Rag Linen | Online Museum of Historic Newspapers

“Always brutal and everywhere fierce, King Philip’s War, as it came to be called, proved to be not only the most fatal war in all of American history but also one of the most merciless,” Jill Lepore wrote in her award-winning book The Name of War: King Philip’s War and the Origins of American Identity (1998).

The back cover summary of Lepore’s book reads: “In 1675 Algonquian Indians all over southern New England rose up against the Puritan colonists with whom they had lived peacefully for several decades. The result was the bloodiest war in American history, a terrifying conflict in which the Puritans found themselves fighting with a cruelty they had thought only the natives capable of.  By August 1676, when the severed head of the Wampanoag leader, King Philip, was displayed in Plymouth, thousands of Indians and English men, women, and children were dead. More than half of the new towns in New England had been wiped out, and the settlers’ sense of themselves as civilized people of God had been deeply shaken.”

One of the earliest printed accounts of King Philip’s War (that Lepore cited in several instances and even pictured in her book) appeared in the August 16 to 19, 1675 issue of the London Gazette.

As the lead report, spanning two-thirds of the London Gazette’s front page (the first time the Gazette had dedicated so much space to the American colonies, which alone underscored the severity and importance of the news), is a letter from Benjamin Batten, the son of Sir William Batten.

Benjamin Batten “happened to be in Boston when that fateful Indian uprising began, and my attention was drawn to him by a letter he wrote to Sir Thomas Allin, Comptroller of the Navy, relating in considerable detail the daily news of the trouble in Plymouth Colony down to the sixth of July, 1675.” (Benjamin Batten and the London Gazette by Douglas Leach, printed in the New England Quarterly 1963.)

The carnage is not diluted for the London Gazette readers:

• “In their journey they had seen lying the bodies of several English without heads, who had been murthered by the Indians…”
• “We had advice, that 16 English were killed in skirmishing and 7 Indians…”
• “And that 14 houses belonging to the English near Swansey, had been burnt…”
• “An Indian Spy had been executed at Plymouth…”
• “Having only seen ten Indians together, of whom they killed four; they found 6 English heads, and twice as many hands, being of those the Indians had murthered…”

Below is the famed issue of the London Gazette containing Batten’s letter about the first days of King Philip’s War. Click to enlarge.

On September 25, 1690, the first issue of Publick Occurrences Both Forreign and Domestick hit the streets of Boston.  With that issue, Benjamin Harris published the first attempt at an American newspaper.

Harris intended for his newspaper to be printed monthly. It contained four pages — three with printed news and a blank one for readers to jot down personal reports before passing it along to family or friends. However, the first issue was printed without license and featured several eye-brow-raising reports, such as the King of France’s alleged affair with his daughter-in-law. The newspaper was immediately banned and all issues burned under the order of Governor Thomas Hinckley. No second edition was ever printed. In fact, the only original copy known to survive is held by the British Library, likely the issue sent back to the homeland by the Governor Hinckley. The issue’s three pages of printed news are shown above — click to enlarge.

With this one-issue-only asterisk next to its title in the history of journalism, Publick Occurrences is debated as the first American newspaper. Many historians give the title of first American newspaper or at least first successful American newspaper to the Boston News-Letter, which began publishing in 1704, almost 14 years after Benjamin Harris’s attempt. Check out the previous post to see a 1716 sample of the Boston News-Letter, when it was still the only newspaper being published in the colonies.

As a short digression, the reason for the 14-year gap partially falls on journalism trends and American reader interests during this time.  Copies of the popular London Gazette, which began publishing in 1665, were shipped across the Atlantic Ocean – usually taking four to eight weeks per voyage – to provide English and European residents in the New World with reports from their homelands. An intense hunger for news  from the motherland, satisfied by the thriving transatlantic readership of the London Gazette is, in part, the reason why we didn’t see the first successful newspaper printed on American soil until 1704.

Back to Benjamin Harris, whose career in publishing began in England during the 1670s. When strict press censorship under the Licensing of the Press Act of 1662 temporarily lapsed from 1679 to 1685, Benjamin Harris was quick to begin printing news. On July 7, 1679, Harris launched the twice-weekly Domestick Intelligence newspaper that, as the title suggested, focused on local topics. Below are two photos from the October 31, 1679 issue of Harris’s Domestick Intelligence. Not long after the revival of the act, in 1686, Harris moved to Boston to avoid severe punishment for his politically- and religiously-charged reporting. According to The Public Prints (Clark, 1994):

“The timing could not hardly have been accidental. For violating the revived act, in fact, he had been pilloried and imprisoned just before coming to Boston in 1686. Prior to that, as an associate of Titus Oates, the vehement anti-Catholic publicist, and opponent of the accession of James, he had been prosecuted under common-law seditious libel proceedings during the earlier hiatus in the act. In Boston, he set up shop as a publisher, opened the London Coffee House, and engaged the printers of the town to print books and an almanac.”

The London Coffee House was a public place for people to read foreign newspapers (i.e., London Gazette) and books.  After Harris’s unsuccessful attempt at publishing an American newspaper in 1690, he continued to run the coffeehouse until 1695 when he packed his bags and moved back to London.  According to Clark:

“Boston printers, however, continued to produce broadsides, presumably with governmental sanction, that occasionally reported public events by printing excerpts from the London newspapers. In addition, the postmaster of Boston, a Scottish bookseller named Duncan Campbell, began exchanging news of Europe and the colonies with correspondents elsewhere in America. Thus the familiar devise of the hand-written newsletter took its place in the American communications chain in the 1690s.”

Duncan Campbell’s son John succeeded him as postmaster in 1702 and soon transitioned the handwritten newsletters into the printed and appropriately titled Boston News-Letter, the first successful newspaper in the colonies.

For more history on the first newspapers, check out our Beginning of Newspapers collection.

Samuel Shute was commissioned governor of the Provinces of Massachusetts Bay and New Hampshire by King George I on June 15, 1716.

Late in the evening of Thursday, October 4, 1716, Samuel Shute arrived in Boston on board the Lusitania. Being so late in the day, the new governor delayed his official landing until Friday morning.  The welcoming celebration began about 9 a.m. and continued until early afternoon — between 1 and 2 p.m. — when “his Excellency was Publickly Entertained at Dinner, in Company with His Majesty’s Council, with the Speaker and many of the house of Representatives, and a great Number of other Gentlemen, Officers, etc. The Joy and Satisfaction of His Majesty’s good People of this Country was so much the greater upon this Occasion, because of some fears we had been under.”

The first and only newspaper announcement of Governor Shute’s celebrated arrival in Boston appeared in the October 1 to 8, 1716 edition of the Boston News-Letter (see full report below). It’s also the only newspaper announcement of Shute’s arrival because, at this time, the Boston News-Letter is still the first and only newspaper being printed in the American colonies.

As background, in 1690, Benjamin Harris published the first attempt at an American newspaper, Publick Occurrences Both Foreign and Domestick. However, the controversial first issue was printed without license and with spicy content, so it was immediately banned and all issues burned by the then Royal Governor Thomas Hinckley. In fact, as I point out in Rag Linen’s Beginning of Newspapers collection, the only original copy of Harris’s paper known to survive is held by the British Library, likely the one issue sent back to the homeland by Governor Hinckley.

Fourteen years after Harris’s attempt, on April 24, 1704, John Campbell (editor and postmaster) joined forces with Bartholomew Green (printer) to publish the Boston News-Letter, the first successful American newspaper.  Despite pre-1720 circulations that rarely, if ever, exceeded 300, the News-Letter remained the only American newspaper until December 1719 when the Boston Gazette and American Weekly Mercury (Philadelphia) both began publishing.

The pictures below are from the Boston News-Letter issue dated October 1 to October 8, 1716, and includes the above-mentioned back-page report on the arrival of Samuel Shute, the new Royal Governor of Massachusetts Bay and New Hampshire in New England.

Among the reports in issue numb. 12 of the Oxford Gazette is this one:

“Edinburgh, Dec. 15. Yesterday four young Fellows were whipt by the common Hang-man through the City, their Ears burn’d, and they afterward delivered to be Transported to the Barbado’s, for abusing one Mr. James Scot, Minister at Ancran, in Sermon time. Six Heads were set upon Gallows betwixt Leith and Edenburgh, for a Murther committed on the Laird of Murlle and his Brother, both young Men of great Estate, led on by Alester Mackull, one of the Lairds own Vassals : The Offenders being required by the Privy Counsel to come over and make answer to their Accusation, slighted the charge, and gave no obedience; whereupon, the Councel ordered a Glan that lived by them to take Arms, and to bring over their Heads, which accordingly was performed. This Alester and his Comrades, killed and wounded near 80 Men before they were taken.”

This report was featured on page 1 of Miscellaneous Anecdotes Illustrative of the Manners and History of Europe During the Reigns of Charles II, James II, William III and Queen Anne, by James Peller Malcolm, published in 1811. Under the subtitle “Antient Scots Customs” appeared this entry:

“A very dreadful circumstance occurred in 1665, which affords a striking picture of the peculiar manners of the Clans at that period. Alester Mackull, one of the vassals of the Laird of Murlle, having received some offence or injury from the above chief, conspired with others, and murdered the Laird and his brother. The Privy Council commanded the offenders to surrender themselves to take their trial, without effect; upon which an order was issued to a clan residing in their neighbourhood, requiring them to bring in the heads of Mackull and his associates. This they accomplished, but with the loss of near eighty persons killed and wounded; when the heads were exposed on the gallows between Leith and Edinburgh. Four young men were whipped through the streets of the latter city by the common hangman about the same time, and afterwards transported to Barbadoes, for interrupting and abusing Mr. James Scot, Minister of Ancram, when preaching.”

Below is the actual report, along with news of the Plague that followed, as printed in the December 21 to 25, 1665 edition of the Oxford Gazette.

The history of events relating to European witch hunting can be traced back to the Medieval Inquisition and the Knights Templar. Yes, long before the Salem witch trials of colonial Massachusetts, witchcraft — and by consequence witch trials and witch burning — had spread across Europe (remember, the American colonists brought over both good and bad).

One of the most concentrated periods of witch hunting occurred in Scotland during the 17th century. According to The Journal of British Studies by Brian Levack:

“During 1661 and 1662 Scotland experienced one of the largest witch hunts in its history. Within the space of sixteen months no fewer than 660 persons were publicly accused of various acts of sorcery and disabolism… We do not know how many people were executed during the hunt, but the report of John Ray, the English naturalist, that 120 were believed to have been burned during his visit to Scotland suggests that the total number was substantial… At no other time in Scottish history, with the possible exception of 1597, were so many people accused of witchcraft within such a brief period of time.”

As evidence of the Great Scottish Witch Hunt of 1661-1662, and the burnings, the May 16 to 23, 1661 issue of Mercurius Publicus reported:

“There were several Witches Men and Women burnt at Edinburgh the last week, and some of them, when they came to dye [sic], said Argyle was a Witch, and did often appear in the likeness of a Fox.”

I am not certain about the reference to “Argyle” in this issue of Mercurius Publicus and welcome any comments with explanation below. I can’t help but wonder if the reference was to Archibald Campbell, Marquess of Argyll, who was beheaded for high treason four days after this newsbook was published, on May 27, 1661.

Below are images from the May 16 to 23, 1661 Mercurius Publicus, which was co-edited by English journalism legends Henry Muddiman and John Berkenhead: