Isaiah Thomas Broadside Ballads Project

Verses in Vogue with the Vulgar

On Samuel Tully and John Dalton, alias R. Heathcote, who is sentenced to be executed the 10th day of December, 1812, for piracy and murder.

In 1812 a spectacular hanging was staged in South Boston for two men, Samuel Tully (1770-1812) and John Dalton, sentenced to be executed for piracy and murder. For a detailed account, see A Copy of a Letter from Samuel Tully. The broadside shown here, On Samuel Tully and John Dalton, was a pre-event broadside printed by Joseph White. This lyric of fifteen verses in ballad meter was released on December 7, three days before the scheduled execution of the two men. Dalton’s alias is given here as R. Heathcote, contradicting the identification on A Copy of a Letter from Samuel Tully, where Tully’s alias is given as R. Heathcoate. The text may have been written by a clergyman. It is didactic, but not overly religious.

Additional Metadata

Date

1812

Place of Publication

Boston.

Subjects

Tully, Samuel, 1771-1812
Dalton, John, 1788?-
Crime
Pirates
Executions and executioners
Death
Murder
God (Christianity)

First Line

To die's the common lot of all.

Identifiers

BIB ID: 304079
OCLC Control No.: (OCoLC)ocm78808502
OCLC Control No.: (OCoLC)ocn191495234
AAS General Catalog URL: http://catalog.mwa.org/vwebv/holdingsInfo?bibId=304079
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Physical Dimensions

29 x 24 cm.

Transcriptions

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Citation

“On Samuel Tully and John Dalton, alias R. Heathcote, who is sentenced to be executed the 10th day of December, 1812, for piracy and murder.,” Isaiah Thomas Broadside Ballads Project, accessed October 22, 2026, https://collections.americanantiquarian.org/thomasballads/items/show/311.