To Benjamin Franklin from Jonathan Williams, Sr. [August? 1772]
From Jonathan Williams, Sr.
ALS (incomplete and mutilated): American Philosophical Society
[August?, 1772]
[Beginning mutilated] advice, because I [torn] I think afterward indeed I am [torn] fearing that he is Spending his [torn] nought his Situation puts me in [mind of a quotation?] I have somewere seen [illegible] the God if the [torn] to hold attendance and Dependence be [torn].8
Agreeable to your Orders Some [torn] your account for the Cost and Loss on the Tic[ket?] [torn] another £20 Prize but Whether [torn] it or your I now Cant tell however [if you will take the?] Troble Please to Let me know what [torn] Will Send a Bill to Discharge it.9 With my most [torn] thanks for all favours shew’d to my Belov’d Son Who got home Just time enought to take Leave of his Friends and bid them a Long farewell, in him we mourn the Loss of a good Son, a most affectionate Brother, agreeable Compainion and Faithfull Friend.1
I have obtain’d an Execution against Hall Returnable next Feby. he has given Personal Security So that the money must be paid or he must Go to Goal at Present its verry unsartain Whether he Will Live or Die Polliticaly tho’ I Wish he may Live for more Reasons then one.2 Aunt Mecom and Daughter are Well my Wife and Children Desire to be Respectfully Remember’d to you. I am with the greatest Esteem your Dutyfull Nephew and Humble Servant
Jona Williams
[In the margin:] [All the money from?] Hall, is it your order that I Deliver it to Aunt Mecom—Please to Say [remainder missing]
Addressed: To / Doctr Benjamin Franklin / at Mrs Stevenson’s in / Craven Street / Strand / London / per the Argo / Capt Folger
8. Our guess, from these remaining fragments, is that Williams was talking about the business dealings of his son Jonathan, for which see BF’s correspondence with the two above, Jan. 13, April 10.
9. Williams’ lottery tickets figured prominently in his correspondence with BF in the two previous volumes.
1. The blind Josiah had returned from England in May and died in Boston on August 15. Mass. Gaz. and Boston Weekly News-Letter, Aug. 20, 1772.
2. The suit against Samuel Hall had been a theme of BF’s correspondence with the Williamses; see, for example, the letter to BF from Jonathan, Jr., above, end of June. The settlement dragged on into 1774. Williams presumably hoped for Hall’s political survival because of the latter’s Essex Gaz., which was taking a strong anti-ministerial stand: Philip Davidson, Propaganda and the American Revolution, 1763–1783 (Chapel Hill, 1941), p. 228.