Dinsmore Documentation  presents  Classics of American Colonial History

Author: Davis, Andrew McFarland.
Title: Currency and Banking in the Province of the Massachusetts Bay.
Citation: New York: Published for the American Economic Association by Macmillan and Co., 1901
Subdivision: Volume I, Chapter XXII
HTML by Dinsmore Documentation * Added @@, 2006
◄Volume I, Chapter XXI   Directory of Files   Volume I, Appendix A

413

CHAPTER XXII.

SOURCES OF AUTHORITY USED HEREIN AND A FEW WORDS AS TO THE STUDY OF THE CURRENCY IN OTHER COLONIES.

The sources of authority for the foregoing accounts of the currency and descriptions of the banks are to be found mainly in the official publications of the several states. They are supplemented, however, in the state of Massachusetts by documentary authorities and records deposited in the archives of the state, in registries of deeds, and in the files of the courts.

In Massachusetts, the records of the colony have been published. References made to laws actually passed during the colonial period, and to proceedings of the General Court which were recorded by the secretary, can be easily verified through these publications. The authority for statements of importance, based upon documents lodged in the archives, has been, as a rule, indicated by a reference to the volume and the number of the paper in the volume. The papers in the Massachusetts archives are classified under different subject headings, and are consecutively numbered in each volume. There may be several papers mounted upon one page, or there may be single papers covering a number of leaves which bear several numbers. The papers under each subject heading are chronologically arranged. The bulk of the references made in this research will be found in the volumes classified under the heading “Pecuniary.” The entire series of volumes in the archives is numbered consecutively, and citations may be made at will under the descriptive classification, or under the

414

numerical designation. By preference, I have adopted the latter method.

The records of the General Court of Massachusetts during the provincial period have not been published, but beginning in the year 1715, and thereafter during the entire period under consideration, the house published its journals. There is no complete set of these published journals under any one roof, but it is probable that the several incomplete collections scattered through different public libraries contain all of them. The journals contain the messages and speeches of the governors and such of the royal instructions as were officially communicated to the assembly. The replies made by the house when engaged in controversial discussion with the governors are, of course, given in full. It is from this set of publications that the facts connected with the controversies between the governors and the representatives are mainly drawn. These journals were issued by sessions and as they do not have any system of continuous pagination, they are not capable of being classified or cited by volumes. Page references to them require for their application a careful description of the session in which the event occurred which is to be examined. It will be seen that the date of the event furnishes a simpler method of reference, and for that reason no attempt has been made to furnish page references to the published house journals. Furthermore, the account of the controversies between the house and the governors and at times between the house and the council rests so completely upon these journals for its authority that the pages have not been cumbered with foot-notes indicating the source of authority for these; but notes have been introduced where statements of importance were made which were based upon evidence obtained elsewhere.

415

The references of this description in connection with the Massachusetts currency are mainly confined to the Suffolk records and files; to the records of the council in the archives department, termed by Felt the “court records”; and to volumes designated by their numbers in the archives.

The records of the council run parallel with the published house journals and sometimes furnish additional information. They have also been referred to as authority for some statements, more especially during the period prior to the commencement of the publication of the journals, citations being given under the title “Court Records.”1

The Suffolk files contain papers relating to suits which were prosecuted in all parts of the province. They have been arranged chronologically, as far as practicable, mounted upon sheets and bound in volumes and are easily accessible to the public. The dockets and records of the courts are, of course, to be consulted under their titles.

A few words ought perhaps to be said concerning the works of contemporary historians. Hutchinson was born in 1711 and entered public life in 1737. From that date on he was in close touch with events. His “History of Massachusetts from the first settlement thereof in 1628, until the year 1750” was published, the first volume in 1764, the second in 1767. The “Collection of Papers” was separately published in 1769. The third volume, which brings the narrative down to 1774, was found in

1 The Council Records are of two classes, executive and legislative. The executive are termed in the classification at the State House “ouncil Records,” and are so cited in this volume. The more voluminous records covering legislation are those which were termed by Felt “Court Records,” a title which has been preserved at the State House and recognized in the citations herein.

416

manuscript among his papers and was published in 1828. The references in the history to events relating to the currency are necessarily disconnected. They are to be found in their proper chronological sequence in the narrative and many of them are brief and inadequate. Where his personal influence was brought to bear to secure important legislation, he has described the proceedings more in detail, and it is upon these descriptions that historians have relied in the past and to which students must always turn for information. It is to his pages that most writers have turned for accounts of the merchants’ notes of 1733 and the Land Bank of 1740. The history is carelessly written, no effort having been made to correct such errors as will creep into the first manuscript of even the most careful writers. For this reason many of his sentences are awkward, and some are incongruous and difficult of interpretation, yet no person could arise from the perusal of the work without a distinct impression that the narrative, as a whole, is simple and direct and that the intention of the author was not only to be truthful, but to deal fairly with all, whether friends or foes.

Douglass will always be remembered, by those who study the currency discussion of this period, rather as the author of the “Discourse concerning the currencies” than in connection with the more pretentious work to which he appended his name. “A summary, historical and political, of the first planting, progressive improvements, and present state of the British settlements in North America” was originally issued in numbers in a contemporaneous publication. The first bound volume originally appeared in 1749, the second in 1755. As was perfectly natural, the publication of the work was the occasion of a libel suit. So far as currency matters are

417

concerned they are often relegated to lengthy foot-notes and these frequently occur in unexpected places. The style of these notes is aggressive and intemperate. Every page of the Summary bears evidence of the haste of its composition, and of the lack of revision. Even in such a matter as the preparation of a table, in which he has grouped certain figures to show more clearly what he means, he contents himself when the columns do not foot up to suit him, with appending a note, “Here is some small error” rather than devote the time necessary for its correction. Nevertheless, the Summary, like the Discourse is replete with valuable information and is not to be lightly set aside because of these obvious defects.

There is no occasion to say more concerning the contemporaneous pamphlet literature which has already been referred to and partially analyzed. We can not, however, pass by in silence a work often quoted as Felt’s Massachusetts Currency, which has been freely used by all writers upon this subject, and which, although not published until well into the second quarter of this century, has come to be regarded as an authority of almost equal importance with contemporaneous publications. For ten years, Joseph B. Felt was engaged in classifying and mounting the papers which constitute the Massachusetts archives. During the progress of this work he made note of such papers connected with the currency and the land bank experiments as seemed to him to be novel and important. These notes furnished the basis of two lectures delivered at the request of the Massachusetts Historical Society, which were, with some additions, published in 1839, under the title of “An Historical Account of Massachusetts Currency”. Mr. Felt was by profession a clergyman, and consequently

418

brought with him to aid him in this work neither the practical training of a business man nor the mental discipline of an economist. His selections from the multitude of papers in the archives bearing upon the subject were made at a time when his mind was occupied in deciphering crabbed hand-writing, settling obscure questions as to dates and determining the general character and purport of the papers under examination. Under such circumstances, he may well be pardoned if he has omitted reference to some papers which seem entitled to have been included in his notes. The wonder is that he was able to make so wise a selection as he did. The value of his work has long been appreciated by writers upon coinage and currency and it would be difficult to find a book of note, written since Felt’s Currency was published, which touched upon the question of the provincial currency of Massachusetts without some recognition of obligation on the part of the author to the work done by Felt. The merit of this book consists not in the opinions of the author, but in the materials collated from the archives of which he made use, the judicious selection of which shows great discrimination on the part of the compiler. He was quick to see what was valuable, but when he came to put together the items which he had collected, the task was performed in a slovenly manner and with perfunctory annotations. His relations with the archives were such that his statements as to the character of the papers have been accepted without question. My own observation leads me to the conclusion that he may be relied upon for accuracy of quotation, but that he was careless in the use of descriptive language concerning the papers from which he quoted. The following instance will at once illustate his discriminating sagacity

419

in noting the value of a paper, the carelessness with which he committed errors in describing it, and the vague method of giving a clue to it in his annotations. There is in the one hundre[d]th volume of the archives a copy of an abortive act against the exportation of coin, which, at the May session in 1654, was passed by the magistrates but failed of passage in the deputies. In the preamble to this, the statement is made that the export of coin cannot advance any profit to such as send it, but rather a fourth part losse”. The importance of this expression, embodied in a wordy preamble, written in the archaic hand-writing of the day, might easily have been overlooked, but it did not escape Mr. Felt’s observation. He saw that here was evidence that the nominal value assigned to the coinage of 1652 was at 25 per cent. discount in 1654, and, on page 36 of his book, he introduced a copy of the above mentioned preamble. On page 32, there is an allusion to a “report of a committee designated by the General Court in 1654,” in which Felt expressly states that “our coin passed abroad at the discount of one-fourth part of its home value”. He furnishes no reference to this report and one might conceive that the archives contained two documents of this date containing the statement above quoted, were it not for the fact that in introducing, on page 35, the preamble, to which I have referred above, and which appears on the next page, he uses the following language: The “General Court adopt, for substance, the report of their committee”. To this he gives a reference: “Massachusetts Archives, Pecuniary, Vol. I.” which is the hundreth volume in the archives, in which the paper can with this reference be run down without much difficulty. When found it does not turn out to be a report of a committee, nor is it the record

420

of anything that was adopted by the General Court. I doubt also if it is capable of the interpretation that the discount on the coinage was of necessity confined to “abroad”. It is evident that in both cases he is referring to the same paper, but it seems to me that students can afford to overlook minor inaccuracies of this class and be grateful for the light thrown upon the subject through the recognition of the value of just such side lights as this which we are considering. It was not of much importance whether it was a committee who expressed the opinion, nor whether the General Court adopted it. What was of value was that such an opinion was expressed. It was not of consequence whether Felt thought the discount was only in operation in foreign parts. We can interpret the language and judge of such a probability for ourselves. He has made public this and many other obscure passages which might have escaped observation indefinitely, and in doing so has shown great sagacity. For this we should hold him in honor.

The plan of Minot’s History of Massachusetts1 did not permit a detailed account of the currency movement. It was in accordance with the general character of Minot’s work, that he should give a brief analysis of what had taken place, bringing forth conspicuously the points which he considered of importance. It is to be regretted that the limitations of the space which he could devote to the subject restrained him from a more elaborate effort. He lived near enough to the time of these events to have obtained from those about him a knowledge of their personal experiences, and yet when he wrote, time enough had elapsed to have given these

1 Continuation of the history of the province of Massachusetts Bay from the year 1748, etc., etc., by George Richards Minot, Boston, 1798.

421

events an historic vista. He was thoroughly competent to have given us an authoritative account of the whole matter. The brief analysis which he furnishes in the fifth chapter of his first volume contains much that is of interest, and sufficiently indicates what he might have done if he had had more space at his command.

The whole subject of the currency emissions of Massachusetts was summarized in an intelligent manner, with copious references to sources of authority, by Mr. Winsor in the fifth volume of his Narrative and Critical History of America.1 In a note, page 176, Mr. Winsor very justly remarks that the general histories take but a broad view of the subject. We can perhaps afford to adopt this curt criticism of the works of our historians, with the following exception. Mr. Winsor includes Palfrey among those whose works he dismisses in this abrupt manner. This is, perhaps, justifiable so far as Palfrey’s text is concerned, for he does not attempt to treat the currency in detail. He says, indeed, “To follow, step by step, the course of the dispute respecting financial affairs between the governor and the representatives, would be to weary the reader with a recital of intricate and dull details.”2 Nevertheless, Palfrey has accumulated in his notes much information which is not easily obtainable from other sources, and the student of the topic ought not to consider his examination of the subject complete until he has analyzed these notes.

Two reports of the council of the American Antiquarian Society deal with this subject. The first was

1 Narrative and critical history of America, vol. 5, ch. 2, note c: Finance and revenue, pp. 170, 177.

2 History of New England, by John Gorham Palfrey, Boston, 1882, vol. 4, p. 549.

422

submitted in April, 1866, and was written by Nathaniel Paine, of Worcester. Mr. Paine in this report has successfully reduced to a coherent and intelligible narrative, the main facts set forth incoherently by Felt. The second was presented by J. Hammond Trumbull, in October, 1884, and was separately published by him under title, First Essays at Banking and the first Paper Money in New England. Like all work of this sort undertaken by this author, he leaves but little chance for gleanings on the part of those who succeed him in the portions of the field which he harvested.

A writer in the Columbia College Studies in history, economics and public law has recently published a Financial History of Massachusetts.1 The currency occupied but a small part of the field covered by Dr. Douglas’s work, but his analysis of the statutes brought to light many hidden points which had escaped observation before his investigation was made.

While dealing with secondary authorities, the opportunity ought not to be neglected to refer the student to the great collection of material brought together with patience and industry by William B. Weeden in his Economic and Social History of New England, 1620-1780.

In the opening sentence of this chapter I have said that we rely mainly upon official publications for information. Prior to the publication of the province laws of Massachusetts, which have been so admirably annotated by Abner C. Goodell, the conscientious editor of the series, it would have been impossible under the limitations as to time and money which restrict the operations of ordinary investigations to make a detailed examination

1 The financial history of Massachusetts, etc., by Charles H. J. Douglas, Ph.D., New York, 1892.

423

of the currency question in Massachusetts from 1690 to 1750. The emissions by resolve were hidden in the council records. The provisions for the retirement of the bills, incorporated in the tax acts, had never been published. No collator of material for a topical investigation could by his individual efforts have got together enough of this material to justify him in attempting from these manuscript sources to construct a table of emissions and redemptions. This feat is placed within easy reach of any investigator by Mr. Goodell, who has also collated from the treasurer’s accounts and from other sources much material that tends to throw light on the currency. To illustrate the value of the notes in these volumes, it may be said that it is through them that we are able to trace the brief history of the 1750 currency, emitted against a silver fund of equal amount,1 apparently without going through the form of passing a regular bill authorizing the emission.

When we turn to New Hampshire we find ourselves destitute of any special publications dealing with the currency.2 The state has published the provincial records in a series of volumes entitled New Hampshire Provincial Papers. The records of the separate bodies of which the assembly was composed are in such a state of confusion that it is very difficult in many instances to comprehend what actually took place. For this reason, great care is requisite on the part of one who may

1 £3,000 were to be prepared and the same number of pounds in milled dollars held as a fund. By the omission of “pounds in” on page 244, the fund is there converted from pounds to dollars.

2 Since this chapter was written, a volume entitled Essays on the monetary history of the United States, has been published by Charles J. Bullock. Part III treats of The paper currency of New Hampshire. The portion with which we are dealing is covered in chapters 1 and 2, not chapter 122 as stated in the note, page 329 ante.

424

make use of them in a topical investigation. Whether because he was appalled by the confusion of the records or that the subject was distasteful to him, Belknap made no attempt to give a detailed account of the currency transactions of the province. He touched upon the subject only in a general way at one or two points and brief as this contact was it was not free from errors.1

The published laws of the province do not contain the acts and resolves connected with the emissions although they have some of the legislation relative to counterfeiting.2 The act of Parliament of the 6th of Anne for ascertaining the rates of foreign coins in her Majesty’s plantations in America, and the act of the 25th of George II. to regulate and restrain paper bills of credit in his Majesty’s colonies or plantations, etc., are, however, republished in these volumes.3

The laws of the colony of Rhode island were collated and published in the days of the colony and the records have been printed by the state. These volumes open up the subject of the currency emissions in a satisfactory manner. One or two points of minor interest can be settled by consulting the manuscript copies of unpublished laws. The subject has also been treated by Elisha R. Potter, a local investigator who published a detailed account of the several emissions and banks.4

1 The history of New Hampshire, by Jeremy Belknap, D.D., [Farmer’s edition] 1831. He says, p. 186, “The next assembly was more pliant and issued fifteen thousand pounds, on loan, for eleven years, at ten per cent.” This can only be interpreted to mean ten per cent. interest. The eleven payments of ten per cent. were to satisfy both principal and interest.

2 Acts and laws of His Majesty’s province of New Hampshire in New England, with sundry acts of parliament, Portsmouth, 1761 and also an edition in 1771.

3 Ibid., edition 1771, pp. 220, 222, pp. 250, 254.

4 A brief account of the emissions of paper money made by the colony of Rhode Island, Providence, 1837.

425

The work performed by Mr. Potter was so thorough that his pamphlet has remained the sole authority on this subject, and has been twice reprinted. This was first done in 1865 by Henry Phillips, jr., in his Historical Sketches of the Paper Currency of the American Colonies. Mr. Phillips reproduced the pamphlet just as he found it without revision or correction and by so doing perpetuated certain errors which were easy of discovery and which might, at least, have been referred to by note in a work of this class, if the compiler did not feel at liberty to change the text. For instance, Mr. Potter, on page eleven, tabulates the statements made in a report of a committee of the assembly in 1749-50. In this table, the amounts outstanding of the several emissions 1728-38 inclusive, are given in old tenor but the emissions of 1740 and 1743 are given in new tenor. The sterling values of the amounts outstanding of each issue are also given, the rate of exchange being i100 for old tenor. The currency outstanding issued for loans, according to this table, was £210,000, whereas if the issues of 1740 and 1743 had been converted to old tenor, it would have been £390,000. The sterling values, being taken from the report, were not affected by this error, but, of course, there was an apparent lack of uniformity in the rates of conversion from currency to sterling. The committee in their report added to the bills outstanding emitted on loans, those outstanding issued to supply the treasurer, amounting to 110,444. 2s.d. and gave their sterling value as £10,040., 7s., 5d.1 This latter amount was entered in the column of sterling values in Potter’s table as £1040., 7s., 5d. and thus the table was left with a statement as to the amount of currency outstanding and another as to its sterling value,

1 Records of the colony of Rhode Island, etc., vol. 5, p. 286.

426

neither of which was correct, and the errors in which had no relation to each other. The report of the committee from which these figures were taken was appended to the pamphlet and furnished an easy means for correcting the errors. This report was reproduced by Mr. Phillips but his attention was not, to all appearances, directed towards the errors contained in the table.

In the eighth number of Rhode Island Historical Tracts, Mr. Sidney S. Rider reprinted Potter’s account of the Rhode Island currency with some additions and changes.1 When the table was reprinted in this tract the error caused by entering the emissions of 1740 and 1743 in terms of new tenor was corrected and the column of currency outstanding was thus freed from error, but by some strange oversight the careless transfer of the incorrect sterling value for the bills issued to supply the treasury was permitted to stand. The reproduction of Potter’s tract of course carried with it the several appendixes, and in the report of the committee on page 187 the sterling value of the outstanding currency issued to supply the treasury is there given in the words “ten thousand and forty pounds sterling.” Mr. Rider’s edition of the tract has, however, special value, which is greatly increased by illustrations of the Rhode Island currency, many of which were struck off from the original plates.

The subject of the currency of this colony has been treated somewhat at large by Samuel Greene Arnold in his History of Rhode Island.2

Connecticut has also published her colonial records and either because the original records were more methodically

1 The title adopted in this publication was “Some account of the bills of credit or paper money of Rhode Island from the first issue in 1710 to the final issue in 1786.”

2 History of the state of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations, etc., by Samuel Greene Arnold, vol. 2, New York, 1859.

427

kept than in the case of Rhode Island or because they were more skilfully arranged by the editors, the work of analyzing the issues of this colony is comparatively easy. Even here, however, the five per cent. allowances, the interest on loans and the substitutions of new currency for torn bills make it extremely difficult to arrive at conclusions as to the amount in circulation at any given time. A careful and laborious investigation of the records made by Dr. Henry Bronson and the patient analysis of what was found there was published in the first volume of the papers of the New Haven Historical Society. Trumbull, the historian of Connecticut, a contemporary writer, deals to some extent with the currency question, but his observations are of little value. He was optimistic in his views and did not realize what was going on about him.1 Failing to take into account the effect of the circulation of the other colonies, his approval of the moderation of Connecticut leads him to conclude that there was little or no depreciation of the bills of credit before the Spanish war in 1740.

The currency question in the other colonies has interested students and in some of them investigations have been made which furnish material for comparison with the fluctuations of silver in New England. While there has been no attempt in this volume to enter into any explanation of the causes which rendered New York and Pennsylvania partially immune from the severe penalties paid by the New England colonies for their infatuation, it is perhaps desirable to refer here to certain publications, which touch upon these questions.

1 A complete history of Connecticut, civil and educational, from the emigration of its first planters, from England, in the year 1630, to the year 1764, and to the close of the Indian wars, in two volumes, by Benjamin Trumbull, D.D., New Haven, 1818, vol. 2, ch. 3, p. 46, et seq.

428

This work was performed for New York by John H. Hickcox, who published A History of the Bills of Credit or Paper Money issued by New York, etc., in 1866.1 The subject has also found treatment at the hands of Horace White in a tract entitled “New York’s Colonial Currency.”2

In Pennsylvania the subject of the currency attracted the attention of Franklin and in 1729 he published a pamphlet on the subject.3 His interest was further shown by his introduction into the General Magazine,4 of the articles of the Massachusetts silver bank and the prospectus of the Land Bank. Thomas Pownall in his Administration of the Colonies, enters somewhat at length into a discussion of the utility of paper money and embodies in his work what he terms a “very judicious tract written and given to me several years ago by Tench Francis, Esq; late attorney general of the province of Pennsylvania, conversant in these matters both as a lawyer and a merchant.”5 Pownall entitles the tract “Considerations on a Paper Currency.” It does not deal specifically with the Pennsylvania currency, but contains the opinions of an intelligent observer based upon contact

1 A history of the bills of credit or paper money issued by New York, from 1709 to 1789, with a description of the bills and a catalogue of the various issues, by John H. Hickcox, Albany, 1866.

2 Published in Sound currency, a serial issued by the Sound Currency Committee of the Reform Club, New York, vol. 5, no. 5. New York, March 1, 1898.

3 A modest inquiry into the nature and necessity of a paper currency. Works of Benjamin Franklin, etc., by Jared Sparks, Boston, 1836, vol. 2, pp. 253-277.

4 The general magazine and historical chronicle for all the British plantations in America [1741].

5 “The administration of the colonies by Thomas Pownall,” etc., was first published in London in 1764. It went through several editions, the second being published in London in 1765. In this edition the tract in question is to be found on pp. 114-150.

429

with the experiences of that province. A special study of the emissions of Pennsylvania was recently made by C. W. Macfarlane and published under the title of Pennsylvania Paper Currency.1 The value of Mr. Macfarlane’s account is greatly augmented by a prolonged and careful study of the effect of the inflation upon the prices of certain articles, the selection of which was apparently governed mainly by the opportunities afforded for obtaining quotations. These prices he has with great patience tabulated and thus brought together material of great value to the student of topics of this sort. The subject was also treated by Mr. Phillips in the collection of tracts which he published on colonial currency.2

The early plunge which South Carolina took into the sea of inflation soon caused her population to experience in anticipation of her northern neighbors all the evils which arise from reliance upon a nominal and artificial measure of value entirely disproportionate in quantity to the needs of the community. The colonial legislation of South Carolina has been published by the state, and in the pages of these volumes will be found most of the statutes which provided for the emission of bills of credit. The editor of the second volume appended a note on the current values of coins which contains much material of interest.3 The editor of the ninth volume appends without comment a statute passed in 1712 for the emission

1 See Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, vol 8, pp. 50-126. Philadelphia, 1896.

2 Historical sketches of the paper currency of the American colonies, etc., the special title of this tract being An historical sketch of the paper money issued by Pennsylvania, together with an appendix containing a complete list of all the dates, issues, amounts, denominations and signers, by Henry Phillips, Jr.

3 The statutes at large of South Carolina, edited under authority of the legislature, by Thomas Cooper, 1837, vol. 2, p. 708, et seq.

430

of £52,000 and an account of the several issues of currency down to 1739 with comments on the fluctuations of silver. This account is evidently contemporaneous, but there is nothing in the volume to indicate whether it was a reprint or whether it was published from manuscript. It is obviously the report submitted to Parliament which was referred to in a previous chapter.1

Ramsay in the second volume of his history of South Carolina gives an interesting and intelligent account of the currency movement.2 Judge Brevard made free use of Ramsay’s work in a much more elaborate treatise upon the coins in use in the province and the currency emissions which forms a part of the introduction to his digest of the laws of South Carolina.3

The editor of the second volume of the statutes at large, in the still more elaborate note which he appended to that volume, which has already been referred to, in turn relied upon both Ramsay and Brevard. More recently, Edson L. Whitney has devoted a chapter to the currency in his monograph entitled Government of the

1 An account of the rise and progress of the paper bills of credit in South Carolina, from the year 1700 to this present time, together with the computed value in money of Great Britain, of such bills, at the respective times of their creating and issuing, and the value of such bills in money of Great Britain at this time, and also an account of the rates and prices of gold and silver coin in the province of South Carolina in the years 1700, 1710, 1720, 1730, and at this present time. The Statutes at large, etc., vol. 9, edited by D. J. McCord, Columbia, 1841, appendix pp. 766-780 inclusive.

This tract was republished by the Sound Currency Committee of the Reform Club of New York, February 15, 1898, in no. 4, vol. 5, of Sound Currency, under title of South Carolina’s First Paper Money [written in 1739—author unknown].

2 The history of South Carolina from its first settlement in 1670 to the year 1808, in two volumes, by David Ramsay, M.D., Charleston, 1809, vol. 2, pp. 160, et seq.

3 Alphabetical digest of the public statute law of South Carolina, by Joseph Brevard, Charleston, 1814. Introduction, pp. xi, xii.

431

Colony of South Carolina,1 the value of which is greatly increased by copious references to the statutes.

The history of the currency of New Jersey has not attracted the same attention as that of the colonies above mentioned. Mr. Phillips furnished the treatise on this subject included in his Historical Sketches of the paper currency of the American colonies.2

An analysis of the act passed in 1733, whereby Maryland furnished her citizens with public bills of credit for currency, is to be found in a note by the editor of the laws of Maryland which was published in 1765.3

The history of the currency emissions of the province of North Carolina remains to be written.4 The publication of the colonial records furnishes abundant material for a general sketch but the records are deficient as to details.5 These volumes are not indexed, nor do they contain any tables of contents. An examination, page by page, is the only satisfactory manner of determining what is to be found therein bearing upon this question. A search of this kind will reveal a statement of outstanding

1 Johns Hopkins University studies in historical and political science. 13th series I-II. Government of the colony of South Carolina, by Edson L. Whitney, Baltimore, 1895, chapter 10.

2 An historical sketch of the paper money issued by New Jersey, by Henry Phillips, Jr.

3 Laws of Maryland at large, with proper indexes, etc., together with notes and other matters relating to the constitution thereof, extracted from the Provincial records, by Thomas Bacon, etc., Annapolis, 1765, ch. 6, 1733.

4 As in the case of New Hampshire, this statement must be modified in consequence of the publication of Essays on the monetary history of the United States. Part II is entitled The paper currency of North Carolina. Our period is covered by chapters 1 and 2.

5 The colonial records of North Carolina published under supervision of the trustees of the public libraries by order of the general assembly. Collected and edited by William L. Saunders, Secretary of State, Raleigh, 1886. For information collated by the editor, see prefatory notes to vol. 2, pp. 4, 5, and prefatory notes to vol. 3, p. 22.

432

bills which was submitted to the Duke of Newcastle in 1731.1 Another, apparently made in 1733 will be disclosed,2 and also one made in 1736.3 Still another is given which must have been made in the latter part of 1739,4 covering all emissions up to 1740. We can trace the conflicts connected with the adoption of a new tenor bill, which was apparently accomplished in April 1748,5 and finally the statement September 29, 1750, that there were then in circulation of these bills £20,646. 14s., 0d., equal to £15,485. 1s. sterling, the same being their full value in proclamation money which they had sustained without discount from the date of their emission.6 We can find statements that the first bills bore interest,7 and that some of the bills were endowed with limited legal tender attributes.8 At the date of the first emission in 1712, trade was almost exclusively by barter, and various articles or commodities were rated in 1715, apparently with a view of furnishing a basis for their reception by way of trade as well as for furnishing a rate at which the government would receive them.9 Up to and including the emissions of 1735, there had been put out on funds and by way of loan, 1712 to 1735, £140,500, of which there remained in circulation

1 Colonial records of North Carolina, etc., vol. 3, p. 145.

2 Ibid., vol. 3, p. 484.

3 Ibid., vol. 4, pp. 178, 179.

4 Ibid., pp. 418, 419.

5 Ibid., pp. 878, 927, 932.

6 Ibid., p. 1073[.]

7 Ibid., vol. 3, p. 484.

8 Ibid., vol. 4, D. 418.

9 These were Indian corn, tallow, beaver and otter skins, butter, raw buck and doe skins, feathers, pitch, pork, tobacco, leather, wildcat skins, cheese, dressed buck and doe skins, tar, whale oil, and beef. Vol. 4, p. 920.

433

at that time £52,500 and the greater part of this amount remained out until the attempt was made to call the bills in in 1745. Exchange in 1731, with about £40,000 in circulation was rated at about eight in public bills of credit for one sterling.1 With a little over £50,000 in circulation in 1735 and thereafter until 1740 the rate was ten for one.2 This would seem to indicate that a circulation of public bills in excess of £5,000 sterling carried with it a proportionate discount, but when a new bill was issued 1748, £21,350 proclamation money were emitted being equal to £16,012, 10s. sterling and two years after £20,646, 14s. of these bills, then remaining in circulation, were said to have remained at the value at which they were issued.3 This brief outline of the facts relative to the North Carolina currency to be obtained from the published records will sufficiently indicate the value of these volumes to the student of this subject.

Douglass winds up the portion of his “Discourse concerning the currencies, etc.,” which is devoted to the continental colonies with the following: “In the new colony of Georgia, their currency are the trustees sola4 bills sterling; the funds are the allowances by Parliament, and private subscriptions to carry on the settlement.” In these words we have a description, accurate as far as it goes, of a currency which circulated for a

1 Ibid., vol. 3, p. 283.

2 Ibid., vol. 4, pp. 345, 418.

3 Ibid., vol. 4, p. 1073.

4 The meaning of the expression “Bola bill,” becomes obvious after a moments reflection. These bills were intended for currency. They could not circulate if issued in sets. The bill which was emitted had no duplicate and was, therefore, the sole or only bill. The expression must have had a recognized commercial meaning in those days, but it has made no impression upon our legal practice and is not to be found in our law dictionaries.

434

few years in the infant colony of Georgia. It was the only currency used in the colonies which circulated on a sterling basis and although drawn, as appears from the copies of bills furnished by historians, at thirty days sight it is said to have been freely received at its face value. Stevens gives a copy of one of these bills for one pound drawn to the order of James Oglethorpe, and says that while Oglethorpe was in Georgia they were to be issued oily to him.1

Jones gives a copy of a bill for the same amount dated 1749. ft is drawn to the order of four named persons and was payable to them or any two of them. The bill in question was indorsed by two of the payees payable to a third person who endorsed it in blank. These bills were each of them headed “Georgia Bills of Exchange payable in England,” and each on its face was termed “this sola bill of exchange.” Jones says that specific report was required by the trustees to be made of the purpose for which each bill was issued, and adds “More than one hundred and thirty-five thousand dollars were thus sent over to the colony at different times and disbursed in payment of salaries and in discharge of other expenses connected with the execution of the trust.”2 The official account of the progress of the colony published by order of the trustees, under the heading “From the 9th June, 1738 to the 9th June, 1739” says: “The trustees published an advertisement in the London Gazette, and ordered it to be published in the South Carolina Gazette, and to be affixed upon the doors the store houses at Savannah and Frederica that

1 The history of Georgia, etc., by Rev. William Bacon Stevens, M.D., vol. 1, pp. 314-316, 402.

2 The history of Georgia, by Charles C. Jones, Jr., LL.D., vol. 1, pp. 429-430.

435

out of a due regard to public credit they had resolved that all expenses which they had ordered or should order to be made in America for the use of the colony should be defrayed and paid for in Georgia, in sola bills of exchange only, under their seal; and they gave notice, that no person whatsoever had any authority from them or in their name, or for their account, to purchase or receive any cargoes of provisions, stores or necessaries, without paying for them in the said sola bills.”1 This action was attributed by M’Call to frauds practiced upon the trustees by certain merchants and captains of vessels.2 The trustees of the colony were scrupulously careful in providing for the redemption of all the bills reported to them as having been issued.

1 An account, showing the progress of the colony of Georgia, in America, from its first establishment. Published per order of the Honorable the Trustees. London, 1742. Reprinted, Annapolis, 1742. Collections of the Georgia Historical Society, vol. 2, p. 297.

2 The history of Georgia, etc., Capt. Hugh McCall, Savannah, 1811. Vol. 1, p. 120.

Dinsmore Documentation  presents  Classics of American Colonial History

Valid XHTML 1.0!