(AMERICAN REVOLUTION PRELUDE) [Vardill James] To the Worthy

Sale 2505 - Lot 14

Price Realized: $ 1,375

?Final Price Realized includes Buyer’s Premium added to Hammer Price

Estimate: $ 2,000 - $ 3,000

(AMERICAN REVOLUTION--PRELUDE.) [Vardill, James.] To the Worthy Inhabitants of the City of New-York. Letterpress broadside, 17 x 10 1/2 inches, signed in type by "Poplicola"; minor wear and dampstaining, repairs along horizontal fold with minimal loss of text, spot-mounted to mat board along top edge. [New York: James Rivington, 1773]

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Additional Details

One of a series of three broadsides under this title by "Poplicola," the pseudonym of loyalist James Vardill. They were all issued as supplements to Rivington's New-York Gazetteer. Poplicola argued that the British tax on tea was reasonable and lawful. This broadside begins with the patriotic-sounding "Every good citizen will be inclined from duty as well as interest, to love his country, and to be zealous in advancing its welfare." It concludes "While we are watchful against external attacks on our freedom, let us be on our guard, lest we become enslaved by dangerous tyrants within." "Poplicola's arguments touched a nerve. If Poplicola was truly a great friend to his country, one anonymous writer demanded, he would sign his own name"--Allison, The Boston Tea Party, page 31. Evans 12956. 3 copies in ESTC, and none traced at auction. Provenance: From the estate of Kenneth Silverman, a Pulitzer Prize-winning biographer. Mr. Silverman was a specialist in Colonial American literature and the co-director of the program in American civilization at New York University.