Ohio History Journal

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the beginning to within a few years it was the headquarters of

that Order in America. From its halls its preachers went into

all parts of the country.

We now find our time gone and we are only getting into

out subject. Other events are quite as interesting and valuable

but we have restricted ourselves to the very first as closely as

possible, and the half has not been told.

Some one ought to write a history of the first forty years

of religious development in Ohio. With its account of God-

fearing men and women, who hungered for the Manna of Life

in their wilderness home, with its story of the splendid band of

consecrated men of God, who had but one passion, namely, to

win souls, with its narrative of struggle and sacrifice to build

these first temples. Nothing in our state history has such ab-

sorbing interest, such vital realities and such permanent results

in the establishment of our Commonwealth.

 

 

EARLY NEWSPAPERS IN THE VIRGINIAS.

 

DR. HENRY S. GREEN.

Sir William  Berkeley, twice governor of Virginia, made

answer to the inquiries of the Lords of the Committee for the

Colonies in 1671, during his second term of office, and one of

his replies to their questionings was as follows:

"I thank God that we have not free schools nor printing, and I

hope we shall not have these hundred years; for learning has brought

disobedience and heresy and sects into the world, and printing has

divulged them and libels against the government. God keep us from

both."

This pious protest of Governor Berkeley was uttered more

than thirty years after the importation of a press into the colony

of Massachusetts and nearly forty years after the founding of

Harvard, and it has been held to indicate that the cavalier civil-

ization which grew up about the Jamestown settlement was more

conservative in its attitude toward learning and literature than

the puritan civilization of New England. However, the printer's

devil began to get in his work in Virginia long before the expira-

tion of the hundred years' respite for which Governor Berkeley

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Annual Meeting Ohio Valley Historical Association. 191

 

had so fervently hoped. The prejudice against printing appears,

indeed, to have been governmental and gubernatorial rather than

popular, for the colony had made no law on the subject, and the

inhibition against printing rested solely on administrative orders.

When in 1681, an adventurous spirit, John Buckner, imported

a printing press into Virginia, he was promptly called before the

governor and council and ordered to enter into bond "not to

print anything hereafter until His Majesty's pleasure shall be

known."

Apparently it was not His Majesty's pleasure that any such

Dangerous piece of political machinery should be operated in

the colonies if His Majesty could prevent it, so we find the gov-

ernor of Virginia in 1683 getting express orders from British

headquarters not to allow any person to use a printing press in

the colony on any occasion whatsoever. The royal prohibition

and gubernatorial diligence were potent enough to keep type

and presses out of the colony until the power of example in

those colonies which afterward became the New England and

the Middle states, caused the colonists in Virginia also to recog-

nize the function of the printer - though at first the recognition

was on an exterritorial basis. William Parks was the first duly

appointed "printer" to the colony of Virginia, and he received

a subsidy or salary of two hundred pounds a year, his press being

located at Annapolis, Maryland, where he published the Maryland

Gazette, established in 1727.

Soon after his appointment as printer to the colony, Parks

was allowed to open a printing office at Williamsburg and to

issue a newspaper. It was established in 1736 and was called

The Virginia Gazette. It was ordinarily printed on a half sheet

of foolscap paper. This first journalistic venture in the Virginias

seems to have followed quite closely the Scriptural injunction

of obedience to the "powers that be." On the death of Wm.

Parks in 1750 the paper suspended publication for a few months,

but it was revived under the same name by William Hunter in

1751 and appears to have survived until the outbreak of the

Revolutionary War for in 1776 there were two papers published

at Williamsburg -the only two then existing in the Virginias-

and each of them was named the Virginia Gazette.

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The political storm which was to break in the seventies began

to mutter in the years that followed the revival of Parks' ven-

ture by Hunter, and the old Gazette was so entirely subservient

in its editorial policy to the British crown and the crown's guber-

natorial representative that it became unpopular with many of

the colonists. It has been said that a few years later the young

Thomas Jefferson and some of his friends desired a more "inde-

pendent paper," and they induced William Rind to embark upon

the publication of a new Gazette which should be "open to all

parties, but subservient to none." I have failed to find any in-

dications, either in the writings of Jefferson or in the extant

copies of Rind's Gazette, that Jefferson himself had anything

to do with the paper's establishment or that he ever contributed

to its columns. The second Virginia newspaper was launched

in May, 1766, "at the beginning," as Jefferson says, "of the

Revolutionary disputes." And the new paper became the medium

of publication for many articles which were unfavorable to the

colonial government. During the first year of its existence it

carried at its masthead the legend, "Published by authority,"

but from the second year it omitted that declaration. The sub-

scription price of the new Gazette was 12S 6d per year.

This new Gazette carried in its columns much live matter

that bore on the colonists' grievances, and it did to some extent

for public opinion in Virginia what the spy of Worcester did for

public opinion in Massachusetts in the decade that preceded the

outbreak of the Revolution. In all the colonies at this time there

were published only a few over thirty papers, and not more than

four or five of them gave much attention to the discussion or

presentation of current public opinion. The real medium through

which the printing press contributed to the revolutionary cause

was the occasional political tract or pamphlet.

Like all pre-revolutionary colonial newspapers, the two early

Virginia specimens were printed on half-sheets of paper of vary-

ing shapes and sizes. Seven by nine and seven by thirteen inches

were very common sizes, and a half sheet would contain from

3,000 to 7,000 ems of printed matter according to size of type

used, the contents of about one or two columns of the New York

Herald of today. Paper was very scarce and very expensive, and

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it was quite impossible to obtain any considerable quantity of

uniform weight and character. The composition, typography and

press work of the early colonial newspapers compare favorably

with those of English papers of the same period. As in those

same English papers, the colonial compositors made a most reck-

less and prodigal use of capital letters, capitalizing all nouns and

as many other words as their fancy dictated.

The earliest paper published in the territory now embraced

within the borders of West Virginia was called the Potomac

Guardian and Berkeley Advertiser. It was established at Mar-

tinsburg by Dr. Robert Henry. The earliest copy extant, so far

as I have been able to ascertain, bears date of April 3, 1792, and

is numbered 73 of Vol. II which indicates that the paper was

founded in 1789. This copy of the paper is in the Virginia state

library at Richmond. It is printed on a sheet of paper nine by

fifteen inches and is a fair specimen of the newspaper work of

its time. The second paper established in West Virginia territory

was also published at Martinsburg in 1799 and was edited by

Nathaniel Willis, father of the poet, Nathaniel Parker Willis.

It was called the Martinsburg Gazette. One year later, in 1800,

also at Martinsburg, appeared the Berkeley and Jefferson County

Intelligencer and Northern Neck Advertiser, the publisher being

John Alburtis. Files of this publication, extending from 1802

to 1808 are available and constitute a most valuable source of his-

torical material.

Other early papers of the eastern panhandle, copies of which

are still extant, are Farmer's Repository (Charlestown) 1808,

1814-16, 1826, Martinsburg Gazette, 1818, American Eagle

(Shepherdstown) 1818, Virginia Monitor (Shepherdstown)

1821, The Journal (Shepherdstown) 1828, The Potomac Pioneer,

(Shepherdstown) 1830.   Virginia Republican (Martinsburg)

1847-1853, Virginia Free Press (Charlestown) 1831, 1836-37,

1858, Shepherdstown Register 1849-50, 1853-57, and subsequent

periods.

In the Western Panhandle the earliest paper was the

Repository, published in Wheeling, first issued in 1807, and dur-

ing the first decade of the Nineteenth Century the total number

of papers published in the state had grown from the two of 1776

Vol. XXV- 13

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to 26. Thomas' History of Printing, published in 1810, gives the

list of papers then in being in the Virginias as follows:

 

Name of Paper.                      Place of Publication.     Politics.

Virginia  Patriot ................                   Richmond   ............ Federalist

Enquirer........................                        Richmond   ............ Republican

Virginia Argus .................. Richmond ............ Federalist

Norfolk    Gazette .................               Norfolk      .............. Federalist

Norfolk    Herald .................                Norfolk      .............. Neutral

Petersburg Intelligencer ......... Petersburg ........... Republican

Republican  .....................  Petersburg  ........... Republican

Virginia Herald ................. Fredericksburg ........ Federalist

Republican Constitution .......... Winchester ........... Republican

Centinel ......................... Winchester ........... Federalist

W inchester  Gazette............... Winchester............  Federalist

Democratic Lamp ................ Winchester ............ Republican

Lynchburg Star .................. Lynchburgh .......... Republican

Lynchburg Press ................ Lynchburgh ........... Republican

Staunton  Eagle..................  Staunton  ............. Republican

Republican Farmer.............. Staunton ............. Republican

W ashingtonian  .................                 Leesburg     ............. Federalist

Republican  Press ................                Leesburg     ............ Republican

Republican Luminary ............ Wythe C. H........... Republican

Holstein Intelligencer ............ Abingdon ............. Republican

Virginia  Telegraph..............  Lexington  ............ Federalist

Monongalia Gazette ............. Morgantown .......... Republican

Farmer's Register............... Charlestown   .......... Republican

 

As only the last two papers on the list were located in West

Virginia territory, it would seem that the other papers established

earlier than 1810 in the Eastern and Western Panhandle had by

that time succumbed to the vicissitudes that have ever beset the

business, and this is not the only ground to be found in the his-

tory of Virginian and West Virginian newspapers tending to

verify Franklin's observation that "the business of a printer was

generally regarded as a poor one."

One of the two Virginia papers listed by Thomas as exist-

ing in 1810 within the West Virginia limits is the Monongalia

Gazette, and this paper had been established in 1803, previous

to which time the Pittsburg Gazette had been the sole purveyor

of  news and      vehicle  for   advertising  in  the   Monongahela

basin. The Pittsburg paper had established a post route in 1793

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from its base of publication to Morgantown, distributing its

publication by private post riders. Clarksburg's first paper ap-

peared in 1815, and Fairmont's about 1840; Parkersburg's ear-

liest journalistic venture was in 1833, and the first papers printed

in Charleston were the Spectator established in 1818 or 1819,

the Kanawha Patriot 1819, the Western Courier in 1820, and

the Western Register in 1829.

During the colonial period, in the Virginias, as elsewhere in

the country, most readers of books and papers preferred the

imprints that came from across the water to those produced in

the colonies. Such papers as were circulated dealt almost en-

tirely with European news and politics. With the most indif-

ferent postal facilities, the circulation of each paper was limited

almost entirely to the immediate community in which it was

published. It was not until the controversy arose which led to

the Revolutionary struggle that the press of the country began

to exercise to any considerable extent the function of present-

ing and leading public opinion. The publishers of the colonial

papers were in the first instance printers, and the publication

of a "gazette" from their printing offices was more or less an

incidental side issue. As the press in all the colonies was under

strict censorship, the expression of opinion was under irksome

restraint, and the anonymously published, surreptitiously printed

tract or pamphlet was the only medium whereby an article which

had failed to commend itself to "His Majesty's pleasure" could

be given to the public.

With the declaration of independence and the establishment

of the same by the events of the war, all this was changed, and

the papers which were established in rapidly increasing numbers

throughout the country began to be edited and conducted by

men, not necessarily printers, who had a message of some sort

to give the public as a part of the service of the newspaper.

One of these papers of the new type was the Richmond En-

quirer, established in 1804, by Ritchie and Worsley and edited

for more than forty years by Thomas Ritchie, who has some

title to be regarded as the father of Virginia journalism.

The early newspapers had of course, none of the organized

facilities for the collection and distribution of news enjoyed by

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modern journalism. The nearest approach to a press service

came with the legislation in congress authorizing free exchange

of papers through the post office among all editors and publish-

ers. This policy was adopted in 1792, and congress took action

from time to time to expedite and facilitate those exchanges,

establishing an "express service" between eastern cities and the

principal places in the west by act of Congress July 2, 1836.

Clippings from the exchanges supplied the material now fur-

nished by the modern press bureau or news service.

Browsing among some of the old newspapers of the early

days in the Virginias, copies of which are preserved at the De-

partment of Archives and History at Charleston, I have selected

a few items as illustrative of the kind of material out of which

the publishers made up their papers in the early days of the

republic, of the form in which they presented this material, and

of their attitude toward the communities served by their papers

and toward the questions of public interest with which they dealt.

The Kanawha Spectator, No. 37, a fugitive, mutilated copy

of which appears to have been published in August, 1821, (the

date line is partly torn away) was conducted by H. P. Gaines,

was also, as evidenced by an ad that seems to have been running

since October 21, 1820, practiced law in the local courts. In the

advertisement he says:

"The subscriber respectfully informs the public that his duties as

an editor of a newspaper will not prevent him from practicing law in

the county and superior courts of Kenhawa; but he cannot attend any

other courts. He intends keeping on hand at his printing office, blank

deeds and other instruments of writing; and will at all times fill them

up for those who may apply."

 

The leading editorial of the issue is given up to a discus-

sion of the thesis that "the trial by jury is the great Palladium

of Liberty." Something must recently have gone wrong with

one of the editor's jury cases, however, for he says as to this

general observation that

Where we apply it to such juries as the sheriffs sometimes pick

up about the tipling houses of our towns and courthouse yards, it will

be mene, mene, tikel upharsin. I very much fear that a spice of ambi-

tion or ill-will against one of the parties, and an undue partiality in

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favor of the other, gains such ascendency over the minds of some of

our juries in Virginia and all other places in which the sheriffs are

equally careless in selecting them, that strict and impartial justice and

the voice of the law have no influence on their determinations.

 

This lawyer-editor also has a criticism for the law's delay,

complaining that "if all the members composing this court had

done their duty as well as those residing in Charleston and its

vicinity, they would probably have gone through the docket, but

little was done besides trying the commonwealth's cases."

The following ad is interesting as showing the state of

trade the market for certain products being apparently depend-

ent on opportunities for barter:

The subscriber will give a liberal price in salt or good trade for

any quantity of flax seed, which may be brought to him at Charleston

Kenhawa.                                        ROBERT TITUS.

 

Another ad on the front page next to reading matter appeals

to the "owner" of a property right which has gone quite out

of fashion. It reads as follows:

A negro girl who is acquainted with house work may be hired

upon good terms to a man in this town with a small family, if immediate

application be made. She will be taken by the month or year and pay-

ment made to suit the owner. Enquire at this office.

 

The coal mining business of West Virginia at this period,

as may be inferred from another ad, was subsidiary almost en-

tirely to the demands of the great salt industry. Under the head-

line "Collier Wanting" it is set forth that

From 10 to 20 steady and industrious men, who understand digging

coal, may obtain high wages in Kenhawa for that business, if immediate

application is made to Dr. Putney, or any other manufacturers of salt

who use coal at their furnaces.

 

The following reference to an "elopement" of the day also

appears in the advertising columns of the Spectator:

 

$10 REWARD.

Ran away from the boat of Mr. Emzy Wilson while at or near

Johnson's shoals, Kenhawa county, a negro woman named Judy, about

22 years old  *    * *her dress when she eloped, a dark calico, her

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other clothes not recollected. It is supposed that she is skulking about

in the mountains on Kenhawa river.

 

The Kanawha Patriot of September 12, 1840, reprints from

the Madisonian a long dialogue reported by Peter Ploughboy

who takes the Van Buren administration severely to task on the

charge of extravagance.     Tables of figures set forth that the

average expenditure per annum by Van Buren had been $37,135,-

654.33, while under General Washington it had cost the country

only $1,₉86,₅₂₄.8₂ to run the government, making a difference of

$35,149,130.61.

By this it appears that the average under Mr. Van Buren is very

nearly thirty-six times greater than it was under Washington. Well, I

don't know what YOU think about it, Squire Capias, but I should say

it was a pretty considerable specimen of "tall walking" into the people's

pockets. It is doing business on a big scale.

It is needless to state that the Patriot was a vigorous sup-

porter of the Tippecanoe ticket and very hostile to Locofocoism

in all its manifestations.

The Kanawha Register of March 5, 1830, remarks editorially that

Rail Roads maintain the good opinion formed of them in England; or,

rather, the calculations concerning them are raised higher and higher.

One an hundred miles long is constructing, from Paris to the Loire and

others are projected. That from the city of Charleston, S. C., is pro-

ceeding with considerable activity. The great work at Baltimore has

been checked by the severity of the season, but all things are ready to

complete about twenty miles of the road at an early day.

The same copy of the Register contains long quotations

from the English papers detailing a series of experiments in the

operation of railroad locomotives over measured stretches of

track at London. It tells how a locomotive of a new type,

The novelty, went off from the starting post at 12 miles per hour

and her velocity increased during the whole trip. The mile between the

quarter post and the judges' tents was run in 2 minutes and 54 seconds,

at the rate of 21 1/6 miles per hour.

The same atricle relates that Mr. Stephenson's Rocket

was stripped for the race, all load was taken off from behind, in-

cluding even the tender carriage with the water tank.

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In this racing form the famous Rocket

was started off, and performed the 7 miles in the incredibly short

space of 14 minutes, being at the rate of 30 miles an hour.

The Kanawha Jeffersonian edited by C. F. Cake had its

troubles from time to time, as the leading editorial of August

20, 1842, indicates.

In consequence of the river running down, our paper running out,

and no boats running up, we are compelled to issue rather a small sheet

this week, but we assure our readers it is of the same family, only a

young'un. Our paper was ordered some weeks ago, but unfortunately

the supply at the Point was out, and the river so low that none could

be had from Wheeling. There has since been a rise in the Ohio, and

next week we hope to spread before our readers our usual sized sheet.

Mr. Cake had recently acquired control of the Jeffersonian

from John J. Hickey, Esq., and the Richmond Compiler makes

mention of the editorial change with the friendly wish that

the efforts of Mr. Cake, like bread cast upon the waters, will

return after many days.

 

The Compiler was a Whig organ, but the editor of the Jef-

fersonian did not allow its friendly good wishes to temper his

references to his political opponents in general.    Commenting

on the worthless character of the issues of a certain bank in

Illinois, as to the reliability of which an inquiry had been made,

the Jeffersonian promptly shunts the blame for a disordered

finance on the other political party, saying:

We shall be glad to learn where there is a bank that can be relied

on now-a-days. Let the people stick to their principles and firmness, and

not be led away by Federal Whig Demagogues, and after a little we will

bring these Bank gentry, and all aristocracies and monopolies to a proper

focus-no mistake in that.

 

That the people west of the mountains were dissatisfied with

their representation in the old state government appears here

and there in the columns of these early newspapers of Western

Virginia. The Jeffersonian from which I have been quoting con-

tains a resolution which had been adopted by a Lewisburg con-

vention as follows:

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"Resolved, That a committee of persons, be appointed and in-

structed to prepare a memorial to the General Assembly, of the Common-

wealth previous to its next session, praying that Honorable body, in

terms befitting freemen, to increase the representation of this state ac-

cording to the provisions, of the fifth section of article III of the

amended Constitution, and to assign the increased number of Senators

and Delegates to the trans-Alleghany section of this Commonwealth;

or if that be declined, to pass a law for holding a convention, based on

the whole white population, to alter and to amend the constitution as in

their inherent right to "alter amend or to abolish their form of Govern-

ment, as may seem to them good."

 

There were numerous warnings even earlier than the date of

the Lewisburg resolution tending to show the imminence of a

division of the state, and many were the speculations indulged

in by the early press as to the form the ultimate and inevitable

division would take. The Kanawha Banner of December 17,

1830, says editorially:

"The Virginia legislature will convene on Monday. To the pro-

ceedings of this body we look with intense interest. Matters of great

moment will come before this body, and the discussions will be as in-

teresting as those of the late convention. The preservation of the state,

we believe, will depend upon this legislature. Disregard the claims of

the trans-Allegheny counties to what they deem a proper share of the

fund of the internal improvement, and a division of the state must fol-

low-not immediately perhaps, but the signal will be given for the rising

of the clans, and they will rise. It is not worth the while now to

speculate upon the mode or manner in which the government will be

opposed. Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof. But a crisis is

approaching. The northwestern counties demand to be separated from

the state with a view of attaching themselves to Maryland or Pennsyl-

vania, the southwestern counties go for a division of the state into two

commonwealths. Should the latter be effected, what will be our con-

ditions in the valley? Infinitely worse than the present, the mere

dependency of a government whose interest and whose trade would all

go westward, we would be taxed without receiving any equivalent; and

instead of being chastised with whips we would be scourged with

scorpions. Of the two projects spoken of, that which would be least

injurious to the valley and the state at large, would be, to part with the

northwestern counties. Let them go. Let us get clear of this disaffected

population. Then prosecute the improvement called for in the south-

west, and that portion of our state, deprived of its northern allies, would

give up their desire for a separation. To cement the union still firmer,

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open the road from Winchester to Parkersburg, and we shall have a

commonwealth, one and indivisible, so long as our republic endures."

On the whole the advertising matter of the early newspapers

is quite as diverting reading as any of the news stories or even

the efforts of the editorial writers to guide and mold public

opinion, and much of the matter in the advertising columns is

of first rate historical interest. The patent medicine man was

abroad in the land, and his literature was spread abroad in the

columns of the press of the early days.

The following delicious specimen of his literary art is taken

from a paper which circulated freely in Virginia in the early days,

though it was published in Maryland. In the front page, top

of column, first column position of the issue of July 4, 1780,

of the Maryland Journal and Baltimore Advertiser, we read of

Dr. Ryan's incomparable worm-destroying sugar plumbs, necessary

to be kept in all families; so exceedingly valued by all people who have

had of them in Great Brittain and Ireland, for their transcendant excel-

lency in the destroying worms of all kinds, both in the bodies of men,

women, and children, * * *

Among other remarkable therapeutic results to be expected

from these transcendant sugar-plumbs it asserted that

Likewise settled, aches and pains in the head, swellings, old sores,

scabs, tetters, or breaking-out will be perfectly cured, and the blood

and skin restored to its original purity and smoothness, * * * and

what makes them more commendable is, they are full as agreeable to

both taste and sight, as loaf sugar; and in their operations as innocent

as new milk.

Nearly the whole of the first column of this newspaper is

given to the "Incomparable sugar-plumbs" and to other remedies

for the ills of humanity sold by Hughes & Williamson, Mer-

chants, while the last two columns of the last page of the same

issue contains the very latest news from the war zone, including

a letter from General Washington to Congress dated at Whip-

pany, June 25, 1780, telling of the operations of the army under

Gen. Greene and the commanding general himself intended to

frustrate the enemy's designs against West Point. An extract

from  another letter from General Washington dated two days

later reads as follows:

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RAMAPAUGH, June 27, 1780.

I arrived, after a severe ride on the evening of the 23rd. You will

see the official Report of that Day's Transactions in the public Papers.

In this and the former Incursion of the enemy, we calculate their loss

at not less than 500, and in both you may be assured they have been

greatly disgraced. They lost some valuable Officers. We have only to

lament that of Captain Thomson, of the Artillery. They abandoned

some Stores in their precipitated Retreat from the Point, which (al-

though well fortified) fell into our Hands. Since this they have em-

ployed themselves in making Demonstrations with their Shipping up

the North-River, and we have been marching until to Day that we take

a Rest. Their Movements seem to look towards West Point, but in

my Opinion they can have no other Object in view, but to embarrass

our Measures. They have experienced that we are not yet so weak

but that we have Spirit to fight them, nor the Militia so disposed as to

lay down Their Arms. Both have, in a signal Manner, added to their

Reputation -baffled the enemy, and preserved our stores from Destruc-

tion, which was least seriously intended.-West Point is now in a

Condition beyond their Experiments, our Army in good Spirits, and

the French Assistance soon expected. But with all this before us, every

State, every Individual should feel, that to complete their Happiness,

or to avert their Ruin, something more is necessary to be attended

to than Wishes for our Success,"

 

The early newspapers of the Virginias, as was the case

throughout the states which had been the thirteen colonies,

multiplied rapidly in numbers with the transition from the

colonial to the national regime. They extended their influence

with improving facilities for gathering news and for reaching

their subscribers and readers. Their horizon broadened with the

removal of the old restrictions of colonial days, and the rising

tide of popular sovereignty in state and nation swept away the

old barriers that had been maintained against freedom of expres-

sion by way of the printed page. For that reason their columns

furnish a rich mine of valuable historical material, presenting

as they do a vivid and detailed picture of those interesting forma-

tive decades of our national life.

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