Abraham Small to Thomas Jefferson, 30 April 1814
From Abraham Small
Philadelphia April 30th [1814]
Sir
Perhaps it would best become me to apologise, for the liberty I take in requesting your acceptance of the Book which accompanies this—My heart tells me it is but a poor expression of my veneration for you
If you should have leisure to look through it, I hope it will indicate the bias of the Compilers mind, & those principles to which your life has been devoted
The little time it has been before the public, seems to promise another Edition—Could I through your instrumentality improve the Indian department of it?—nothing of that nature has I believe escaped your notice—my endeavors here, have been either ill-directed or in vain—however this may be, I hope you will forgive the expression of what you can never be divested
Abrm Small
RC (MiU-C: Thomas Jefferson Collection); corner torn; at foot of text: “The Honble Thomas Jefferson”; endorsed by TJ as a letter of 30 Apr. 1814 received 13 May 1814 and so recorded in SJL. Enclosure: Small, The American Speaker; a Selection of Popular, Parliamentary and Forensic Eloquence; particularly calculated for the Seminaries in the United States, 2d ed. (Philadelphia, 1814; , 13 [no. 819]).
Abraham Small (1765–1829), printer, was a native of Taunton, England. He was in Philadelphia by 1796, when he formed a three-year-long partnership with John Thompson for the purpose of printing America’s first hot-pressed Bible. From about 1800 until 1813 Small partnered with William Young Birch, after which he worked independently as a printer and stationer until at least 1825 (H. Glenn Brown and Maude O. Brown, A Directory of the Book-Arts and Book Trade in Philadelphia to 1820, Including Painters and Engravers [1950], 20, 110, 118; , 2:979, 984, 996; Thomas Wilson, ed., The Philadelphia Directory and Stranger’s Guide for 1825 [Philadelphia, 1825], 128; Edward L. Clark, A Record of the Inscriptions on the Tablets and Grave-Stones in the Burial-Grounds of Christ Church, Philadelphia [1864], 579; Philadelphia United States Gazette, 16 Sept. 1829).