Sir, Westfield in Massa: Bay July 8th: 1776

Had it not been for fear of interrupting the important business you are engag’d in, or breakg: in upon your more leisure hours, if such you have, I1 might have acquainted you perhaps with some things that have occurr’d in the Colony during your absence, the most material of wch: however I do suppose may have been transmitted to you.

The occasion of this is to know if you co’d inform me whether there have, or have not been two different impressions of the Continental four 242dollar bills, as from the variation of the words in the body, & the omission of the words FOUR DOLLARS in one corner of some that are passing, there are not wanting those who are willing by this & other ways to discourage the currency, & affirm they have been counterfeited on board the Asia man of war.2

I observ’d by the papers you had the honor of being one of the gentlemen that were appointed to go to Canada some time since; if any cause can be assign’d, why affairs in that quarter have been so unsuccessful, which may be communicated, & can be remov’d, I co’d wish it were in my power to satisfy many in these parts who are apprehensive of our upper towns & Settlemts: being depopulated.

Orders are this week come from Court for raising men in this & Berkshire County. Some from Connecticut are on their march for Crown Point &c.3

My Complimts: if you please to the honble: Jno: Adams Esqr. I sho’d have done myself the honor of writing to him but for reasons as before mention’d, I had the pleasure of seeing his Lady well at Braintree a few weeks past; when I took a journey from hence to see what I had left, & as my friends had inform’d me, most of my houshold furniture & effects have been plunder’d & carried away, which occasions my stay a while longer here: I enclose this to Lt: Colo: Willm: Sheppard4 in the Army at New York, whose home is in this place, & who co’d forward a letter, if you sho’d send by a safe hand free of postage to him, in case you had not a more direct conveyance.

With wishg. the blessing of Heaven may attend your endeavors for the public good, I take the honor to subscribe myself Sir Your friend & hume. Servt:,

Josha: Green

RC ; addressed: “To The Honorable Robt: Treat Paine Esqr: Philadelphia”; endorsed.

1.

Joshua Green (1731–1806), a Harvard classmate of RTP, was a Boston merchant who moved his family to western Massachusetts during the Revolution. His wife, Hannah (Storer), was a friend and correspondent of Abigail Adams ( Sibley’s Harvard Graduates , 12:380–381).

2.

There are known counterfeit four-dollar bills from the issue authorized by congressional resolution of Feb. 17, 1776, but they were “so basely done, that, on the least inspection, no person could be deceived by them” (Pennsylvania Gazette, July 16, 1777; Eric P. Newman, The Early Paper Money of America [Racine, Wisc., 1976], 37, 407). The man-of-war H.M.S. Asia was part of the fleet which transported reinforcement troops from Halifax to New York in the summer of 1776 and at this time was still in New York (Naval Documents of the American Revolution, 5:935, 948).

243 3.

On June 13, 1776, the House of Representatives resolved to raise 5,000 men to serve in New York and Canada. The apportionments by county were for Suffolk, 448; Essex, 457; Middlesex, 1,070; Hampshire, 742 Plymouth, 380; Bristol, 362; York, 105; Worcester, 1,102; Cumberland, 39; and Berkshire, 261 (Journals of the House of Representatives, 52, pt. 1:37).

4.

William Shepard (1737–1817) of Westfield was at this time lieutenant colonel of the Third Continental Infantry. He was wounded at the Battle of Long Island on Aug. 27, 1776. Later Shepard became colonel of the Fourth Massachusetts Regiment (Whittemore, Memorials of the Massachusetts Society of the Cincinnati, 549).