OF LANCASTER COUNTY. 259 



under tlie direction and command of our Brigadier General, to the assist- 

 ance of all or any of the Free and Independent States of America ; that 

 associators to be drafted out of each county, by the Brigadier Generals, 

 shall be in the same proportion as directed by the late Provincial Con- 

 ference held in Philadelphia.^ 



The DECLAKATION OF INDEPENDENCE was passed by the 

 Continental Congress at Philadelphia on the same day when the Mili- 

 tary Convention met at Lancaster, to wit, on July 4th, 1776. On that 

 day the thirteen Confederate Colonies dissolved their allegiance to^the 

 British crown and declared themselves free and independent under the 

 name of the Thirteen United States of America. 



The members from Pennsylvania who signed the declaration were: 

 Robert Morris, Benjamin Rush, 



Benjamin Franklin, John Morton, 



George Clymer, James Smith, 



George Taylor, James Wilson, 



George Ross. 

 By direction of the Council of Safety the Declaration of Independence 

 was published at Lancaster on Monday July 8, 1776. 



1 Rupp, History of Lancaster County, pp. 405-407. 



