their fortunes. Among the number was Gen. Heath, who though not absolutely poor could not be called rich. He was the cultivator of an excellent farm which had descended to him from his ancestors through five generations.* The retirement which Gen. Heath here enjoyed enabled him to devote considerable time to reading, for which he had a taste, the perusal and arrangement of his papers, which he esteemed of great value, and to writing a book which he perhaps had as well not written. His 'Memoirs' were near blasting his reputation for that good judgment which in service had made him very much esteemed and respected. But this must not be a handle for censure; the letters which he addressed to persons. in all stations during fourteen years of public service forming the bulk of his writings are the best evidence not only of his understanding, but also of his integrity and good heart, and are far from being inelegant compositions. What induced him to publish a private journal hastily written, not so much with reference to public events as to record the trifling occurrences of the camp, cannot be accounted for unless by supposing that he was persuaded by his friends to do what he would otherwise never have thought of, and this in fact he confesses.

"Very fortunately Gen. Heath prized these papers so much as to carefully lay them aside and at his leisure to file them, though without any particular method. He preserved many other papers which fell into his hands,

*This farm, after the death of his son William Heath three years since, was sold, and has been divided by roads and built on. It extends along the south side of what is called Parker's hill in Roxbury, and formerly included the land on the opposite side of Heath Street. The old mansion, with its shady buttonwood trees, is left, but is not occupied by the family. [From the records of the First Church in Roxbury it appears that the younger William Heath died March 8, 1836, which establishes approximately the date when Mr. Lawrence's memorandum was written.]

which are more voluminous. These comprise trials by court-martial, reports of the guards on duty, petitions, receipts, returns of the men, provisions and arms, and different kinds of certificates. The whole number may be twenty thousand. They were preserved in oaken trunks with care till Gen. Heath's death, when they fell into the hands of his son William. Owing to some peculiarities this gentleman was averse to bringing his valuable legacy to the light, and excepting to a few persons he refused admittance to them, and in no instance would he allow them to be taken from the

garret of his paternal mansion. Even the biographer of Washington, though he applied for them himself, and was assisted with the kind offices of a neighboring gentleman, was unable to obtain possession of them while he was completing his great work.

"The death of this, the last of the name of William Heath was followed, as was mentioned before, by the sale of a great part of the farm, which was induced by the high price of land at that time, and the principal heirs having farms of their own. The papers were still preserved, though in considerable disorder, and at the sale of some of the furniture with a view of renting the old mansion, when some of them were accidentally exposed, they were carried back to their chests, with a good deal of feeling on the part of the owners. time after this they were induced to part with them after considerable negociation, since which they have been arranged in the order of time in volumes, with indices of the letters in each, and have been strongly bound; the whole forming twenty-six large folios. Besides which there are seventeen volumes of newspapers and pamphlets, each of which contains a memorandum of

Some

some event which is noted in Gen. Heath's handwriting in the margin. They comprise more than three hundred letters from Gen. Washington, many of them written confidentially; many from John and Samuel Adams, Hancock, Jay, Hamilton, Laurens, Morris, Trumbull, the Clintons, Livingstons, Thompson, McKean, and others of less note, members of civil bodies; from Lee, Gates, Greene, Putnam, Knox, St. Clair, Sullivan, Lincoln, Wayne, Stark, Mifflin, Stirling, Schuyler, Prescott, Paterson, McDougall, and other American officers, not excepting the traitor Arnold; from Lafayette, D'Estaing, Rochambeau, Steuben, Kosciusco, Armand, Villefranche, Viomenil, De Ternay, Gouvion, Chastellux, and other allies; from Burgoyne, Phillips, Hamilton, Campbell, Tarleton, Reidesel, Specht, Dalrymple, Pigot, and other officers in the British army.

"The letters are not of a general character, but almost wholly relate to the details of the camp, so that as historical papers they are not separately valuable, but taken together they exhibit the state of the country and the manner of carrying on the war in a more vivid light than can be obtained from any regular history. The interest in them is increased by seeing the original handwritings.'

To this very full and exact description little need be added. The arrangement of the papers under Mr. Lawrence's direction was in the main well carried out; but in a few instances letters were misplaced, and inserted in a different year from that to which they belonged; and there were a few other mistakes of lesser importance. Many of the letters bear marks of having been written in great haste, and by persons of very little education; but the chief difficulty in reading them arises from the bad

h

spelling, especially of proper names. In the case of letters written by General Heath, with but a few exceptions, we have only his rough draughts, which are mere scrawls with numerous omissions and interlineations; but his alterations were made with so much care and exactness that there can be little or no doubt that the letters actually sent were verbatim copies of the draughts as we find them, though the spelling is extremely careless, and was probably corrected in the fair copy.

Major-General William Heath was a descendant from William Heath, who came over from London in September, 1632, settled as a farmer in Roxbury, and was made a freeman in March, 1633. In 1634, and in several later years, he was a deputy to the General Court, and at his death in 1652 he was described by Rev. John Eliot, as "an able, godly, and faithful brother." His more distinguished descendant, Major-General Heath, was born on the ancestral farm March 2, 1737, and died there January 24, 1814. Though bred a farmer, and always fond of a farmer's life, he early showed a taste for military studies, and in 1765 joined the Ancient and Honorable Artillery Company of Boston. Early in 1770 he published in the " Boston Gazette" a series of articles signed "A Military Countryman," urging the importance of military discipline and skill in the use of arms; and he seems to have been a close student of the writings of Frederick the Great. In 1774 he was elected colonel of the first Suffolk regiment. In the meantime he was also prominent in civil affairs, serving as a member of the General Court, a delegate to the Provincial Congress, and a member of the Committees of Correspondence and Safety. In December, 1774, he was appointed a brigadiergeneral in the Massachusetts militia, and in the following

June was promoted to be a major-general. Two days later he was made a brigadier-general in the continental service, and in August, 1776, was raised to the rank of major-general. During the siege of Boston he had the command at Roxbury. After the evacuation he went to New York, and near the close of the year he was stationed in the Highlands. Early in 1777 he was transferred to the command of the Eastern Department, where he remained for about two years. In June, 1779, he rejoined the army, and was given the command of the posts on the Hudson. When Washington marched to Yorktown, Heath was intrusted with the entire command of the Department of New York. He continued in active service until the end of the war, when he returned to his farm. Subsequently he was a member of the State Convention which ratified the Federal Constitution, a State senator, and a judge of probate, and was elected lieutenant-governor, but declined to accept the office. In 1812 he was one of the presidential electors.

In the present volume a selection is given from the papers written between October, 1775, and the end of the year 1779; another volume, which is now in the press, will bring the selection down to the close of the war.

The portrait which is prefixed to this volume is a reproduction of an engraving by J. R. Smith of a portrait by H. Williams, which first appeared in the "Polyanthos Enlarged," in 1813, a few months before the death of General Heath.

For the Committee,

BOSTON, October 20, 1904.

CHARLES C. SMITH.