A Counterfeiter's Paradise (37 page)

25–26, The only account

The people and places Sullivan mentions in his narrative are corroborated by the available evidence; the characters that appear in the confession (Captain Gillmore, Captain Bradbury, et al.) existed at the times and locations that Sullivan places them. The proper names are usually spelled wrong (Sullivan’s hometown Fethard appears as Fedard, Bradbury is spelled Bradbery), which suggests that Sullivan narrated the account while someone, most likely the printer, transcribed it by hand, writing out phonetically the names he didn’t recognize. As it’s impossible to confirm the truthfulness of much of the confession, I have relied on it only in part, mostly in sketching the otherwise unknown story of Sullivan’s life before 1749. A word on the time line: based on the confession, I’ve calculated he was probably born in 1723, spent his childhood in Ireland in the 1720s and 1730s, and departed for America in 1742.

26, Sullivan started hearing

“[F]rom my youth…”:
Sullivan,
A Short Account
, p. 3.

26–27, At the age of thirteen

Irish landscape: Constantine FitzGibbon,
The Irish in Ireland
(New York: W. W. Norton, 1983), pp. 220–221, and Mike Cronin,
A History of Ireland
(New York: Palgrave, 2001), pp. 88–93.
“miserable dress…”:
quoted in Redcliffe Nathan Salaman,
The History and Social Influence of the Potato
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1970 [1949]), p. 251.
“clothes so ragged…”:
quoted in Arthur P. I. Samuels,
The Early Life, Correspondence, and Writings of the Rt. Hon. Edmund Burke
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1923), pp. 172–173.

27, Anglo-Irish Protestants

Population growth: Liam de Paor,
The Peoples of Ireland: From Prehistory to Modern Times
(Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame Press, 1986), p. 184. English economic restrictions on Ireland: Sean J. Connolly,
Religion, Law, and Power: The Making of Protestant Ireland, 1660–1760
(Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002 [1992]), p. 107. Regular harvest failures and the 1740 famine: Daniel Webster Hollis III,
The History of Ireland
(Westport, CT: Greenwood, 2001), pp. 69–85.

27–28, A young face

Beggars and landless laborers: FitzGibbon,
The Irish in Ireland
, pp. 222–223. Sullivan ended up in Limerick County, about one hundred miles northwest from his hometown of Fethard (now Fethard-on-Sea).

28, Once he had recovered

“After I got well…”:
Sullivan,
A Short Account
, p. 6.

29, In the fall

The
Sea-Flower
incident: in
A Report of the Record Commissioners of the City of Boston, Containing the Records of Boston Selectmen, 1736 to 1742
(Boston: Rockwell and Churchill, 1886), pp. 317–318, and
Boston Post Boy
, November 23, 1741.

29–30, Fifteen days

“Just arrived…”:
Boston Gazette
, December 1, 1741.

30, While an extreme case

Scene with the biscuits: Sullivan,
A Short Account
, p. 6.

30–31, The reason for

Conditions endured by indentured servants en route to America: Sharon V. Salinger,
“To Serve Well and Faithfully”: Labor and Indentured Servants in Pennsylvania, 1682–1800
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1987), pp. 87–97.

31, If Sullivan came

In
A Short Account
, pp. 6–7, Sullivan reports that his seven-year indenture was sold to Captain Gillmore, whom he served in “chopping of Wood and clearing of Land” near the St. George River in Maine. James Gillmore’s signature appears on a letter written on August 6, 1742, by several residents of the St. George region to Massachusetts governor William Shirley complaining of their cattle and horses being killed by Indians. The letter is included in the Massachusetts Archives Collection (1603–1799), vol. 31, p. 414, at the Massachusetts Archives. For more on the conflict over Maine, see George Bancroft,
History of the United States of America, From the Discovery of the Continent
, vol. 2 (New York: D. Appleton, 1895 [1837]), pp. 175–211, and Francis Parkman,
Pioneers of France in the New World
(Boston: Little, Brown, 1918 [1865]). Dummer’s Treaty, in 1725, had brought about a period of relative peace between the English settlers and the Indians.

31–32, The next conflict

Charles VI’s meal: Eduard Vehse,
Memoirs of the Court, Aristocracy, and Diplomacy of Austria
, vol. 2, trans. Franz Demmler (London: Longman, Brown, Green, and Longmans, 1856), p. 163. See also William W. Ford and Ernest D. Clark, “A Consideration of the Properties of Poisonous Fungi,”
Mycologia
6.4 (July 1914), p. 168. The beginning of the War of the Austrian Succession: Reed Browning,
The War of the Austrian Succession
(New York: St. Martin’s Griffin, 1995), pp. 37–54.
“This plate of champignons…”:
Voltaire,
Memoirs of the Life of Voltaire: Written by Himself
, trans. unknown (London: G. Robinson, 1784), p. 49.

32, Despite heavy fighting

Delay in news reaching Boston and French surprise attack: George A. Rawlyk,
Nova Scotia’s Massachusetts: A Study of Massachusetts–Nova Scotia Relations, 1630 to 1784
(Montreal: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 1973), pp. 136–140. Gillmore’s flight: Sullivan,
A Short Account
, p. 7. Jabez Bradbury was a commanding officer at the fort at St. George River from 1747 to 1756, according to the fort’s payrolls held by the Massachusetts Archives: the Massachusetts Archives Collections (1603–1799), vol. 092, pp. 81–83, 88; vol. 093, pp. 51, 91–93, 152, 168; and vol. 094, p. 138. I’m grateful to John Hannigan of the Massachusetts Archives for finding this material.

32–33, Bradbury was a veteran

In 1755, Bradbury testified that he had been in Maine for thirty years; see Fannie Hardy Eckstrom, “Who Was Paugus?”
New England Quarterly
12.2 (June 1939), p. 210. Bradbury’s past and frontier milieu: Ronald Oliver Macfarlane, “The Massachusetts Bay Truck-Houses in Diplomacy with the Indians,”
New England Quarterly
11.1 (March 1938), pp. 48–65. Bradbury took command in 1742: Cyrus Eaton,
History of Thomaston, Rockland, and South Thomaston, Maine
, vol. 1 (Hallowell, ME: Masters, Smith, 1865), pp. 52–53.
“diliverd from this…”:
James Phinney Baxter, ed.,
Documentary
History of the State of Maine, Containing the Baxter Manuscripts
, vol. 24 (Portland, ME: Fred L. Tower, 1916), pp. 45–46. Bradbury and Shirley corresponded frequently in the 1740s and 1750s about Indian unrest in Maine.

33, While Sullivan and Bradbury’s

The Louisbourg siege: Rawlyk,
Nova Scotia’s Massachusetts
, pp. 154–155, 166–172.

34, Remarkably, though, the siege

The festivities: ibid., pp. 172–174.
“The churl and niggard…”:
Boston Evening-Post
, July 8, 1745, quoted ibid., p. 174.

34, Not everyone greeted

The attack on the fort in July 1745: Samuel Gardner Drake,
A Particular History of the Five Years French and Indian War in New England and Parts Adjacent
(Albany: Joel Munsell, 1870), pp. 79–80, and Eaton,
History of Thomaston, Rockland, and South Thomaston, Maine
, pp. 55–56. The scalped corpse of the prisoner: from a letter from Bradbury to Shirley dated July 29, 1745, included in Charles Henry Lincoln, ed.,
Correspondence of William Shirley: Governor of Massachusetts and Military Commander in America, 1731–1760
, vol. 1 (New York: Macmillan, 1912), p. 261.

34–35, Sullivan witnessed

In
A Short Account
, p. 7, Sullivan says he served Bradbury for two years from the time that the war broke out (in 1744), which means he didn’t go to Louisbourg until 1746, the year after its capture. Military service by indentured servants: Richard B. Morris,
Government and Labor in Early America
(New York: Octagon Books, 1975 [1946]), pp. 282–290.
“took great Delight…”:
Sullivan,
A Short Account
, p. 7.

35, Perhaps for someone

Hardships of life in Louisbourg: Rawlyk,
Nova Scotia’s Massachusetts
, pp. 175–177. Twelve hundred soldiers dying of sickness: from a letter by William Pepperrell, quoted ibid., p. 177.

35–36, During the two

“I unhappily Married…”
and
“aggravating Tongue”:
Sullivan,
A Short Account
, p. 7.

36, Fortunately for Sullivan

The Treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle: Fred Anderson,
Crucible of War: The Seven Years’ War and the Fate of Empire in British North America, 1754–1766
(New York: Vintage, 2001), pp. 35–36. Almost everything reverted to the map before the war, except for a few small concessions: for example, Prussia kept the Austrian territory of Silesia. The amount of the reimbursement was £183,649 2s. 7d., according to Rawlyk,
Nova Scotia’s Massachusetts
, p. 177.

36–37, While the windfall delighted

The Louisbourg cross: Alison D. Overholt, “University Returns Louisbourg Cross to Canada,”
Harvard Crimson
, June 30, 1995; John George Bourinot, “Once Famous Louisbourg,”
Magazine of American History with Notes and Queries
, vol. 27, ed. Martha J. Lamb (New York: Historical Publication Co., 1892), p. 191.

37, Sullivan returned to

“I thought it…”:
Sullivan,
A Short Account
, p. 8.

CHAPTER TWO

38, On a summer day

Descriptions of Providence: Charles Rappleye,
Sons of Providence: The Brown Brothers, the Slave Trade, and the American Revolution
(New York: Simon & Schuster, 2006), pp. 8–9; Lynne Withey,
Urban Growth in Colonial Rhode Island: Newport and Providence in the Eighteenth Century
(Albany: State University of New York Press, 1984), pp. 9–10; and William Eaton Foster,
Stephen Hopkins: A Rhode Island Statesman. A Study in the Political History of the Eighteenth Century
, pt. 1 (Providence: Sidney S. Rider, 1884), pp. 86–88. Meadows outside the town: Andrew Burnaby,
Travels Through the Middle Settlements in North America in the Years 1759 and 1760
(New York: A. Wessels, 1904 [1775]), p. 131.

38, When they had

Scene with Stephens: Owen Sullivan,
A Short Account of the Life, of John——Alias Owen Syllavan…
(Boston: Green & Russell, 1756), pp. 9–10. Stephens, whose full name is given in court documents as Nicholas Stephens Jr., was a laborer from Dighton, Bristol County, Rhode Island, according to his case entry in the Superior Court of Judicature, Court of Assize, and General Gaol Delivery, Providence County, Record Book 1, September Term, 1752,
Rex v. Stephens
, p. 97 (Judicial Archives, Supreme Court Judicial Record Center, Pawtucket, RI).

39, The Providence jail

The arrest of Sullivan’s associates and
“he is now in the Country…”
:
Boston Post Boy
, August 17, 1752. See also Kenneth Scott,
Counterfeiting in Colonial Rhode Island
(Providence: Rhode Island Historical Society, 1960), pp. 31–33, and
Counterfeiting in Colonial America
(Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2000 [1957]), p. 188. Providence’s taverns, churches, and inns: Rappleye,
Sons of Providence
, p. 8.

39, Colonial Americans had

The challenges of capturing and convicting counterfeiters in the colonial era: Scott,
Counterfeiting in Colonial
America
, pp. 9–10.

39–40, Sullivan was caught

History and location of Providence jail: William R. Staples,
Annals of the Town of Providence, From Its First Settlement, to the Organization of the City Government, in June, 1832
(Providence: Knowles and Vose, 1843), p. 180. Providence’s commerce with the West Indies: Gertrude Selwyn Kimball,
Providence in Colonial Times
(Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1912), pp. 275–276. The wooden drawbridge: Rappleye,
Sons of Providence
, p. 8. Beds of oysters and clams on the eastern side of the river: Richard M. Bayles, ed.,
History of Providence County, Rhode Island
(New York: W. W. Preston, 1891), pp. 134–135. Providence in mid-eighteenth century: Foster,
Stephen Hopkins
, pp. 87–88. Population estimates: Rappleye,
Sons of Providence
, p. 8; Bayles,
History of Providence County
, p. 3. Location of the shipyard: Foster,
Stephen Hopkins
, p. 88. For the overall layout of colonial Providence and its environs, see the 1750 map of the town included in John Hutchins Cady,
The Civic and Architectural Development of Providence, 1636–1950
(Providence: The Book Shop, 1957), p. 27.

40, By the time

“exceedingly well Counterfeited…”:
Boston Post Boy
, August 17, 1752. The report was reprinted in the
Boston Gazette, or Weekly Journal
, August 18, 1752, and the
New-York Evening Post
, August 24, 1752; shorter notices of the arrest are also found in the
Boston Evening-Post
, October 9, 1752, and the
New-York Gazette Revived in the Weekly Post-Boy
, October 16, 1752.

40–41, Providence provided

Political struggle between Providence and Newport: Mack E. Thompson, “The Ward-Hopkins Controversy and the American Revolution in Rhode Island: An Interpretation,”
William and Mary Quarterly
16.3 (July 1959), pp. 363–375. Rhode Island printed money by licensing “banks” to emit currency; see Henry Phillips,
Historical Sketches of the Paper Currency of the American Colonies, Prior to the Adoption of the Federal Constitution
(Roxbury, MA: W. Elliot Woodward, 1865), pp. 101–111.