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CHAPTER VII
JAMES RIVINGTON
“THE ONLY LONDON BOOKSELLER
IN AMERICA”
ON the death of Richard Chiswell in 1711, a London publishing-house established some fifty years before, which had produced in that period, among other books, the fourth folio edition of Shakespeare, passed into the control of Charles Rivington. The new proprietor turned his attention largely to religious publications, and became the founder of a house which earned fame and wealth by following in his footsteps until its very recent dissolution. Charles Rivington had,
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besides, a sound judgment which incited him to urge upon Richardson the writing of a series of “letters, in a common style,” which acquired an instant success under the unforgotten title of “Pamela.” But he also had a humorous appreciation of the foibles of mankind, of which Curwen relates an amusing instance. A poor vicar of a remote country parish had preached a sermon so acceptable to his congregation that they begged him to have it printed. Full of the honor conferred, and the celebrity to come, the parson started to London to find a publisher. He was recommended to Rivington, who accepted his proposals, but was startled with the preacher’s idea that the edition should consist of about thirty-five thousand copies. Rivington remonstrated, but in vain; the author insisted that no less a number would meet the demand, and the matter was settled. The clergyman
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returned home and waited. Two months exhausted his patience, and he wrote demanding an account, adding he was in no hurry for a remittance. In response Rivington sent the following bill:
| The Rev. Dr.—— | |||
| To C. RIVINGTON Dr. | |||
| £ | s | d | |
| To Printing and Paper, 35,000 copies of Sermon | 785 | 5 | 6 |
| By sale of 17 copies of said Sermon | 1 | 5 | 6 |
| Balance due C. Rivington . . . | £784 | 0 | 0 |
The horror of the poor vicar, which can be readily imagined, was soon relieved by the following letter from the printer:
Rev. Sir,—I beg pardon for innocently amusing myself at your expense, but you need not give yourself any uneasiness. I knew better than you could do the extent of the sale of single sermons, and accordingly printed one hundred copies, to the expense of which you are heartily welcome.
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Charles Rivington died in 1742, and was succeeded in business by his sons John and James.
James Rivington was born in London in 1724, and with his brother continued the business in the channel it had been led into by their father—the publication of works mostly of a religious character until sometime after 1752. On September 14 of that year he married a daughter of Thomas Mynshull of Charlton Hall, Lancashire, and about 1754 he withdrew from St. Paul’s Churchyard and began business first with one Millar and then in partnership with James Fletcher “at the Oxford Theatre in Pater-noster Row.” His connection with the latter began early in 1756, but their first notable publication did not appear until about May, 1757. It was Smollett’s “History of England,” in four quarto volumes, and it is said that the author realized £2000, and the publishers
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£10,000, by its publication. Rivington & Fletcher issued a number of other very successful works, among which were “Newcomb’s Version of Hervey’s Contemplations,” Mably’s “Principles of Negociation,” “Enquiries concerning the First Inhabitants of Europe,” “Memoirs of the Royal Academy of Surgery at Paris,” “The Natural and Civil History of California,” and “A Dialogue between General Wolfe and the Marquis Montcalm.” The wealth acquired by success in business enabled Rivington to keep a carriage and live in handsome style, while his manners and address were such as to gain for him a footing in the higher classes of English society. He became devoted to the turf and a regular attendant of the races at Newmarket. During the season of 1759 his losses were so heavy that he thought himself ruined, and persuaded one of his creditors in January,
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1760, to have him declared a bankrupt. His assignee was finally enabled to pay twenty shillings on the pound, and hand over a balance to Rivington.
In September, 1760, he opened a book-store in Hanover Square, New York, announcing himself as the “only London Bookseller in America.” In January, 1761, he removed to Philadelphia and opened a store there, leaving his New York house in the care of an agent. The arrangement underwent a change in 1762. Samuel Brown, of whom a brief notice will be found on page 58, became his partner, and took charge of the business in New York. Rivington brought out a considerable stock of books from London, of which he issued a catalogue in November, 1760, no copy of which is now known to exist. A copy of “A Catalogue of Books sold by Rivington and Brown at their Stores in New York and Philadelphia,”
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issued in 1762, has been preserved. It is a small pamphlet of ninety pages, and is divided into two parts, the first of which comprises 783 titles, to many of which are appended long descriptive notes and extracts. Among the books catalogued are “The Rambler”; Smollett’s indecent “Ferdinand Fathom” and famous “Peregrine Pickle”; “Chrysal”; “The Spectator”; “The Tatler”; Anson’s “Voyages”; Cibber’s “Lives of the Poets”; Plutarch’s “Lives”; “History of the Devil, written by Daniel Defoe, father of the late Mr. Defoe, Merchant at NewYork”; Middleton’s “Cicero”; the works of Addison, Pope, and Swift; several editions of Shakespeare and Dryden; Bayle’s “Dictionary”; a complete edition of Voltaire’s works, then appearing monthly, with Smollett’s name as translator; Walton’s “Complete Angler”; “The American Gazetteer”; many school-books, works on mathematics,
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architecture, astronomy, husbandry, etc.; and two or three pages of novels and plays. To Rousseau’s “New Heloise” Rivington gives as a note an extract from the preface filling twelve pages, while from Smollett’s “History of England” he quotes the characters given of the elder Pitt and General Wolfe. The last five pages are filled with one-line titles of books which “were the Library of a Gentleman of genteel Taste.” This list comprises three hundred and fifty volumes, and is interesting and instructive in showing the extent of colonial reading in the middle provinces. Theology, to which, according to McMaster, the New England library was almost confined, finds but little space. Pufendorf, Locke, Sidney, Machiavelli, Milton, and Johnson’s Dictionary appear among the folios; Newton’s “Principia,” Francis’s “Horace,” Plutarch, Swift, Pope, Smollett, and Sydenhaan
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among the octavos; Shakespeare,”The Spectator,” “Tom Jones,” Moliere’s plays (in French), and other lighter works, among the duodecimos. There is a sprinkling of Americana too, such as the “Laws of Pennsylvania,” printed by Bradford in 1714; Franklin’s “Cato Major,” and Stith’s “Virginia.” At the end of the catalogue Rivington offers: “The greatest Variety of elegant Pocket-books with Knives, Scissars [sic], Pencils, Cork-screws, &c. &c.” “Also an elegant Assortment of Jewelry; consisting of Diamond, Garnet, and Past [sic] Ornaments for Ladies and Gentlemen, and of Gold, Pinchbeck and Silver Buckles.” “With the very Best Green, and Bohea Teas, Finest Snuffs.”
Until the advent of Rivington it was generally possible to tell from an American bookseller’s advertisements in the current newspapers whether the work offered for sale was printed in
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America or England. But the books he received in every fresh invoice from London were “Just published by James Rivington,” and this form was speedily adopted by the other book-sellers, so that after 1761 the advertisements of books are no longer a guide to the issues of the colonial press. Some of the pamphlets announced by Rivington were no doubt printed for him in Philadelphia or New York, but it is difficult to distinguish them. In 1762 he further extended his business by establishing a store in Boston. This was discontinued, however, in 1765, on the death of the person to whom its management was committed. He withdrew from Philadelphia in 1763 or 1764, and returned to New York, and soon afterward dissolved his connection with Brown. After 1765 he confined his business to New York, where he was not successful, and finally became a second time a bankrupt.
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He soon recovered, and in 1767 was keeping a book-store under the name of J. Rivington & Co. In January, 1769, he was admitted a Freeman of the City of New York, and in March of the same year married his second wife, Elizabeth Van Home. This lady was an aunt of the Revolutionary belles described so vivaciously in Becky Frank’s letter to her sister, Mrs. Andrew Hamilton of Philadelphia, which is printed in “The Re-publican Court,” except a few sentences. One of these, relating to Cornelia Van Horne, reads: “Her feet as you desire I’ll say nothing about [and then, like a woman, does directly the contrary], they are V. Horn’s and what you ’d call Willings.”
About 1772 Rivington moved to a shop “facing the Coffee-House bridge,” and toward the close of that year added a printing-office to his book-store, where, in 1773, he began the
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publication of a newspaper, to which I shall refer later on. A sermon by the Rev. John Sayre, a volume of church music, a catalogue of books for sale at his store, and a couple of almanacs were the only separate publications of his press during the first year of its existence. But in the following year his business as printer became one of the most active in the country. Besides the two volumes of Cook’s “Voyages,” with plates engraved by the Boston silversmith of midnight-ride fame—Paul Revere—he issued some forty other publications. These were mostly political pamphlets called forth by the dispute between the colonies and Great Britain. Rivington printed for both sides with great impartiality. Among his publications in 1774 are Hamilton’s replies to Seabury, Wilkins, and Cooper, whose pamphlets were also printed on Rivington’s press. The latter’s
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“American Querist” called forth the following card from the printer:
Last Week the Heads of the Flatbergasted Fraternity, who have lately affected to stile themselves the Public, in solemn Conclave audited the Queries contained in the following Book, and on finding some they could not, and others they would not answer, with a Candour, Justice and Decorum, by which their Proceedings have ever been distinguished, they committed it to the Flames; in immediate Consequence of which the Printer has been called upon by large demands for the Editio Altera, of this piece. When you damn the Printer, and burn his Pamphlet, he laughs, reprints, triumphs and fills his Pocket.
In 1775 Rivington issued some twenty-eight political brochures, nearly all on the Tory side. Among them were Sewall’s “The Americans Roused, in a Cure for the Spleen,” Chandler’s “What think ye of the Congress Now?” Barry’s “The General, attacked By a Subaltern,” and Galloway’s “Candid Examination.” The last called for “An
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Answer,” and to this Galloway wrote “A Reply” which was printed by Rivington in April, but not published until his return to New York in January, 1777, as the following advertisement in Game’s “New York Gazette” shows:
The above pamphlet was printed by James Rivington about a twelve month ago; but the spirit of persecution and sedition raged so high at that time he dared not publish it. The last sheet had been scarcely struck off, when an armed mob surrounded his house, and forcibly carried off all his types.
Also, Leonard’s “Present Political State of Massachusetts” and “Origin of the American Contest,” “The Patriots of North-America,” and “The Triumph of the Whigs.” On the American side he printed several tracts, such as Burke’s speeches in Parliament, Arthur Lee’s “Appeal to the People of Great Britain,” General Charles Lee’s “Letters” and “Strictures” on the “Friendly Address,” and Hamilton’s
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“The Farmer Refuted.” Besides these controversial publications he also printed a four-volume edition of Chesterfield’s “Letters,” “A Short State of the Proceedings of the Proprietors of East and West Jersey, Relative to the Line of division between them,” and Bernard Romans’s “Concise Natural History of East and West Florida.” The last-mentioned nugget, like the Wilmington edition of Filson’s “Kentucky,” is always found without the two large maps promised on the title-page. The maps were engraved by some one who resided far up the Hudson, were printed on paper made at Wilcox’s mills near Philadelphia, and their completion was announced on May 4, 1775, in Rivington’s newspaper. At present but a single copy of each is known, both of which are in the collection of the Historical Society of Pennsylvania.
In the “Gazetteer” of April 13,
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1775, Rivington announced as in the press “The Republican Dissected: Or the Anatomy of an American Whig, in Answer to the Farmer Refuted,” which brought the popular feeling against him to a climax. The Whigs of Newport, Rhode Island, had passed resolutions condemning his course on March 1, and similar action was taken at Freehold, New Jersey, a week later. He had during the previous year indulged in an epistolary quarrel with Isaac Sears, the leader of the “Sons of Liberty” in New York, which partook of a very personal character, and in which Rivington made Sears appear both ill-tempered and illiterate, and, of course, ridiculous. Sears now seized the opportunity for revenge, and heading a body of “Sons of Liberty” from Connecticut, attacked Rivington, and destroyed the sheets and manuscript of “The Republican Dissected,” and much more of the printer’s property. This act
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was disavowed by the leading Whigs, and the New York Provincial Convention several times endeavored to obtain from Connecticut pecuniary compensation for the damages Rivington had sustained. Soon after Sears’s raid Rivington was formally arrested, but after being detained some time he “signed the General Association,” published a handbill declaring his intention to adhere to it, and asking pardon for his ill-judged publications, and was thereupon “permitted to re-turn to his house and family.” While under arrest he addressed the following protest to the Continental Congress at Philadelphia:
Whereas the subscriber, by the freedom of his publications during the present unhappy disputes between Great Britain and her Colonies, has brought upon himself much public displeasure and resentment, in consequence of which his life has been endangered, his property invaded, and a regard to his personal safety requires
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him still to be absent from his family and business; and whereas, it has been ordered by the Committee of Correspondence for the city of New York that a report of the state of his case should be made to the Continental Congress, that the manner of his future treatment may be submitted to their direction, he thinks himself happy in having at last for his judges gentlemen of eminent rank and distinction in the Colonies, from whose enlarged and liberal sentiments he flatters himself that he can receive no other than an equitable sentence, unbiased by popular clamor and resentment. He humbly presumes that the very respectable gentlemen of the Congress now sitting at Philadelphia will permit him to declare, and, as a man of honor and veracity, he can and does solemnly declare that however wrong and mistaken he may have been in his opinions, he has always meant honestly and openly to do his duty as a servant of the public. Accordingly his conduct, as a printer, has always been conformable to the ideas which he entertained of English liberty, warranted by the practice of all printers in Great Britain and Ireland for a century past, under every administration; authorized, as he conceives, by the laws of England, and countenanced by the declaration of the late Congress. He declares that his press
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has been always open and free to all parties, and for the truth of this fact appeals to his publications, among which are to be reckoned all the pamphlets, and many of the best pieces that have been written in this and the neighboring Colonies in favor of the American claims. However, having found that the inhabitants of the Colonies were not satisfied with this plan of conduct, a few weeks ago he published in his paper a short apology, in which he assured the public that he would be cautious for the future of giving any further offence. To this declaration he resolves to adhere, and he cannot but hope for the patronage of the public, so long as his conduct shall be found to correspond with it. It is his wish and ambition to be an useful member of society. Although an Englishman by birth, he is an American by choice, and he is desirous of devoting his life, in the business of his profession, to the service of the country he has adopted for his own. He lately employed no less than sixteen workmen, at near one thousand pounds annually; and his consumption of printing paper, the manufacture of Pennsylvania, New York, Connecticut, and the Massachusetts Bay, has amounted to nearly that sum. His extensive foreign correspondence, his large acquaintance in Europe and America, and the manner of his education, are circumstances which,
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he conceives, have not improperly qualified him for the station in which he wishes to continue, and in which he will exert every endeavor to be useful. He therefore humbly submits his case to the honorable gentlemen now assembled in the Continental Congress, and begs that their determination may be such as will secure him, especially as it is the only thing that can effectually secure him in the safety of his person, the enjoyment of his property, and the uninterrupted prosecution of his business.
May 20, 1775. James Rivington.
Toward the close of 1775 he once more made himself obnoxious to the Revolutionary party, and in November of that year his office was again mobbed and its contents almost entirely destroyed. In January, 1776, Rivington left New York for London, in the ship Sansom, in company with a number of other loyalists. After a stay in England of more than a year, he returned to New York with a new outfit and the appointment of “Printer to his Majesty,” but printed
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nothing worth mentioning until the following year. Among his publications during 1778 were: “The Ad-ventures of a British Nobleman at Paris, or the art of ruining a man of fashion in fourteen days, said to be written by a Mr. Routledge, who melted his twelve thousand Louis there in the above space, and then returned pensive and chop fallen to recruit in his native country”; Anstey’s “Election Ball,” a volume of spurious “Letters from General Washington,” Charles Lee’s “Account of the treatment of Major-General Conway,” Pratt’s “Pupil of Pleasure,” Robertson’s “History of America,” an “Army List,” and some lampoons on the Americans, such as “The Diaboliad,” “The Triumph of Folly,” and “A full and perfect List of the rebel Council, Assembly, Committees, etc., etc., of the Province of Massachusetts Bay.” His business as a publisher
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began to decline in 1779, and with the exception of a reprint of Tickell’s “Anticipation” and a collection of “Songs, Naval and Military,” compiled by himself, I know of nothing from his press worthy of mention. In regard to the last-mentioned volume the following advertisement was inserted in “The Royal Gazette” of March 10, 1779:
The printer being employed at the desire of many gentlemen, in compiling a collection of Navy, Military, and Constitutional Songs, and being in want of the following, begs the favour of any Gentlemen, possessed of the words, to oblige him as soon as possible with copies of them: Genius of England, and Sing all y Muses, by Purcell; Grog is the Liquor of Life, by Harry Greene; The Soldier who Danger and Death doth despise; Hot Stuff, by Colonel Hale, of the 47th.
The collection was published in “a pocket volume” on March 24. It is curious to note that the last-mentioned
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song had appeared in his own paper of May 5, 1774 (with the “clever but indecent” concluding verse which Sargent printed on a separate leaf), and was then ascribed to “Ned” Botwood, a sergeant of Hale’s regiment. Could a copy of this collection now be found, we might have a new and enlarged edition of “The Loyalist Poetry of the Revolution.”
Rivington’s publications during 1780 were few but varied in their character. The report of the trial of André came from his press some six months after the “Cow-Chace,” the original manuscript of which is now in the Childs collection at the Drexel Institute; and Bogatzky’s “God’s Thoughts of War in Peace,” and “A Discourse upon Devilism,” appeared at about a like interval. André’s “Cow-Chace” appeared originally in three numbers of “The Royal Gazette,” the last canto on the very day of his capture,
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a singular verification of its prophetic epilogue:
|
And now I’ve clos’d my epic strain, I tremble as I show it,
Lest this same warrior-drover Wayne Should ever catch the poet. |
In 1781 he issued “The Candid Retrospect, or the American War, examined by Whig Principles,” Raynal’s “Revolution in America,” “The New Duty of Man,” and Miss Seward’s “Monody on André”; and in 1782, “The Amusing Practice of the Italian Language” and the “Paris Papers, or Mr. Silas Deane’s late intercepted Letters,” the latter in a small volume now of great rarity. In 1783 he published the last of the British “Army Lists” printed in America, and reprinted “Advice to the Officers of the British Army,” and one or two other pamphlets. After the royal forces withdrew from New York, Rivington
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was allowed to remain, and continued business until near the beginning of the present century, when he again failed and retired finally from active life, and resided with his son James, a half-pay officer of the British army. He published a few books after the war, such as “The Democrat or Intrigues and Adventures of Jean Le Noir from his Enlistment as a Drummer in General Rochambeau’s Army and Arrival at Boston,” and a book of “Fairy Tales” with nine copperplates engraved by Alexander Anderson, but confined himself mainly to selling books and stationery. Dr. Francis, in his “Old New York,” gives us a glimpse of “Rivington in rich purple velvet coat, full wig and cane, and ample frills, dealing good stationery to his customers.” Rivington has been charged with being a traitor to the royal cause when it became the losing side, by furnishing Washington
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with information as to the movements of the British; but the tale as told by Lossing is loaded with such marvelous details as to the way in which his communications were made as to east discredit on the main assertion. He certainly retained to the end the respect of Carleton, the last British commander-in-chief in New York, who when peace was a practical necessity for England, presented his sons John and James with commissions in the British army, which enabled them to enjoy half pay from 1783 until their deaths, without having seen any active service. Rivington died in New York City (one of whose streets still bears his name), July 3, 1802, and was buried in the yard of the old Dutch church on Nassau street, the site of which is now covered by a modern office-building. At the time of his death he was the senior “Liveryman” of the “Stationers’ Company of London.”