The herald., 1897-05-26
Some Valuable Relics

James B. Kennedy, while looking over
some OF the effects of the late DR.. Alfred
lCreigh came across some rare relics In
the shape OF ancient newspapers which
he has presented to ]. Shan. Margerum.
One is the Evening Chronicle. printed at
Philadelphia, and bearing the date OF
Tuesday, October 49, 1887. 1t is semi
weekly. published every Tuesday and
Saturday evening. There are four pages,
three columns to a page, each column
being II inches in length. The old style
of spelling ie used. for instance an
being inserted in certain words for an S.
Of the IL columns nearly eight are de-
voted to advertisements. Whether the
paper was edited at Philadelphia, IS
! hard to determine. The heading does
not say anything which would indicate
what town or city it represented. On
the last page and at the bottom appears
this notice: philadelphia. printed by
Robert Smith. below the Drawbridge,
the third door below Spruce street in
Front and Water street" In whatever
city or town it was edited that place
must have been very slow 109 years ago,
as the reading matter relates altogether
to affairs in Boston, Brussels. London
and points in France. The advertise
ulcHtSy WIllc uOtHlAS AihS tAo0S OA SAA's
modern newspaper. are very pointed.
and there is no misunderstanding their
meaning. Here is one which the author
evidently intended as an apology and
in which he naively admits that he was
somewhat of prevarlcator:
II hereby declare that an advertise
ment inserted by me in a few copies Of
the Evening Chronicle, of the 26th of
A,,o 1-G- Mr. Matthew
Carey, vac totally false"
The above apology perhaps prevented
duel. as in those days the code was
resorted to on very little provocation.
Another relic is two pages of "The
Carlisle and Western Repository OF
Knowledge" dated Wednesday. Decem-
Der %, 1856 There is no means of telling
where it was published. he news mat
ter relates solely to refutation by Cen
eral George Washington of charges OF
cruelty to an English army officer, made
against the General by London officials
This officer was Captain Afgill, of the
First Battalion of the British guards.
Afgill it seems had been condemned to
death by the American authorities, in
retaliation for the inhuman execution
by the British of an American officer.
State Troops. The British Captain was
selected by lot from number of other
British officers then prisoners, to suffer
death in retaliation for Huddy's execu-
ton. The doomed man was finally
saved through the intercession of Cen
eral Rochambeau, a Frenchman. In
the correspondence published General
Washington. as usual, came out with
flying colors
The third relic is also a newspaper
called THE Newport Mercury. or the
Weekly Advertiser" 1t was dated Tues.
day, December 10, 175S. A notice similar
to the one mentioned as being inserted
at the bottom Of the last page of the
Chronicle indicates that the paper was
published at Newport. Rhode Island.
At any rate is was printed there. 1t is
crude affair. and the only article or
interest in it to people of this section is
a letter from Fort Duquesne (now Pitts
burg) dated November 80, 1858, telling OF
the destruction of the fort by burning
by the French and Indians, their evac-
uation, and the arrival of the British
forces The letter tells of the great
desolation presented at the ruins and
the act Of cruelty perpetrated by the
FTGnCl anu Their 1uOldu dlllCS ut
following letter written from Fort Du-
quesne and published in the paper men
toned, under date of November 30
1853, will be interesting. perhaps. to
many readers:
After much fatigue and labor We
have at last brought the artillery to
this place, and found the French had
left US nothing to do, having on the
night of the oath instant blown up their
magazine, and burnt their fort to the
ground. Their Indians had, either
through fear, or to atone for their many
barbarities, deserted them; and as they
depended on them to attack US in tn.
woods (the only chance they had of beat
ing us) the French judged rightly in
abandoning fort the front of whose
polygon is only $50 feet, and which our
shells would have destroyed in three
days We have fired some howitzer
shells into the face of the works, which
10 made of nine-inch plank and rammed
between with earth, and found that in
firing but few hours we must have de-
stroyed the entire face"
Those three relics are almost invalu-
able and it is scarcely likely that they
can be duplicated.
.s,-1 @;oS1 80 {