What was advertised in a revolutionary American newspaper 250 years ago today?
“THREE PENCE per pound … for the best sort of CLEAN WHITE LINEN RAGS.”
A year after the battles at Lexington and Concord, the landscape of newspapers published throughout the colonies had changed. Some ceased publication, including most of the newspapers previously printed in Boston and Charleston as well as the only newspaper printed in Georgia. During that time, one printer also launched a new newspaper. Samuel Loudon commenced the New York Packet on January 4, 1776. Printers and others experienced a scarcity of paper because of the war and nonimportation agreements. That contributed to the suspension or irregular publication of some newspapers. On April 23, 1776, William Trickett, a stationer in Philadelphia, ran an advertisement offering “THREE PENCE per pound … for the best sort of CLEAN WHITE LINEN RAGS.” Readers knew that he planned to recycle that linen into paper.
I periodically provide a census of newspapers consulted for the Adverts 250 Project. These are the newspapers published throughout the colonies as the Revolutionary War entered its second year. This list includes only those that have been digitized and made widely accessible. A couple titles have not survived or have not been digitized, so this list does not reflect every newspaper that circulated in the colonies in late April 1776.
Published on Mondays
- Boston-Gazette (Watertown, Massachusetts)
- Connecticut Courant (Hartford, Connecticut)
- Dunlap’s Pennsylvania Packet (Philadelphia, Pennsylvania)
- Newport Mercury (Newport, Rhode Island)
- New-York Gazette and Weekly Mercury (New York, New York)
- Norwich Packet (Norwich, Connecticut)
Published on Tuesdays
- Dunlap’s Maryland Gazette (Baltimore, Maryland)
- Pennsylvania Evening Post (Philadelphia Pennsylvania)
Published on Wednesdays
- Connecticut Journal (New Haven, Connecticut)
- Constitutional Gazette (New York, New York)
- Henrich Millers Pennsylvanischer Staatsbote (Philadelphia, Pennsylvania)
- Maryland Journal (Baltimore, Maryland)
- Pennsylvania Gazette (Philadelphia, Pennsylvania)
- Pennsylvania Journal (Philadelphia, Pennsylvania)
Published on Thursdays
- Maryland Gazette (Annapolis, Maryland)
- New-England Chronicle (final issue in Cambridge, Massachusetts on April 4; first issue in Boston, Massachusetts, on April 25)
- New-York Journal (New York, New York)
- New York Packet (New York, New York)
- Pennsylvania Evening Post (Philadelphia, Pennsylvania)
Published on Fridays
- Connecticut Gazette (New London, Connecticut)
- Essex Gazette (Newburyport, Massachusetts)
- Henrich Millers Pennsylvanischer Staatsbote (Philadelphia, Pennsylvania)
- Thomas’s Massachusetts Spy (Worcester, Massachusetts)
- Virginia Gazette [Purdie] (Williamsburg, Virginia)
Published on Saturdays
- Constitutional Gazette (New York, New York)
- Pennsylvania Evening Post (Philadelphia, Pennsylvania)
- Pennsylvania Ledger (Philadelphia Pennsylvania)
- Providence Gazette (Providence, Rhode Island)
- Virginia Gazette [Dixon and Hunter] (Williamsburg, Virginia)
These American newspapers published in late April 1776 either have not survived or have not been digitized for greater accessibility.
- Germantowner Zeitung (Germantown, Pennsylvania; few numbers known)
- North-Carolina Gazette (New Bern, North Carolina; possibly suspended)