To Benjamin Franklin from Jonathan Williams, Sr., 16 November 1770
From Jonathan Williams, Sr.
ALS: American Philosophical Society
Boston Novr 16 1770
Since I Clos’d my letter I Received your Verry agreeable favour adviceing of the good fortune of Our Cousin Nancey in her Maraige too Capt. Clark.5 We Wish them all Happiness We are much Pleased With the Connection. Our Young folks are aquanted With his Late Uncles Famley that Lives at Salem. I Will take Particular Care to have a thrrough Repaire to the Tomb.6
I have Given your Account Credit for the Balance of my Lottery Account £38 3s. Sterling.7 I am your Dutifull Nephew and Humble Servant
Jona Williams
To Benja Franklin Esqr
Addressed: To / Benjamin Franklin Esqr / at Mrs Stevinson in Cravin Street / London / per Scot
5. Nancy Johnson and Peter Clarke; see above, p. 210 n.
6. The “late uncle,” John Clarke, the eldest son of Francis and Deborah Gedney Clarke, had died in 1764; see Henry F. Waters, “The Gedney and Clarke Families of Salem, Mass.,” Essex Institute Hist. Collections, XVI (1879), 271–2. Neither Williams nor BF, we assume, was interested in Clarke’s tomb; the one that Williams was promising to refurbish was probably that of BF’s parents, Josiah and Abiah, in the Granary Burying Ground in Boston, for which BF composed the epitaph discussed and printed above, VII, 229–30. Josiah was Grace Williams’ grandfather.
7. For the complicated business of Williams’ lottery tickets see above, XVI, 178, 211; BF to Smith, Wright & Gray, May 10, and to Williams, June 6, 1770.