To Alexander Hamilton from Angelica Church, [1–7 April 1794]
From Angelica Church1
[April 1–7, 1794]
My Dear Brother:
You will have the pleasure to receive this letter by Dr. Priestly,2 a man dear to virtue and to science. Without the advantage and satisfaction of his acquaintance, I revere him for his works, and take a particular interest that he should be well received in America. That happy country which seems reserved by Providence as an Assylum from the crimes and persecutions which make Europe the pity and disgrace of the age.
You my dear Brother will receive with distinguished kindness this worthy stranger, (if he whose breast teems with the love of mankind may anywhere be called a stranger) and make our country so dear to him as to cause him to forget that which he leaves at an advanced period of Life and which he has most ably served.
Mr. Church is under the first attack of the Gout. He unites in love to you and dear Eliza.
I am my dear Brother your affectionate sister
Angelica Church.
, 301–02.
1. Angelica Church was H’s sister-in-law and the wife of John B. Church. H handled Church’s business affairs in the United States.
2. Joseph Priestley was a British scientist and philosopher. On June 7, 1794, The [New York] Daily Advertiser announced: “It gives us pleasure to mention the arrival in America, of that celebrated Philosopher, Dr. Priestly, in good health, together with his family and a large party of his friends. Although the Doctor’s theological tenets are not generally believed in this country, yet they have many respectable advocates, and the Doctor will felicitate himself on finding in the United States, no persecution of opinions. We are told a Company, of which the Doctor is a part, have purchased 300,000 acres of land in Pennsylvania, on the Susquehannah river, about 150 miles from Philadelphia, where they project a considerable settlement.”