The Poems of Philip Freneau, Poet of the American Revolution. Volume 1 (of 3)Freneau, Philip Morin
General
The Poems of Philip Freneau, Poet of the American Revolution. Volume 1 (of 3)
Freneau, Philip Morin
American poetry
"Mr. Madison said: 'Freneau's paper was another cause of soreness
in General Washington. Among its different contributors, some were
actuated by over-heated zeal, and some, perhaps, by malignity.
Every effort was made in Fenno's paper, and by those immediately
around him (Washington) to impress on his mind a belief that this
paper had been got up by Mr. Jefferson to injure him and oppose
the measures of his administration. Freneau himself was an old
College mate of mine, a poet and man of literary and refined
tastes, knowing nothing of the world. He was a French scholar,
and employed at first as translator. Henry Lee, who was also his
College mate, and had also a friendly feeling for him, was the
more immediate cause of his establishing a paper. Our main object
in encouraging it, was to provide an antidote against Fenno's
paper, which was devoted to monarchy, and had begun to publish
extracts from Mr. Adams's book. I used occasionally to throw in an
article, all of which I have marked, and some of which I have
shown you, with a view chiefly to counteract the monarchial spirit
and partisanship of the British government which characterized
Fenno's paper. I never engaged in the party criminations.'"
It deserves mention that Freneau stuck to his post during the yellow
fever epidemic of 1793, and that for weeks he was the only active editor
in the city. On October 1st he resigned his position as translator, and
soon after removed to his old home at Mount Pleasant. For a time he was
without employment. He contemplated several newspaper enterprises. He
evidently took steps toward the publication of a paper in Monmouth
County, New Jersey, as the following advertisement, published in the
_Jersey Chronicle_, May 30, 1795, would show:
"A number of persons in Freehold and other parts of Monmouth
subscribed last year to a paper the editor then proposed to set on
foot. As various causes delayed him prosecuting his intended
purpose until the present spring, and as he supposes, many of them
might in the meantime have engaged with other printers, he hopes
they will if possible transfer their subscription to the
_Chronicle_."
On November 2, 1794, he writes Madison, recommending his old friend
Bailey for the office of public printer, and on May 6th following, he
received a reply:
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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