The History of Massachusetts, From the First Settlement Thereof in 1628, until the Year 1750; Volume I & II; Third Edition

Thomas Hutchinson

Thomas C. Cushing, 1795

2 Volumes. Octavos, 22 cm. Bound in contemporary full calf. Gilt lettering on red spine label. Speckled blue pages end. Library markings, moderate rubbing. Joints split. 478, 452 pp. Volume II with library tape to spine, affecting title page. Toning and foxing. Evans 28878-9. Howes H-853; Sabin 9705.

Thomas Hutchinson was a businessman, historian, and a prominent Loyalist politician of the Province of Massachusetts Bay in the years before the American Revolution. A successful merchant and politician, Hutchinson was active at high levels of the Massachusetts government for many years, serving as lieutenant governor and then governor from 1758 to 1774. He was a politically polarizing figure who, despite initial opposition to Parliamentary tax laws directed at the colonies, came to be identified by John Adams and Samuel Adams as a proponent of hated British taxes. He was blamed by Lord North (the British Prime Minister at the time) for being a significant contributor to the tensions that led the outbreak of the American Revolutionary War. Hutchinson had a deep interest in colonial history, collecting a large number of historical documents. The section on witchcraft (Volume II pp. 22-64) is particularly interesting, because it gives details on the subject of witchcraft leading up to Salem in 1692.