To help disseminate the news, the first printed versions of the Declaration were read aloud to gathered crowds, instantly and exponentially expanding their reach. They also acted as copy for printers throughout the colonies, who immediately started creating their own broadsides and reprinting the text of the Declaration in newspapers. The important ways in which printed and oral dissemination of the Declaration were intertwined in these early days is illustrated in this broadside edition of the Declaration, printed in Salem, Massachusetts, byEzekiel Russell (1743-96) less than two weeks after the Declaration’s approval. Although very similar to other early broadside versions of the Declaration, it has an added paragraph at the bottom beneath the “signatures” of John Hancock (1737-93) and the secretary of the Continental Congress, Charles Thompson (1729-1824). This section states that the Revolutionary Council of the State of Massachusetts ordered this broadside printed and a copy sent “to the Ministers of each Parish, of every Denomination, within this State,” so that they could read the Declaration to each of their respective congregations. After doing so, they were to deliver their copies to the “Clerks of their several Towns or Districts,” who were “required to record the same in their respective Town, or District Books, there to remain as a perpetual Memorial thereof.” With the vast majority of citizens attending church services, the governing body of Massachusetts—now given additional authority with the approval of the Declaration—knew that this would be the best way to reach as many people as possible.

Although in most cases we have no way of knowing if these orders were followed, in this instance a small scrap of paper accompanying the broadside contains a handwritten note that reads, “The original copy of the Declaration of Independence, sent by the Council at Boston to the Town of Charlton July 17, 1776 and there read by the minister, Rev. Caleb Curtis, as directed. (See the order below the Declaration.) E. I. Comins.” The Reverend Caleb Curtis was the town’s first minister, and he was a staunch Whig and active in local politics, serving as a member of Charlton’s Committee of Correspondence. He also preached before the Charlton militia, providing a blessing to them as they headed off to fight the regulars at Lexington and Concord on April 19, 1775. Given this background it follows that Curtis would have been eager to read the Declaration of Independence before his congregation at the first opportunity.

This issue of the American Weekly Mercury is from the last year of Andrew Bradford’s proprietorship. Like most newspapers of the time, it includes mainly European news, but with some attention as well to news from Boston and New York. England was at war with Spain in 1741, so the paper also has a substantial amount of war news from the Caribbean. This issue is also typical in that it includes an essay, a style Bradford began to use in the 1720s when he published young Benjamin Franklin’s satirical “Busy-Body papers.” This particular essay is on manners.

American Weekly Mercury was aimed mainly at the commercial class, with shipping notices and ads for the mercantile trade. The elaborate woodcut banner on the front page nicely illustrates the newspaper’s commitment to news and commerce. The first image in the banner is the Roman deity Mercury, the messenger of the gods and the god of trade and commerce; the second is the Philadelphia waterfront, bustling with ships; the third is a galloping post rider, delivering the Mercury to subscribers far distant from the city. Post riders announced their arrival by blasting on a horn and carried in their pouches not just the “public prints”—newspapers, pamphlets, and broadsides—but personal mail as well. They generally delivered the newspapers to a central location in the community, such as a general store, tavern, or post office where rural subscribers would retrieve them with the rest of their mail when next they came to this location. Printers were often also postmasters and their printing offices were thus communication hubs from which post riders were coming and going.

The confrontation on March 5, 1770, that almost immediately became known as the Boston Massacre began when a large group of locals—mainly comprised of sailors and rope makers who felt threatened by British soldiers who were competing for part-time jobs during off-duty hours—started taunting British soldiers with snowballs, stones, and clubs. At the head of this group was Crispus Attucks (ca. 1723-70), probably a runaway slave of African and Native American descent who was working as a sailor and rope maker in the city. Several more British soldiers came to help those already being attacked by the colonists and opened fire on the crowd. It is unclear whether Attucks attacked a soldier first, but he ended up being the first fatality from bullet wounds. Two others, Samuel Gray and James Caldwell, also died during the incident, and Samuel Maverick and Patrick Carr died days later as a result of their injuries. Six others were wounded.

This print is full of inaccuracies. It depicts British soldiers firing on their commander’s orders, clearly insinuating that it was an unprovoked military attack. The colonists are all well dressed and appear to be from the middle and upper classes, rather than from the working class. They are also depicted as being unarmed and helpless, but brutally mowed down regardless. Attucks, if depicted, is not rendered as African American.

Despite its inaccuracies, this engraving is Revere’s most well-known print and the most referenced image of the event. It was an effective propaganda piece, aiming to demonstrate what occupation by the British soldiers meant for the colonists. And unlike his earlier print depicting the landing of the British troops in Boston, which only subtly criticized the British in the accompanying text, Revere makes his opinions very clear through the poem below the image here. It begins:

Unhappy Boston! see thy Sons deplore
Thy hallow’d walks besmear’d with guiltless gore
While faithless P____n [Captain Preston] and his savage bands
With murd’rous rancour stretch their bloody hands
Like fierce barbarians grinning o’er their prey
Approve the carnage and enjoy the day.

Though at first glance it appears to be a dispassionate description, the implication that the British were preparing for a siege and the use of “insolent” when describing the troops’ parade into town suggest otherwise. Furthermore, Revere cheekily dedicated the engraving to the Earl of Hillsborough (1718-93), secretary of state for the colonies, in a cartouche at the bottom right that is bordered by a Native American standing on a British soldier. “This View of the only well Plan’d Expedition, formed for supporting y^e dignity of Britain & chastising y^e insolence of America, is hum’y Inscrib’d,” he concludes. Aside from any textual ambiguities, the enormity of resorting to military occupation would have been clear in such a detailed visual representation.

As the second part of the broadside illustrates, the Stamp Act was so hated in London—particularly by merchants who dealt in trade with the Americans—that news of its repeal resulted in public celebrations. Similar celebrations soon broke out in the colonies. As the broadside concludes, “It is impossible to express the Joy the Town [Boston] is now in,” and “The Bells in all the Churches were immediately set a Ringing, and we hear the Day for a general Rejoicing will be the beginning of next week.”

Perhaps what’s most remarkable about this broadside, however, is that excitement on receiving the news was so great that the publishers of the Boston newspapers put aside competition and all worked together to spread the news with no monetary benefit to themselves. The note on the very bottom of the broadside reads, “Printed for the Benefit of the PUBLIC, by Drapers, Edes & Gill, Green & Russel, and Fleets. The Customers to the Boston Papers may have the above gratis at the respective Offices.”

This Narrative was commissioned by the Provincial Congress on May 22, 1775, and Thomas had it ready for distribution in July. Copies were sent to King George III, the provincial governors, and other influential personages who may have been swayed by its “official” information. This was the only official printing Thomas completed for the new congress.

For example, in his entries for March 1737 Prince writes about sermons, meetings, and dinners with local ministers and political friends. He notes when his son Tommy comes home from Harvard for a family visit. But he also records public news, including a fire in cabinetmaker John Brocas’s workshop in the heart of the city, the death and funeral of Harvard President Benjamin Wadsworth (1670-1737), and the collapse of a church gallery in Northampton—events that also appeared in the Boston newspapers. In the typical laconic style of his diary entries, he also recorded the biggest news of the year in Boston: the destruction by an angry mob of the town central market sheds. 

A published transcription of Prince's 1737 diary is available here, courtesy of The Colonial Society of Massachusetts.

Outside of the protective covering of the porch, seated on the step, is an African American man with a child in front of him, and in the window of the hotel there is a woman leaning out, straining to hear. These three listeners are physically and metaphorically outside of the conversation, separated by their race and gender from political participation, but will nonetheless be affected by the outcome of the war in Mexico. They, too, are eager for news.

Woodville, the original painter, belonged to a prominent Baltimore family but left the United States for Europe at the age of twenty. There he spent several years studying under Karl Ferdinand Sohn (1805-67) in Düsseldorf, Germany. Woodville was known for painting contemporary interior scenes with exquisite detail and color. Many of his paintings, including War News from Mexico, were exhibited in the United States, often at the American Art-Union. The engraver, Alfred Jones, was born in Liverpool in 1819 and eventually traveled to America with his family. He attended the National Academy of Design in New York, and in 1839 took an apprenticeship with a banknote engraver. He returned to Europe in 1840, where he studied under London’s master engravers. After returning to America, he became one of the premier engravers in the country, eventually establishing a career in postage stamp engraving. He also engraved a number of images for the American Art-Union, including this one, which was originally engraved and sold by subscription to the union’s members in 1851. 

The text of the broadside depicts the British troops as attacking the Americans or “provincials” with a “savage barbarity” that included “shooting down the unarmed, aged, and infirm, they disregarded the cries of the wounded, killing them without mercy, and mangling their bodies.” This broadside also exonerates the Americans, claiming that “not one instance of cruelty that we have heard of was committed by our victorious militia.” Rather, the Americans “listen[ed] to the merciful dictates of the Christian religion. They breathed a higher sentiment of humanity.” 

This broadside was printed in Salem, Massachusetts, by Ezekiel Russell (d. 1796), a Boston printer who had moved to Salem in 1774 and established the Salem Gazette. Isaiah Thomas, in his 1810 book, The History of Printing in America, wrote, “A young woman who lived in Russell’s family sometimes invoked the muse, and wrote ballads on recent tragical events, which being immediately printed, and set off with wooden cuts of coffins, etc., had frequently ‘a considerable run.’” It is unknown if this woman authored the elegy that appears at the bottom of this broadside, but it seems quite possible.

A transcription of the broadside can be found here.