EZEKIEL RUSSELL | A very scarce Salem handbill issued to (and possibly printed by) Ezekiel Russell

Property from the Collection of Elsie and Philip Sang

EZEKIEL RUSSELL

PRINTED SUMMONS FOR RUSSELL TO KEEP EVENING WATCH IN SALEM TOWN. [SALEM, 1777]

Printed handbill (2 1/2 x 3 1/8 in.; 63 x 81 mm) on a slip of paper, signed and accomplished by the Salem constable; some light foxing, some arithmetic figures on verso.

The present tiny handbill orders Russell, "Pursuant to Orders received from the Justices of the Peace and Select-men of Salem, I hereby warn you to appear next mon day at 9 o'Clock in the Evening, at the Watch-House, and to keep Watch in said Town 'till Sunrise next Morning. … Salem March ye 1 1777."

According to Felt's Annals of Salem, in 1704 the town ordered that "a watch house … be erected on Leech’s Hill." While built to watch for French and Indian intruders, by the time Russell was summoned for duty, the Watch-House was to used to look out for the approach of British troops. Since Ezekiel Russell established his press in Salem in 1774, it is possible that he was the printer of this ephemeral form.

Very rare: not in Evans, Ford's Massachusetts Broadsides, or Tapley’s Salem Imprints. 

PROVENANCE:

Goodspeed's catalogue 500 (1961), item 127