tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28102666.post259808864111428824..comments2024-03-14T13:25:20.613-05:00Comments on Boston 1775: “Inn-keeping was a favorite occupation”Unknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger3125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28102666.post-77109013785806701112012-09-14T14:48:43.137-05:002012-09-14T14:48:43.137-05:00I was just reading a Nathaniel Ames almanac when I...I was just reading a Nathaniel Ames almanac when I saw your latest posting about the Suffolk County Convention. The high-minded nature of the essays and commentary contained in revolutionary-era almanacs always amaze – a full-court press of reason and humor encouraging wisdom, restraint and leaning toward expressing elevated virtues. <br /><br />Take for example Nathanial Ames almanac for 1767 – post Stamp Act crisis, there was a perception that the repeal of the Stamp Act would serve as a ‘North American Magna Carta’ – Nathanial Ames (Jr.) gives a sense of delight at the outcome of the recent struggle and urges attention and a shift towards the work of peace. <br /><br />He begins by presenting thanks and kudos “to the first exciters” and then goes on to suggest study and reflection on issues of more importance than “idle tattle of the town.” Good stuff!<br /><br /> “to the first exciters of which we are so superlatively indebted on so many accounts, as would far exceed the limits of my page to express. I only hope that you will always show your sense of the obligation by rewarding them and their posterity, so long as they shall hold their integrity, with all the most important posts of honour and profit that you are capable of bestowing ; and that whenever a Virginian shall visit this part of the Land of Freedom, you will be no niggard of Hospitality.<br /><br />Having these matters so far settled according to our wishes, let us turn our thoughts on the arts of peace. Oh ! ye husbandmen, too happy would ye be, did ye know your own advantages ; did ye turn your minds to the cultivation of ingenious arts, that soften the manners and prevent our being brutish ; did ye neglect the vain amusements and idle tattle of the town, and rather strive to know the life and manners of young prince Heraclius of Georgia, than whether neighbour Such-a-one married a month too late to be honest. What fine opportunities have ye to improve yourselves by study above tradesmen and mechanicks, whilst your fruits and herbage are growing ? At the intervals of cultivating your fields, ye might be enriching your minds with useful knowledge by perusing the Roman history ye might learn how gradually a rough and ignorant people, by cultivating the study and practice of useful arts and manufactures, did emerge from obscurity to a state of grandeur and affluence inconceivable ; so great that their relicks are at this day the wonder of the world how at last they became indolent and luxurious, and therefore vitious and ignorant, which made them a prey to tyranny ; and tyranny always ends in the extinction of a nation, as is evident to those that take notice of what passes in the great world, that is, read history. Ignorance among the common people is the very basis and foundation of tyranny and oppression.”Byron DeLearnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28102666.post-89432949537277263312012-09-14T14:39:04.458-05:002012-09-14T14:39:04.458-05:00No, these families aren’t really part of my focus;...No, these families aren’t really part of my focus; I just picked up these tidbits about them while looking for something else. And I shy from the task of examining legal records unless it's absolutely necessary—so many technicalities to learn and keep straight!<br /><br />Richard Woodward’s son Richard appears to have been the artillery lieutenant in the Battle of Bunker Hill who was later kicked out of the regiment for badmouthing his captain—who himself didn’t reenlist in 1776 after his uncle had lost command of the regiment.J. L. Bellhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15405157000473731801noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28102666.post-30625060559037097002012-09-14T14:13:35.467-05:002012-09-14T14:13:35.467-05:00Have you considered looking at quartersessions cou...Have you considered looking at quartersessions court records to see if you could find more information on the Ames family and Woodward? Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com