as the Puritans fled the tyranny of Charles I and Archbishop Laud, made the hazardous Atlantic crossing, and carved out new homes in the American wilderness. “Our worthy ancestors … [endured] many Struggles with their Enemies in the Face of every Danger and at the expence of much Treasure and Blood,” the Lexington town meeting declared. They thereby “secured to themselves, & transmitted to us, their Posterity, a fair and rich Inheritance, not only of a pleasant fertile Land, but also of Invaluable Rights & Priviledges both as Men & Christians, as stated in the Royal Charter of this Province, and … [guaranteed] by the Faith of the British Crown & Kingdom.” So precious a legacy came as a sacred trust. It was the townspeople’s duty to protect and preserve this birthright of liberty and pass it on intact to the next generation. To do otherwise would betray their very character as a people.

The rhetoric of filial duty became ubiquitous in 1774–75 and with good reason. To punish the Bay Colony for the Tea Party and to curb what royal officials deemed a disorderly democracy, Britain effectively revoked the revered 1691 Massachusetts Charter. Under the Massachusetts Government Act (MAGA), the Crown took over the hiring and firing of all judicial officials and excluded the assembly from its previous role in choosing the provincial council, the upper chamber of the general court. Most important, the new law barred town meetings without the governor’s consent, except for an annual session to elect municipal officials.

MAGA was a direct attack on local autonomy and on popular influence in government. To the inhabitants, these arbitrary changes, imposed from above, amounted to disinheritance, and as worthy heirs of virtuous forefathers, they rose up in outrage.

One result of Parliament’s overreach, Gross argues, was to spur the Patriots into adopting a broader view of their cause, not linked to one nation’s history. The article quotes Dr. Joseph Warren’s praise for a “universal enquiry into the rights of mankind in general” as well as the rights of British subjects.

Eventually that produced the natural-rights argument of the Declaration of Independence, which could inspire many later movements, not bound to Britain or the limits of eighteenth-century society.

The current administration may invoke the Founding, but in disregarding the natural rights of anyone who’s not an American citizen, that administration is showing contempt for the philosophy the Founders came to champion.

Back to Philadelphia for “The Road to Independence” in September

In April, I went to Philadelphia to help lead the Pursuit of History Weekend on “The Road to Independence,” nearly three full days of exploring the city and the Continental Congress’s move to breaking from Britain.

That was so much fun that we’re offering a similar program on 18–20 September. The anniversary of the Declaration of Independence has passed, of course, but we can dig deeper into its history in this Sestercentennial year. In fact, we have the chance to take in new material and historic spaces not available in the spring.

This time our base will be the Arch Street Meetinghouse, commissioned by Quakers in 1803–04 and shown above. We’ll also visit Carpenters’ Hall, Independence Hall, the controversial Presidents’ House site, the Arch Street Burying-Ground, the Museum of the American Revolution, the American Philosophical Society Museum, and other places in scenic Philadelphia.

One addition to this session is the First Bank of the United States, which just reopened after a major refurbishment. We’ll visit that on Sunday, our “extra” day when we go outside the period of our main focus.

Our speakers this time around will be:

• Jane E. Calvert, Ph.D., author of Penman of the Founding and founding director of the John Dickinson Writings Project.
• Christina R. Carrick and James P. McClure, Ph.D., editors at the Papers of Thomas Jefferson.
• Shawn David McGhee, Ph.D., author of No Longer Subjects of the British King: The Political Transformation of Royal Subjects to Republican Citizens, 1774–1776.
• Samuel A. Forman, M.D., M.P.H., author of Joseph Warren and Ill-Fated Frontier, and a native of Philadelphia.
• Richard Vague, author of The Banker Who Made America: Thomas Willing and The Rise of the American Financial Aristocracy, 1731–1821.
• J. L. Bell, program director and author of The Road to Concord.

We’re expecting this session to be smaller than the one in the spring, but still looking for two to three dozen folks interested in Revolutionary history.

For more information about what’s included, costs, and registration for “The Road to Independence,” please visit the Pursuit of History website.

(Meanwhile, I’m also working on the program for a new Pursuit of History Weekend in November.)

“So disagreeable that one half of the Congress withdraw”

Delving into the newly published John Dickinson letters also led me back into the notes of the Continental Congress during 1775.

The official record that secretary Charles Thomson kept for eventual publication was often anodyne. The delegates made themselves into a committee of the whole to avoid going on the record, and of course Thomson was politic about what he recorded.

But some delegates kept their own notes. In this period Silas Deane kept busy summarizing arguments and then grading the speakers.

Neither Dickinson nor John Adams came off in Deane’s notes as so composed and effective as they would have liked.

In his memoir Adams described himself as “not having ever been remarkable for very long Harrangues.” But on 15 May Deane described the Massachusetts man’s remarks as “lengthy, and argumentative.”

Dickinson felt he was guiding the Congress to a safe middle course. That same day Deane wrote that the Pennsylvanian “argues smoothly but Sophistically on the Subject and gives rather disgust.”

And here’s the delegates’ interactions on 24 May:

Mr. Dickinson in his old Way lengthy, and concludes in his old Way with a Fable

Mr. [Thomas] Mifflin animadvests[?] with spirit on him and exposes his reasoning &c

Mr. [Thomas] Johnson, on a reconciling plan and offers a Motion.

Col. [Richard Henry] Lee for a different mode of expression in ye Motion and is severe on Dickenson

Mr. Jno. Rutledge against any Concession whatever, that Lord North has given Us his Ultimatum with which We cannot agree. Treats Dickinsons plan with the upmmost Contempt. and is so severe that [Samuel] Chase rises to explain himself.

Col. Lee up again

Mr. [Thomas] Stone of Maryland so disagreeable that one half of the Congress withdraw

Deane’s 1775 notes were published in Letters of Delegates to Congress, and they can easily be found online at From the Page and American Founding.

Meanwhile, the Congress’s official record of 24 May 1775 is:

Peyton Randolph, President, returned to Virginia where he was Speaker of the Assembly. John Hancock was unanimously chosen President.

Samuel Ward reported that the committee of the whole had made progress in the business of the state of America, but not having come to a conclusion, requested permission “to sit again.”

Adjourned till to Morrow at 9 o’Clock.

Deane’s notes show what was really behind that “progress.”

“Dependant upon the Imperial Crown of Great Britain”?

In 1775, John Adams and John Dickinson held the same basic position about the best course for the British Empire and its large North American colonies:

• There must be a new understanding of the relationship between those colonies and the central government in London.
• But those colonies need not become independent.

The problem was that the two men defined “independent” differently.

On 15 May, Silas Deane made these notes on the Continental Congress’s debate:

Mr. Jno Ruttlidge…insists it previously some that points must be settled, such as do We aim at independancy, or do we only ask for a Restoration of Rights & putting of Us on Our old footing. speaks long & well

Mr. Robt. R Livingston Succeeds him in the same way. short

Mr. Jno. Adams lengthy, and argumentative. independance on Parliamant is absolutely to be avowd. in the Americans, but a dependance on the Crown is what We own

Adams thus declared himself in favor of “independance” only from Parliament, not the entire British system (“the Crown”). How exactly that would work he didn’t say.

Two months later, in his letter to James Warren that fell into British hands, Adams went into more detail:

We ought to have had in our Hands a Month ago, the whole Legislative, Executive and Judicial of the whole Continent, and have compleatly moddelled a Constitution, to have raised a Naval Power and opened all our Ports wide, to have arrested every Friend to Government on the Continent and held them as Hostages for the poor Victims in Boston. And then opened the Door as wide as possible for Peace and Reconcilliation

Adams still didn’t use the term “independance.” He still held out the prospect of “Reconcilliation.”

To Dickinson, however, Adams’s wish list amounted to “a total Independence, & the Establishment of a Commonwealth.” The term “commonwealth” recalled the English protectorate of the mid-1600s, which Adams’s Puritan ancestors had applauded but most British subjects remembered with distrust.

Adams never saw the material that Dickinson sent to David Barclay in Britain in August 1775. In fact, hardly anyone in the history of the world saw those documents until they were just published in the William & Mary Quarterly. With his letter Dickinson included draft legislation he hoped would calm the crisis by resetting the imperial relationship to how it had been back before Parliament started raising tariffs in 1763.

But Dickinson prefaced part of that legal repeal with this language:

Whereas it is essential to the good Government & Prosperity of every Sosciety [sic] or State, that an undisputed Supreme superintending Power & Authority should exist within it; And whereas this Power & Authority hath always been vested in & exercised by Parliament; and whereas the respective local legislatures of distinct Colonies are in many Instances incompetent; be it therefore further enacted by the Authority aforesaid, that when any of the said Colonies shall by an Act of Assembly acknowledge & recognize & declare the said Colony to be dependant upon the Imperial Crown of Great Britain, and that the Kings most excellent Majesty by & with the Advice & Consent of the Lords Spiritual & temporal & Commons in Parliament assembled had hath & of Right ought to have full Power & Authority to make Statutes to bind the People of the said Colonies, where the general Wellfare of the Whole Empire shall require the Exercise of such a Supreme superintending Power & Authority, as especially to make Statutes for regulating the Trade & Navigation of the Whole Dominion of the Imperial Crown of Great Britain…

To Adams, Dickinson’s concession would have amounted to accepting dependence on Parliament.

Ironically, both men claimed that the disclosure of Adams’s letter was useful because it showed how far he wanted to go. Dickinson felt those words should make politicians in Britain realize that some Americans sought de facto independence. Adams felt the same words emboldened more Americans to adopt his position.

In fact, none of the documents I’ve been discussing—Adams’s intercepted letter, Dickinson’s two letters to Barclay and his draft legislation—made any difference in London. On 23 August, before those papers could cross the Atlantic, King George III issued a proclamation written by Lord Dartmouth that the North American colonies were in “open and avowed rebellion” and his forces should “use their utmost endeavours to withstand and suppress such rebellion.”

“The last Words which ever passed between Mr. Dickinson and me”?

The discovery of John Dickinson’s 28 Oct 1775 letter to David Barclay, quoted yesterday, lets us assess his thoughts on John Adams’s private criticism of him in an intercepted letter earlier that year.

As Jane E. Calvert writes in the July 2026 William & Mary Quarterly, it should also make us reassess Adams’s recollection of how he came to make that criticism. We know that other passages from Adams’s nineteenth-century memoir contradict contemporaneous sources, or at least aren’t supported by them.

According to Adams writing in 1805, the two men fell out during the Continental Congress’s debate over the Olive Branch Petition in the spring or early summer of 1775:

I was opposed to it, of course; and made an Opposition to it, in as long a Speech as I commonly made, not having ever been remarkable for very long Harrangues, in Answer to all the Arguments which had been urged. . . .

At this moment I was called out to the State house Yard, very much to my regret, to some one who had business with me. I took my hat and went out of the Door of Congress Hall: Mr. Dickinson observed me and darted out after me. He broke out upon me in a most abrupt and extraordinary manner. In as violent a passion as he was capable of feeling, and with an Air, Countenance and Gestures as rough and haughty as if I had been a School Boy and he the Master, he vociferated out, “What is the Reason Mr. Adams, that you New Englandmen oppose our Measures of Reconciliation…[?]”

I answered him very coolly. “Mr. Dickenson, there are many Things that I can very chearfully sacrifice to Harmony and even to Unanimity: but I am not to be threatened into an express Adoption or Approbation of Measures which my Judgment reprobates. Congress must judge, and if they pronounce against me, I must submit, as if they determine against You, You ought to acquiesce.”—These were the last Words which ever passed between Mr. Dickinson and me in private.

If Adams had made a firm, direct speech against the Olive Branch Petition, and Dickinson had gotten so upset about it, why would Dickinson be surprised to read Adams criticizing him weeks later? Why did Dickinson write that before the intercepted letter the Adams cousins had always “behav’d to Me…with the…greatest Marks of friendly Respect,” expressing “the most silken softness of public pretensions”?

Of course, a big part of the problem was Adams’s rude language, calling Dickinson a “piddling Genius” whose measures made the Congress appear “silly.” That went beyond a collegial disagreement over policy. Dickinson recognized the two men “differed in Sentiments” but thought they were still friendly and recognized they were all trying to solve the same problem.

Dickinson’s surprise might have been the result of John Adams’s own actions up to that point. He probably didn’t speak out as strongly as he remembered decades later. Calvert points out how Adams signed the Olive Branch Petition in July. Of course, that’s consistent with his later statement “Congress must judge, and if they pronounce against me, I must submit.” 

At the same time, I see indications that Dickinson and Adams were talking past each other on “independence” and what that really meant.

TOMORROW: Cross-purposes.

“So severely & so meanly attack’d from that Quarter”

On 28 Oct 1775, John Dickinson finished writing a long letter to a Quaker banker in Britain, David Barclay—one of the documents just published in the William & Mary Quarterly.

Dickinson had written most of that letter in late September, starting with his comments on what he had filed in his papers as “Letter from John Adams of Massachusetts Bay, in which he abuses Me, for opposing the Violent Measures of himself & others in Congress.”

Dickinson told Barclay:

The inclos’d Letters written by John Adams one of the Delegates from Massachusetts, were intercepted, as the Boat was passing an Arm of the Sea, and have been publish’d by General [Thomas] Gage. These are now in every Body’s Hands, and indisputably prove the high projects that are in Agitation. . . .

I did not expect that my Reputation would be so soon so severely & so meanly attack’d from that Quarter. My Compassion for the unhappy Province of Massachusetts Bay was so sincere & tender, that I truly regarded her Delegates as my Brothers; and they ever behav’d to Me, especially the two, that, I am now convinc’d, are my Enemies, with the [illegible] greatest Marks of friendly Respect.

That second Massachusetts delegate was almost certainly Samuel Adams.

Tho We differed in Sentiments, yet I suppos’d without the least Hesitation, that as We had embarqued our Lives & Fortunes in the same Bottom, We should feel a manly & liberal Indulgence for each others particular Opinions.

I have been mistaken; for under the most silken softness of public pretensions, lurk the bitterest Resentments, which can only spring from the Disappointment of selfish Designs.

This Assault so far from hurting my Character, has, if I can form any true Judgment, been of Advantage to Me. It convinces those, who before doubted—that tho I am resolved, as is testified by my public Conduct, at every Hazard to act for the Wellfare of my Country, yet I am not hurried away by the Torrent of Passions, that has swept so many at this Time from their sure Footing: but still retain the heartiest wishes for a Reunion with G[reat] B[ritain].

But another Effect of vastly more Consequence, will be deriv’d, from the Publication of those intercepted Letters. It will prove, that a total Independence, & the Establishment of a Commonwealth, are seriously thought of, and that hitherto they have been successfully oppos’d…

You will observe, no Doubt, how…the Writer of the intercepted Letters, & his party…abhorr any prospect of Accommodation, before they have got “the whole legislative, executive, and judicial of the whole Continent in their Hands, have completely modell’d a Constitution, have rais’d a naval Power, opended all Ports wide” &c that is, before they have established an independent Commonwealth.

Dickinson was repeating phrases directly from Adams’s letter, using it to show that his August warning that some Americans actually wanted independence had been well founded.

TOMORROW: Up until then…

“He passed without moving his Hat, or Head or Hand”

The part of the newly released documents from John Dickinson getting the most attention, including a news story in the New York Times, is his detailed proposal to reconcile the British government and the colonies at the Continental Congress before they reached a permanent breaking point.

But of course I’m drawn to the juicy interpersonal gossip. Dickinson wrote the second of those letters after John Adams’s nasty private comment about him had leaked. That letter reveals Dickinson’s feelings about that slight as well as his perspective on what led up to it.

The July 2026 issue of the William & Mary Quarterly contains an essay by Dr. Jane E. Calvert about this episode. She points out that historians have relied on Adams’s recounting of the event in his memoir, even while acknowledging those recollections can’t be confirmed and flatter Adams in consistent ways. (Calvert and Jonathan Gienapp’s article about the Dickinson documents offers an accessible précis of her essay.)

I wrote about Adams’s indiscreet remark back in 2014. In short, Adams gave the young lawyer Benjamin Hichborn two letters to carry home to Massachusetts. Hichborn let those papers fall into British hands. Gen. Thomas Gage had the texts published in Margaret Draper’s Boston News-Letter on 17 Aug 1775.

Adams’s 24 July letter to James Warren included these lines:

In Confidence,—I am determined to write freely to you this Time.—A certain great Fortune and piddling Genius whose Fame has been trumpeted so loudly, has given a silly Cast to our whole Doings…

Those lines made their way back to Philadelphia. No delegate to the Congress had more money and fame combined than Dickinson. (Benjamin Franklin was more famous but not as wealthy; a few men may have commanded bigger estates, but none had gained more respect as a political writer than Dickinson the “Farmer.”) So everyone knew who Adams was referring to.

On 16 September, Adams wrote in his diary:

Walking to the Statehouse this Morning, I met Mr. Dickinson, on Foot in Chesnut Street. We met, and passed near enough to touch Elbows. He passed without moving his Hat, or Head or Hand. I bowed and pulled off my Hat. He passed hautily by. The Cause of his Offence, is the Letter no doubt which Gage has printed in Drapers Paper.

That was a “cut direct.” It showed Dickinson was upset, but he was making that clear by not saying anything.

Forty years later, Adams insisted:

• He wrote his 24 July letter only after Dickinson had tried to browbeat him and other “New Englandmen” into not arguing against the Congress’s Olive Branch Petition, and
• He didn’t write that letter anyway. Or “not exactly.” The royal authorities had altered his words before publication.

Adams’s letter doesn’t survive, as far as anyone knows, so we can’t say for sure whether the newspaper text was edited. But we do know Adams expressed some similar sentiments in other private letters at the time. And he never specified which of the published words he hadn’t penned.

Thanks to the new documents, we now have John Dickinson’s view of the dispute, written in the year that it happened rather than decades later.

TOMORROW: The other side.

Dickinson Seeking “a happy & permanent Reconciliation”

The William & Mary Quarterly had a big Sestercentennial scoop in its July 2026 issue—so big that it made those newly discovered documents available online for a limited time ahead of publication. 

The documents are two long 1775 letters and an enclosure from Pennsylvania politician John Dickinson to David Barclay, a British merchant and banker (shown here).

In 1775 the Continental Congress assigned Dickinson the task of drafting the Olive Branch Petition. He also reworked Thomas Jefferson’s prose in the Declaration of the Causes and Necessity of Taking Up Arms. The first text sought a reconciliation with the Crown in traditional fashion, the second explained publicly why the young war was justified.

Together those texts show the balancing act Dickinson was trying to pull off. He believed in the American resistance to Parliament’s new measures, in which he had played a leading role, and he also believed in the danger of splitting completely from Britain.

Dickinson dated the first of the newly surfaced letters on 5 Aug 1775. It shared his (not always accurate) description of the war so far, emphasizing how the Crown was unlikely to prevail without both sides suffering great harm. Then came his draft bill for reworking the constitutional relationship between Britain and its colonies and calming people’s “Fears & Jealousies.”

Those two documents were written out by a secretary for Dickinson’s edits and signature. The second letter, finished 28 October, is in Dickinson’s own messy, reconsidered writing. By then, though he didn’t know it, George III and the government had dismissed the Olive Branch Petition without looking at it, declared all the colonies at the Congress to be in rebellion, and promised a forceful response. Dickinson’s proposal had arrived too late to do any good.

According to the New York Times, these letters remained in the Barclay family, coming into the hands of his great-great-great-great-great-nephew, Humphrey Barclay. In 2024 he showed them to book and manuscript specialist Donovan Rees, who realized their importance. Dickinson’s initiative isn’t mentioned in any other source—both he and Barclay were working backchannels, so they kept their correspondence quiet. Dickinson even put a postscript on the first letter asking Barclay not to print it or give anyone a copy.

On behalf of the Barclay family, Rees offered to sell the three documents to the U.S. Library of Congress, but it didn’t meet the asking price. (It’s unclear when that discussion took place, but the Library of Congress has been under dire pressure at times in the last couple of years. There’s an ongoing legal dispute over whether the President’s criminal-defense lawyer and current acting U.S. Attorney General is also the acting Librarian of Congress.)

The documents were then purchased by Harvard professor Eric Nelson, author of The Royalist Revolution: Monarchy and the American Founding among other books. Nelson generously makes manuscripts in his collection available to researchers.

Prof. Jonathan Gienapp of Stanford and Dr. Jane E. Calvert of the John Dickinson Writings Project prepared transcripts of the documents for analysis and publication. The William & Mary Quarterly organized a forum of scholars to discuss their implications in short essays appearing in that July issue.

For a good primer on these Dickinson letters, see Calvert and Gienapp’s article “The Secret Effort to Prevent the Revolution.”

TOMORROW: Hurt feelings.

“Praying for an Act of Assembly to hang the Memorialist”

At the end of August 1771, Richard Steele finished a very busy year.

Since the start of September 1770, the young man had been:

• convicted of theft, whipped, cropped, and branded twice
• locked up seven times, twice in irons
• escaped three times
• acquitted of theft twice

All those events were reported in Connecticut’s newspapers. And then we don’t hear about Steele’s activity for three years.

That said, on 15 October the Connecticut Courant in Hartford ran a long essay, filling most of a newspaper page and headed:

A MEMORIAL, praying for an Act of Assembly to hang the Memorialist.

To the Honorable the General Assembly of the Colony of Connecticut, to be conven’d at New-Haven, on the second Thursday of October, 1771.

The MEMORIAL of Richard Steele Burglarian, now confin’d in Fairfield Goal, in behalf of himself and the rest of the Housebreakers who now, or hereafter may, practice their calling and profession, within said colony

In this context the word “memorial” meant a memorandum, not a remembrance of the dead (yet).

The author was not Richard Steele but someone (ironically) stealing his persona to complain, for himself and fellow criminals, about the state of legal justice in the colony. The essay was dated September, and its writer was apparently unaware that in late August a court acquitted Steele of the charges that had landed him in the Fairfield jail. Not that such knowledge would have made the author happy.

The essay argued that under Connecticut’s legal system “the reformation of the punished—has…never been to any degree effected.” Yet “the confining of us to hard labour” was “utterly inconsistent with the privileges and liberties of Englishmen.”

That left only one course of action: “That your honors would order, decree and enact that the first offence be punished with death.”

It’s a weird use of sarcasm. I suspect that the real target was talk of establishing a prison to lock up convicted criminals for long terms. The essayist expressed hope

That the proposal for confining us to hard labour may (as we are confident it will) be treated with the contempt it deserves.

The Connecticut assembly didn’t approve converting the Simsbury copper mine into a prison until October 1773, but this looks like an attempt to quash that proposal early. It didn’t work.

Indeed, Richard Steele probably was the sort of criminal the New-Gate Prison was designed for. The traditional corporal punishments hadn’t deterred him, and by the end of 1770 he had no more ears to crop. Yet juries may have been reluctant to send the young man to the gallows for property crimes—hence the two acquittals in 1771.

An underground prison might have looked like the best way to keep Richard Steele off the streets.

COMING UP: Steele goes to New-Gate.

“Steel made a most vigorous Resistance”

The 7 May 1771 Connecticut Courant newspaper of Hartford repeated Sheriff Ezekiel Williams’s wanted notice for Richard Steele that I quoted yesterday.

Folks up in Hartford Country didn’t know that Steele was once again in jail.

Four days earlier, on 3 May, the Connecticut Journal of New Haven reported:

Last Monday [29 April], the notorious Burglar, Richard Steel, was taken up at Milford, and conveyed to Fairfield Goal, (charged with several Burglaries and Thefts, since his late Escape from Hartford Goal, the last of which was committed in Stratford) also one Evens, an occasional Landlord of Steel’s, and as whose House he was taken; Steel made a most vigorous Resistance, and wounded the Person in the Head, with a Cutlass who took him.

The same item was reprinted in the 18 May Providence Gazette with the landlord’s name spelled “Evans.”

As far as I can tell, this was the first time Steele was accused of a violent act, as opposed to stealing clothing, jewelry, or horses.

Steele had a record of breaking out of jails, but Fairfield County managed to hold onto him. On 30 July, the Connecticut Courant ran this item:

NEW-HAVEN, July 26.

A few Days ago a Letter from the notorious Richard Steel (now in Fairfield Goal, and who is to be tried for his Life for Burglary at the next Superior Court) directed to a Woman belonging to Milford, named Alling was intercepted, the Contents of which was to desire her to be out of the Way at the Time of his Tryal, she being the principal Witness against him;——but to prevent her escape she was last Evening committed to the Goal in this Town; not being able to procure Bail.

Steele thus stayed in custody until his case came up in August. Furthermore, Connecticut authorities had detained two possible accomplices or witnesses against him. Surely he wouldn’t get away with his crimes again!

On 27 August, the Connecticut Courant reported:

The notorious Richard Steel, so well known in this Town and County, and who was tried for his Life for Burglary last March Term, in this Place and acquitted, was again tried for his Life last Week at Fairfield for a like Offence, and again acquitted.

TOMORROW: The “Memorial of Richard Steele.”

“The notorious Burglarian, that called himself Richard Steel”

Yesterday we left young Richard Steele back in the custody of Hartford County law enforcement in February 1771.

According to the 27 August Connecticut Courant, Steele “was tried for his Life for Burglary last March Term, in this Place and acquitted.”

Acquitted! The man was already being labeled “notorious.” But the evidence must not have been strong enough this time.

Nonetheless, the Connecticut authorities detained Steele on the grounds that he hadn’t paid the costs of his last case. That kept him off the streets for a few weeks, but the 2 April Connecticut Courant reported:

A few Days since the noted Richard Steel was dismissed from Goal in this Place, where he had been confined for Costs on his last Trial for Burglary——and on Tuesday Night last Week [26 March] he broke open the House of Mr. —— Kibbe, of Enfield, and rob’d it of sundry Articles and a small Sum in Money; from thence he went to the Barn of Mr. Terry of Enfield, and stole a Horse, and made off; but he was pursued and taken the next Day at Weston, and on Saturday returned to his former Lodgings in this Place, where it is hoped he will be confined till he shall receive a full Reward for all his past Offences.

Those hopes were soon dashed, though. This advertisement appeared in the 23 April Connecticut Courant and ran in that newspaper through early May:

Hartford, April 16, 1771

BROKE out of the county Gaol in this town, last Night and escaped, the following persons viz.

The notorious Burglarian, that called himself Richard Steel, that has been twice crop’d and branded, and was at March Court, in Hartford, again tried for the third Offence, but found not guilty, pursuing his old Trade, was again taken up and closely confined in Irons, but has found Means to get them off.

His appearance is that of a likely young Man of about 21 year of Age, about middling for Height somewha [sic] slender, has a lively, keen, dark colour’d Eye and is finely pitted with the Small Pox, wears his Hair, pretty dark Colour’d, but not unlikely he may soon get a wig to cover his Ears; he is pretty quick and lively in speaking, and has a little different Manner from persons born among us.

After descriptions of two other escapees, the same ad listed:

Also a woman called Rosanna Blanchard, who had been convicted of harbouring and entertaining the above named Steel and punished, and was held for the Cost.

Whoever shall take up either of the first mentioned notorious Criminals, and secure them that they may be brought to Justice, shall have a Reward of Forty Shillings; Lawful Money, and all necessary Charges paid;…and for the woman, Ten Shillings.

Ezekiel Williams, Sheriff.

The same newspaper carried this notice:

Ten Dollars Reward.

STOLEN from the Subscriber, out of his Stable in Hartford, on the Evening of the 17th Inst. a dark brown, or black colour’d MARE, with white on her near hind Foot, had on her Breast, the Mark or Print of a Collar, about fourteen Hands High, five years old; said Mare is well shaped, very high Liv’d, and good Carriage, both Paces and Trots. ALSO a plain Russett SADDLE, with a Saddle Cloth, and Bridle.—

Said Mare, &c. is supposed to be Stolen by that notorious Burglarian, who calls himself by the Name of Richard Steel, he hath been twice Crop’d and Branded within 12 Months past. Said Steel, broke out of Hartford Goal but two Nights before said Mare was Stolen, is about 21 Years old, of a middling Stature, somewhat slender, of a genteel Shape and Appearance, hath lively Dark coloured Eyes, and is very finely pitted with the Small Pox, Dark coloured Hair, European Born.

Whoever shall Apprehend and Secure said Thief, so that he may be brought to Justice, or shall secure said Mare, Saddle and Bridle, so that the Owner may have them again, shall have a Reward of TEN DOLLARS, Paid by me,
WILLIAM HOOKER.

Hartford, April 20th, 1771.

The description of Steele as “European Born” and the statement that “has a little different Manner from persons born among us” suggests that he had grown up somewhere in the British Isles.

By this time Steele was so infamous that people were assuming he was responsible for thefts simply because he was in the vicinity. Those accusations may well have been accurate, but the authorities would need better evidence if they wanted to convict him.

TOMORROW: A summer in jail.

“When at liberty very sociable and familiar”

Yesterday’s posting left Richard Steele in New Haven, Connecticut, in December 1770, being branded and cropped on his ear the second time in a few months.

(I presume his right ear was cropped first, then his left, but the newspaper accounts don’t specify that.)

You might think that punishment would have taught Steele the error of his ways, or at least made it harder for him to keep committing crimes.

But no, Steele managed to get in one more theft before the end of the year, according to the Connecticut Journal of 4 Jan 1771:

----Stop the Felons!----

A Goldsmith’s Shop, belonging to the Subscriber in Waterbury, was broken up, on the Night of the 27th Instant, and sundry Pair of Stone Ear Rings, one Pair Stone Buttons, one Pair Gold ditto, and one Gold Ring, with some Shillings in Coppers, and some other Money, and likely some other Articles of Goldsmith’s Ware, was taken away, supposed by one Richard Steele, (and his Partner unknown) who was lately punished for breaking open Mr. Marks’s House in Derby.

Said Steele is of middling Stature, about 21 Years of Age, has dark brown Hair, not much curl’d, black Eyes, and beautiful Complection, but much Pockbroken, both Ears crop’d, branded twice in the Forehead, wears a brownish Coat, check’d woollen Shirt, old leather Breeches, and Hat slop’d.

Whoever will take up said Steele, or his Accomplice, and secure him or them, and notify me, shall have Three Dollars Reward, and necessary Charges paid, by
JOSEPH HOPKINS.
Dec. 31, 1770.

The 8 January Connecticut Courant, published in Steele’s usual haunt of Hartford, summarized the news about him for local readers.

Then on 5 February the Connecticut Courant had good news:

The Thief is Caught!

And was last thursday bro’t to this town and again committed to goal. He is perhaps the most notorious one that ever infested this colony, was last September before the hon. Superior Court, held in this place, convicted of Burglary by the name of Richard Steele, and in consequence thereof crop’d and branded, not long after which he broke goal, and escaped but pursuing his trade, was again taken for Burglary committed in Derby, and indicted at New-Haven before the adjourn’d Superior Court in December last, for the second offence, and again crop’d and branded, and very soon after escaped from that goal, and has since (perhaps) committed more Burglary’s than ever the notorious [Isaac] Frasier who was hanged at Fairfield ever did in so short a time.

He is now put in irons in very close confinement but least he should again escape, would that the world might know him, observe that he is a young man of about 20 years old, rather of a slender make, and about or little more than middling for stature, his facce [sic] finely pitted with the small pox, has a keen black eye, wears his own hair, of a very dark colour, pretty well down on his forehead in order no doubt to hide his scars, is a very lively active man and I believe when at liberty very sociable and familiar.

He had on him now when taken a light coloured surtout, of a cloth call’d bearskin or coating, most probably stolen from Mr. Ingersol of Westfield; a strait bodyed coat, stolen from Dr. Hooker of this town, trim’d with silver buttons, one each of which was wrote at large Sept. 2d, Daniel Hooker 1764; also 2 summer jackets stolen out of Mr. Mattock’s shop a barber in this place from whom also it is supposed, he took at the same time 2 wiggs, not yet found; had also with him, two silver watches; one of which stolen from Mr. Jonah Gillot of Wintonbury, the other with a China face, seems to answer the description of one advertized to be stolen from somebody in Stratford; also 5 pair silver shoe buckles; 2 gold necklaces; 2 pair stone jewels set in gold; 2 small Rings with 3 stones set in each; 3 watch seals set in silver; one pair gold sleeve buttons; one chain ditto, marked within side B W; one worsted purse with a mill’d dollar, marked G R and sundry other pieces of silver money; 4 very good black Barcelona handkerchiefs, with a paper pin’d on one of them marked 9s; a hatt crape; one brass inker with penknife and case, marked D, a scale for a womans finger; a bodkin, and a small gimblet; said to be owned by Jonathan Burney of Union, where he has disposed of a considerable quantity of valuable goods—

The foregoing articles are now lodged with the Sheriff of this County, and may be seen by any claimers this week at the Court House in Hartford, and any time afterwards before the setting of the superior court, in March next at his own house in Weathersfield.

If the Printers should generally insert the foregoing in their papers, it might perhaps be of public service.

This was, by my count, the fourth time Sheriff Ezekiel Williams had Steele in his custody.

And it looks like this time Steele stayed in jail for nearly two months.

TOMORROW: A busy April.

“Punished at Hartford, for Burglary, by the Name of Richard Steele”

On 17 Sept 1770, the Connecticut Courant of Hartford reported on recent cases from “the Superior Court of Assize and General Goal Delivery.”

After trials on bestiality (acquitted) and rape (acquitted), the newspaper told readers:

Also, Richard Steele and John Galloway, both transient Persons, were convicted of Burglary, and sentenced to be whip’d 15 Stripes each, and to be crop’d and branded with the Letter B on their Forehead, which Punishments they accordingly received on Friday last.

That corporal punishment took place on 14 September. Then the felons were set free.

Several weeks later, the Connecticut Courant for 6 November advertised Steele, Galloway, and Charles Livingston as wanted men. They had evidently been arrested again and escaped because the paper said:

The two first are shrewdly suspected to be the same that on the next evening, broke open a shoe makers shop, in said Hartford, and stole a greatcoat suit of cloaths, and two pair of shoes, and also last night Mr. [Peter] Verstille’s shop at Weathersfield, carried off considerable money, and sundry goods, were poorly clad when they went away, but probably by this time are well cloathed.

Whoever shall take up either of the two first mentioned persons, and convey the said Galloway to New-Haven Goal or to this, and the said Steel to this, shall have 20s. lawful money reward for each, and, for the said Livingston, a reward of 10s.

per Ezekiel Williams, Sheriff.

N.B. The Thief stole from Mr. Verstille two dollars, the one a Cobb, the other a Mill’d Dollar, which were both counterfeit, & about a Doz. black Barcelona handkerchiefs, several pieces of ribbon, &c.

That advertisement included a physical description of Steele, but unfortunately the page is ripped in the newspaper database I use, so I can’t offer a word picture of him yet.

On 4 December, the Connecticut Courant offered some good news, datelined New Haven on 30 November:

Last Tuesday was committed to the Goal in this Town, a Person Charged with breaking open and robbing the Shop of Mr. Marks of Derby: he says his Name is Richard James, but by the Mark on his Forehead, and some other Circumstances, it appears he is the Person who was lately punished at Hartford, for Burglary, by the Name of Richard Steele.

The authorities in New Haven sent the man back to Sheriff Williams in Hartford County. (The sheriff’s house in Wethersfield appears above, courtesy of Daniel Sterner’s Historic Buildings of Connecticut.)

On 24 December, the Boston Evening-Post ran this item from New London, dated 14 December:

Last Monday, one Richard Steele, was punished at Hartford, for the second offence of Burglary, by being whipt & branded, and having his left Ear cropt. He has since escaped from goal, but was yesterday taken and re-committed.

Thus, in the course of four months Richard Steele had been accused of burglary in Hartford, Wethersfield, and Derby; had been whipped, branded, and cropped on his ears twice; and had escaped jail twice—but was once again back in custody.

TOMORROW: On into 1771!