“Such a prudent and proper Use of this Letter”

On 29 Feb 1768, as I described yesterday, the passengers on the Abigail finally made it to solid ground in Boston after a terrible fourteen-week voyage from London.

Among those passengers was a new Customs officer named Thomas Irving, who carried a letter of introduction to Gov. Francis Bernard. The economic historian John McCusker reports that letter was dated 23 Oct 1767 and marked as received on Sunday, 30 Jan 1768, which gives us a benchmark for other letters that may have traveled on the Abigail.

On Monday, 1 February, in the Representatives’ chamber:

The Speaker [Thomas Cushing] communicated a Letter from Dennys DeBerdt, Esq; which was read and communicated for Consideration to Mr. Speaker, Capt. [Edward] Sheaffe, and Brigadier [Timothy] Ruggles.

The Colonial Society of Massachusetts published a set of DeBerdt’s letters in 1911. One of those was dated 21 Oct 1767, shortly before the Abigail set sail, and addressed to Whig legislator Edward Sheaffe of Charlestown, appointed to the committee to reply. It’s possible that Cushing brought forward another letter that hasn’t survived, but this appears to be the most likely candidate.

In that letter DeBerdt pressed to be appointed as the official lobbyist for the whole Massachusetts provincial government, not just the House. He added, probably as a sign of his access, “I shall have a Conference with the Secretary of State in a few days…“

That likely reminded legislators of DeBerdt’s last letter to Cushing, dated 19 Sept 1767, in which he wrote about the Earl of Shelburne being sympathetic to the colonies and added:

He had also wrote to every Governour on the continent to behave with temper & moderation to the severl. Provinces over which they preside, & he had wrote to your Governour in particular to persue healing measures & was so condesending to offer shewing me Copy of his letter the next time I waited on Him

The Massachusetts Whigs had been so pleased with that assurance that London wanted their governor to act more moderate that they had the letter published in the 10 November Boston Gazette.

On Wednesday, 3 Feb 1768, the legislators were treated to a different message from London:

Mr. Secretary [Andrew Oliver, shown above], by Order of the Governor, came down and Read in the House a Letter from the Right Honorable the Earl of Shelburne to his Excellency [the governor], and then withdrew.

Bernard had just received a copy of Secretary of State Shelburne’s letter dated 17 September, forwarded from New York. (The signed original didn’t arrive until April, amazingly late.) This was the dispatch that DeBerdt had suggested would show Shelburne advising more “healing measures.”

Instead, that letter offered Bernard solid support for all the steps he had taken. Shelburne began, “I have the Pleasure to signify to you His Majesty’s Approbation of your Conduct, and to acquaint you that he is graciously pleased to approve of your having exerted the Power…” He went on to say:

I am to inform you, Sir, that it is His Majesty’s determined Resolution to extend to you His Countenance and Protection in every Constitutional Measure that shall be found necessary for the Support of His Government in the Massachusets Bay.

No doubt pleased, Bernard replied:

I shall make such a prudent and proper Use of this Letter, as I hope it will restore the Peace and Tranquility of this Province, for which Purpose considerable Steps have already been made by the House of Representatives.

The “prudent and proper Use of this Letter” that Bernard planned was to have Secretary Oliver read it to the House, pushing lawmakers to recognize the reality that he had the royal government behind him.

That didn’t work. Instead, the very next day the House decided to repudiate its earlier vote not to send a circular letter to the other colonial legislatures. Whatever “considerable Steps” toward “Peace and Tranquility” Bernard perceived on 2 February were gone two days later. The House decided to communicate with other colonial governments, even if that did breach protocol.

Furthermore, Massachusetts legislators focused on one phrase from Shelburne: “from your several Letters.” For the rest of the session, House leaders periodically asked Bernard for “a Copy of the Letter from the Right Honorable the Earl of Shelburn, lately read to the House by Order of his Excellency, and his own several Letters to which it refers.” The governor gave Cushing a copy of Shelburne’s letter but stonewalled on sharing his own, which is what the Whigs really wanted.

As discussed back here, Massachusetts politicians were convinced Bernard was writing bad things about them to London. All the more reason to form a united front with other colonial legislatures!

And all that time, nobody in Boston knew that the Earl of Shelburne’s opinions no longer mattered. There had been a shakeup in the British government. The Earl of Hillsborough had assumed responsibility for the North American colonies, and he was stricter than his predecessor.

TOMORROW: What was so important about the February 1768 circular letter.

What Prompted Reconsideration of the Circular Letter?

As I described here, on 21 Jan 1768 a legislative committee steered by James Otis, Jr., and Samuel Adams proposed that the Massachusetts House send a circular letter to the other colonial legislatures.

And the House voted that down.

But then on 4 February, the legislators voted to reconsider. And a week later, on 11 February, they approved the text of a letter that quickly went out to the other capitals.

What changed representatives’ minds before 4 February? I have a theory.

The Massachusetts House records tell us that two letters from London were presented to the chamber at the beginning of that month. On 1 February, speaker of the house Thomas Cushing shared a dispatch from Dennis DeBerdt, the body’s new lobbyist. And on the 3rd, province secretary Andrew Oliver read aloud a letter that the Earl of Shelburne, Secretary of State, had written to Gov. Francis Bernard.

The newspapers and Boston town records report that the brigantine Abigail, captained by James Harding Stevens, arrived late that January. That was the only ship that those sources reported had come from London since the start of the year, and possibly the only one since November.

(I must acknowledge that the 1 February Boston Chronicle also reported that two ships had arrived from Plymouth, England: the brigantine Commerce under Edward Sears and the schooner Nancy under John Choate. But I think those were less likely to have carried important mail from London politicians. In addition, some mail went to New York on the regular packet to that city and was then shipped up the coast. But the timing of the letters in question points strongly to the Abigail.)

Capt. Stevens and the Abigail carried, among other things:

• an honorary diploma from the University of Edinburgh for the Rev. Samuel Cooper, according to the 8 February Boston Evening-Post.
• “two beautiful Brass Field Pieces” for the Boston militia’s train of artillery. [In 1774, those two cannon were stolen from an armory under redcoat guard and eventually smuggled out to Concord. They survive today at local national parks as the “Hancock” and the “Adams.” Read all about them in The Road to Concord.]
• Lt. William Haswell, retired from the Royal Navy, and his daughter, who would grow up to become the actress and novelist Susanna Rowson.
• Thomas Irving (called “Robert Irvine” in the newspapers), Inspector of Imports and Exports for North America, a Customs officer.
• three sea captains and three other mariners who worked out of Boston or the Piscataqua harbor.
• various craftspeople, including a saddler, a joiner, a farmer, and a spinster. The 4 February Boston News-Letter said the passengers included “a number of weavers, wool-combers, cloathiers, and other manufacturers and mechanics,” but those don’t appear on the town’s official list of arrivals.

Usually a trip across the Atlantic took six weeks. The 22 Oct 1767 Boston News-Letter made special note when Capt. James Bruce “had but 4 Weeks Passage” from London. Capt. Stevens was not so lucky.

The Abigail left London in late October 1767, according to Boston newspapers of 1 Feb 1768. As of 9 November, it was still within sight of “the Downs” in southeastern England. The Boston Chronicle reported that Stevens “met with contrary winds the whole passage, and with such severe cold weather on this coast, that several of his ship’s company were frost-bitten.” The Boston Post-Boy added: “the Ship’s Company were at a short Allowance [of food] for 5 Weeks before their Arrival, being 36 Persons in Number Passengers Included.”

The Abigail entered Boston harbor on the night of 28 Jan 1768 during a snowstorm. And it wasn’t safe yet. As the Post-Boy reported, “by the Violence of the Wind, and the Weather being extreme cold, the Vessel drove ashore on Lovel’s Island.” The ship had to be partially unloaded before it could be floated again.

On that luckless brigantine, I hypothesize, came the two letters from London that were brought into the Representatives’ Chamber of the Town House early the following week.

TOMORROW: Looking at the letters.