The Treaty of Paris, signed on September 3, 1783, formally ended the war between Great Britain and the United States. It acknowledged the American colonies to be sovereign and independent states, free from British rule. Given by Mr. and Mrs. William M. Cahn, Jr., Class of 1933, in memory of DeWitt Millhauser. Rare Book Division.
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Phillis Wheatley was named for the slave ship Phillis that brought her from Gambia, West Africa, to Boston in 1761, and the Wheatley family who purchased her. At 12 years old, educated by her mistress, she began publishing poems and elegies in newspapers. She was freed after the publication of her book. Her depiction in this frontispiece is the only surviving work by the African-American slave artist Scipio Moorhead (b. ca. 1750). Gift of Sidney Lapidus, Class of 1959. Rare Book Division.
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In 1765, the British Parliament imposed a tax on printed materials in the American colonies to help pay for troops stationed in North America after the Seven Years’ War. However, many colonists believed the act violated their rights as British subjects to be taxed only if they were represented in Parliament. They responded with riots, boycotts, and other organized protests, and the act was repealed in 1766. Gift of Sidney Lapidus, Class of 1959. Rare Book Division.
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The soldier and adventurer Captain John Smith became president of the Jamestown Colony’s governing council in 1608. He led the colony through its first year by improving defenses, cultivating land, and maintaining relations with Native Americans, whose agricultural knowledge and food stores were vital to the colonists’ survival. Between 1623 and 1624, during a period of weakening trust in the Virginia Company, Smith rushed to publish this major work supporting the Jamestown settlement. This copy bears the arms of King James I of England (r. 1603–1625). Rare Book Division.
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One of the most widely circulated images of the 18th-century abolitionist movement first appeared in print in this pamphlet addressed to the British Parliament. It had been designed in 1787 as a seal for the Society for Effecting the Abolition of the Slave Trade. Gift of Sidney Lapidus, Class of 1959. Rare Book Division.
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