Joseph Reed’s Second Source

As I discussed yesterday, Joseph Reed (or someone close to him) adapted a 4 Jan 1776 letter from Gen. George Washington into part of an article that appeared in John Dunlap’s Pennsylvania Packet on 15 Jan 1776.

That article started by announcing its sources: “authentic advices from the Camp at Cambridge, of the 3d and 4th instant”—i.e., letters sent on 3 and 4 January. That meant it was based on at least one other source.

The second major source was Stephen Moylan’s letter to Reed dated 2–3 January, particularly the later pages penned on the 3rd. That document has been digitized by the New-York Historical Society.

Reed knew Moylan in Philadelphia before the war. The two men worked together in Cambridge as Washington’s military secretary and muster-master general. When Reed went home to his wife, he passed off a lot of his tasks to Moylan. So it was natural for those two men to correspond.

The Pennsylvania Packet article contained many items of intelligence, in addition to the general’s anecdote about the new flag. Here are those topics, and in whose letter that information appeared:

• Boston’s harbor was open. (Moylan)
• A British warship was outside Salem, Beverly, and Marblehead harbor. (Moylan)
• 500 British soldiers arrived from Ireland, later identified as from the 55th and 17th. (Moylan, Washington)
• Two British regiments had been sent to Halifax. (Moylan, Washington)
• Two more regiments were moving up the St. Lawrence River to Québec. (Moylan)
• Admiral Molyneux Shuldam arrived in Boston. (Washington)
• H.M.S. Scarborough and Fowey would lead nine transport ships and other vessels south; they were said to be headed to Newport, but more likely were going to Long Island or Virginia. (Washington, Moylan slightly different)
• British ships were taking on drinking water and biscuits. (Washington, Moylan slightly different)
• The British army had no intention of attacking the Continental siege lines. (Moylan)
• The redcoats were grumbling, so they were told that Gen. John Burgoyne had headed home to Britain to help settle the whole colonial dispute. (Moylan)
• Four ships had sailed from Hispaniola with arms and ammunition. (Moylan)
• The Continental “army were all in barracks, in good health and spirits.”
• Five thousand militiamen were filling in for soldiers who had gone home when their enlistments ran out. (Washington)
• The “whole army [was] impatient for an opportunity of action.”

Thus, almost every piece of information in the article came from one or both of those letters. The few exceptions were details of the anecdote about the flag, as listed yesterday, and positive descriptions of Continental soldiers being “all in barracks, in good health and spirits,” and “impatient for an opportunity of action.”

In fact, Gen. Washington had written gloomily about how few troops he had left after the end of 1775 and what he could now expect:

for more than two Months past I have scarcely immerged from one difficulty before I have plunged into another—how it will end God in his great goodness will direct, I am thankful for his protection to this time. We are told that we shall soon get the Army compleated, but I have been told so many things which have never come to pass, that I distrust every thing.

But of course Reed would never have those thoughts printed in a Patriot newspaper. In fact, sections like that are probably why he edited the general’s letter for public consumption.

Likewise, Moylan wrote a lot about how George III’s uncompromising speech to Parliament should impel the Continental Congress into seeking help from foreign powers like Spain—a big step toward independence which top politicians were not yet ready to go public with. His 2–3 January letter is becoming famous for containing the earliest appearance of the phrase “the United States of America,” months before the Congress adopted that moniker.

In the quest to find out more about the flag on Prospect Hill, however, Moylan’s letter is a dead end. He wrote nothing about the banner, and therefore didn’t provide the details that appeared in the Pennsylvania Packet without first appearing in Washington’s letter. Did Reed draw on another source?

TOMORROW: My theory that belongs to me.