Description:

William Ellery Lengthy ALS Re: RI Lighthouses After War of 1812, Incl. Beavertail Light "burnt by the British in the revolutionary war"

An 8pp autograph letter signed by William Ellery (1727-1820), the Declaration of Independence signer then in his role as Customs Collector of Newport, Rhode Island, as "Wm Ellery" near the center of the last page. Written on May 4, 1815 in the "Collector's Office, Port of Newport." Being a retained clerical copy of Ellery's original letter, with numerous edits, cross-outs, and amendments. Docketed on the last page. Expected wear including even toning, isolated edge darkening, and scattered minor foxing. The pages are comprised of two bundles of bifold paper bound with string along the left edge. Else near fine and very legible. 6.625" x 8.125." Accompanied by an auction Letter of Authenticity from PSA/DNA Authentication Services from April 2008, reference number 3166023.

William Ellery served as the Customs Collector of Newport from 1790 until his death in 1820. Lighthouses, as well as all matters pertaining to ports and navigation, fell under the jurisdiction of Treasury Department. Ellery was responding to a circular letter presumably issued from the Commissioner of Revenue's office. He addressed his reply to Commissioner of Revenue Samuel Smith (1772-1845).

Ellery's letter is dated three months after the conclusion of the War of 1812. That most recent conflict is referred to in the letter as "the War," while the fight for American Independence forty years before is referred to as "the revolutionary war." Besides the very interesting historical context of the letter, it is made doubly intriguing by its references to three important political, military, and scientific notables of the Revolutionary War/Federal period: Albert Gallatin (1761-1849), who served as U.S. Secretary of the Treasury from 1801-1814; Henry A. Dearborn (1751-1829), the seasoned military commander who served as Customs Collector of Boston from 1809-1812; and Winslow Lewis (1770-1850), who in 1815 was awarded the federal contract for installing spermaceti oil lamps in lighthouses along the Eastern Seaboard.

Ellery's letter provides us with a comprehensive summary of the state of Rhode Island's three principal lighthouses at Jamestown, Point Judith, and Watch Hill further down the Rhode Island coast, as well as the condition of buoys and stakeages on nearby Goat Island, located between Aquidneck and Conanicut Islands in Narragansett Bay, and in the Warren River, a tidal extension of the Palmer River flowing into Narragansett Bay.

No topic is unworthy of Ellery's dutiful investigation or bureaucratic comment. He weighs in on the different types of lighting used to illuminate the lighthouses--from sea coal, to charcoal, to whale oil--and speculates on the quality of the light in relation to its expense. Ellery also asks pointed questions about who will be responsible for installing and maintaining lighthouse optics, possibly betraying some residual anxiety over the United States government's ownership of the lighthouses. (Rhode Island did not formally cede its lighthouses to the U.S. government until 1793, four years after the 1789 congressional act transferring the original 12 colonial lighthouses to federal ownership. Rhode Island's reluctance was due in part to concern that the new government would not be able to properly maintain the state's maritime infrastructure.)

Paragraph breaks have been added for clarity, else unchanged. Ellery wrote in part:

"In answer to the first paragraph let me observe that the buoys in this harbor will be placed & maintained as usual in good repair... The buoy was carried away with its mooring from the south end of Goat Island in this harbor at the breaking up of the Ice, which surrounded it last winter, & has not yet been found. The Stakeage in Warren River has been and will be annually repaired and fixed… The Stakes there, are every Winter broken more or less, or moved from their places by the Ice, Storms & Currents, and repaired or renewed, and refixed as soon in the Spring as the weather will allow…

Besides these buoys, and this Stakeage, no beacons, buoys, public piers, piers, stakeage of channels, bays, & shoals, are or have been under my Superintendence. The Light Houses of Point Judith & Watch Hill, by the last returns of their keepers, were in good order, but the Light House at Jamestown, notwithstanding the repairs it has had, has leaked more or less ever since I have had the charge of it…

In answer to this paragraph, I would observe, that the Light is without doubt more brilliant; but the returns of the Oil on hand, which have been annually made by the Keepers and transmitted by me when received have been so different and conjectural, that taking the amount of the whole quantity returned as consumed annually in the three Light Houses, that it is not so clear that the superior brilliancy has been produced with one half the quantity of oil used in the former mode of lighting but I believe it to be so… It is not easy to inform your Office at present of the precise condition of the apparatus fitted up by Mr. Lewis, nor in what degree it has been injured by circumstances growing out of the War… The Lights have not been extinguished in either of the Light Houses, during the War… The Oil, was by the war, compelled to store, and when it became dangerous to keep it here, I sent what remained of it to East Greenwich in the Revenue Cutter, and caused it to be carted from thence to a place of safety where it remained until the twenty fifth of April last…

In, and by the last paragraph of the second article of the contract, it is advanced that the apparatus or Clockwork, for revolving the Lights, shall be fixed in such of the Light Houses as may be designated by the Secy. of the Treasury of the United States &c. - It is not mentioned at whose expense this apparatus is to be procured, fixed, or supported - Such an apparatus has been fixed in the Point Judith and the Watch Hill Light House, and has been frequently out of order…

It is supposed by some that the leaking of the Light House at Jamestown, which is built of Stone, was occasioned by the inside wooden work being burnt by the British in the revolutionary war; but the principal leak now, is through the stonework erected a few years past on the former top of it…"

Versions of the Jamestown lighthouse, or the Beavertail Lighthouse, have existed on the southernmost point of Conanicut Island since at least the early 18th century. The lighthouse played a critical role in preventing shipwrecks near the entrance of Narragansett Bay, which had several notorious shallow reefs and ledges, and was often obscured in wintertime fog. The lighthouse that Ellery mentions was "burnt by the British in the revolutionary war" was a stone tower constructed after 1753. When British forces evacuated from Newport and Conanicut Island in October 1779, they destroyed woodwork within the stone light house, torched its mast and light tower, and also carried away the lighting apparatus, which during the time was comprised of a sophisticated set of 15 individual lamps and conical reflectors. The lighthouse standing in Beavertail State Park today was built in 1856. For more information on the Beavertail Lighthouse, please see Varoujan Karentz, "Beavertail Light Station On Conanicut Island" (BookSurge Publishing, 2008).

William Ellery lived his entire life in Newport, Rhode Island. The Harvard College graduate was a merchant, customs collector, lawyer, and state assembly clerk before serving as a Rhode Island delegate in the Continental Congress in 1776. His signature on the Declaration of Independence is second largest after Boston merchant John Hancock's.

This item comes with a Certificate from John Reznikoff, a premier authenticator for both major 3rd party authentication services, PSA and JSA (James Spence Authentications), as well as numerous auction houses.

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