What was advertised in a colonial American newspaper 250 years ago today?
“I … am really sorry that my Fellow-Citizens should be so unfriendly to me.”
Tensions rose in the fall of 1774 as the harbor in Boston remained closed and blockaded due to the Boston Port Act and the rest of the Coercive Acts went into effect as punishment for the Boston Tea Party. Yet that port was not the only place that experienced discord. John Head’s advertisement, published in both the Pennsylvania Gazette and the Pennsylvania Journal on October 19, revealed his frustration with rumors and accusations that he sought to take advantage of the situation through unscrupulous business practices.
He reported that “a Number of unkind People have industriously propagated through this City, Philadelphia, “I made it my Business to purchase a large Quantity of several Sorts of dry Goods, in order to sell them again at an advanced Price.” Head, like many other colonizers, anticipated that the First Continental Congress, meeting in Philadelphia at the time, would enact some sort of nonimportation agreement in response to the Coercive Acts. His critics accused him of attempting to sidestep such measures by stocking up on merchandise in advance, thus not having to make the same sacrifices as truly patriotic merchants. To make matters worse, they insinuated that once goods became scare because of a nonimportation agreement that Head would jack up his prices and gouge consumers who did not have the usual range of choices available to them.
Head vigorously denied those rumors. That “Report,” he asserted, “I do declare to be false.” Furthermore, he challenged “any Person to appear to my Face, and prove that I have bought to the Amount of One Shilling’s Worth of Goods from them, since the Arrival of said Ships.” Continuing to make his case, Head declared that “on a cool Reflection, I cannot recollect that I have bought to the Amount of Fifty Pounds Worth of dry Goods on Speculation since I have been in Trade.” He did not have a history of acquiring goods in large quantities, nor had he done so recently, despite whatever his adversaries claimed. Head expressed his disappointment over the gossip that made it necessary to take to the public prints to defend his reputation. He lamented that “my Fellow-Citizens should be so unfriendly to me, and unjust to themselves, as to propagate a Report of this Sort.” In so doing, he positioned himself among the ranks of citizens and patriots, confirming his fidelity to their cause.
