■\ 



270 AUTHENTIC HISTORY 



Letter from Mr. Atlee to his Brother, 1778. 

 Pray, my dear Brother, how comes it that Congress, by their resolve, 

 relating to the two emissions of May, 1777, and April, 1778, have set 

 the Country in such a ferment, and given room for a set of speculating 

 People who are Enemies to the real good of their Country, to take occa- 

 sion from it to depreciate the value of those two Emissions in the man- 

 ner they have done, and are now daily doing. Mr. Henry just now tells 

 me that there are a set of them here very busy in this matter ; that by 

 their management within this day or two it is rendered twenty-ftve per 

 Ct. worse than the other Emissions, which God knows were sunk low 

 enough before. The principal hands here who busy themselves, he says, 

 are Jno. Musser, Jno. Witmer, Balser Hertzer, and (to my surprise) 

 Wirtz k Lowman ; that they exchange it at twenty-five per Ct. discount, 

 and wont take it in payment for any Articles without that allowance, 

 and our Butchers, Bakers and Farmers begin to refuse it entirely, owing 

 to the stories propagated about it. Must people, who have this Money, 

 either lose a fourth of it or starve? and when the time comes for ex- 

 changing it, must they spend half the value of the little they have in 

 taking it to Philada to place it in the office? and after that wait sixty 

 Days and attend a second time for payment? Indeed, I think the re- 

 solve is not one of the wisest, and wish to see these Evils speedily reme- 

 died. Mr. Henry tells me that Billy Wirtz returned here yesterday from 

 Philada, and reports that the Merchants, or rather Hucksters, of Philada, 

 are playing the same Game there. Surely, Congress can call in these or 

 any other Emissions in a manner less injurious to the Country. I am so 

 angry at this affair that I hardly know what I write, and so vexed at the 

 daily schemes for depreciating of our Currency, that I sometimes think 

 we don't deserve the liberty we have been contending for, while such 

 miscreants are suffered to breathe among us ; and indeed, I cant help 

 thinking that the Congress's own Servants, such as Quarter Masters, 

 Commissaries of purchase, &c., do as much injury to it as any other 

 speculators — for, the more they lay out or charge for articles which 

 themselves have ingrossed, the more are their Commissions. 



Council to Magistrates of Lancaster and Chester, 1778. 



In Council, Lancaster, Feb. 14, 1778. 

 Gentlemen : Council has this Day received information that an affray 

 has happened at the sign of the Compass on the Great Eoad leading to 

 Philadelphia between some officers in the Continental service and others. 

 Inhabitants of this State, in which one person, Lieut. Hammon, has been 

 unhappily killed, and several others dangerously wounded. Wm. Atlee, 

 Esq., one of the Judges of the Supreme Court, writes to you by this 

 messenger, to request your particular attention to this unhappy Quarrel, 



