A Hero Remembered: Vermont’s Anthony Haswell

By Mary Carter
EAGLE TIMES
CORRESPONDENT
BENNINGTON, Vt. — When Esther Forbes penned her award winning novel Johnny Tremain, she may have been channeling the life of Anthony Haswell.

Born in or near Portsmouth, England, in the spring of 1756, Haswell emigrated to Boston, with his father and brother, when in his early teens. His father returned to England, leaving Haswell apprenticed with a potter and sibling William apprenticed with a shipwright. While Haswell did not suffer the crippling accident Tremain did as a silversmith’s apprentice, Haswell found himself passed on to the Overseers of the Poor and assigned to a different master. Like Tremain, Haswell ended up working for a pro-independence newspaper.

That newspaper was the Massachusetts Spy. While other local periodicals had subscriptions in the low hundreds, the Spy boasted 3,500. Its founder was Isaiah Thomas. Making full use of the power of the press, Thomas’s influence in a pre-revolutionary Boston was such that he was included with Samuel Adams on a most-wanted roster for arrest and execution.

It’s been said that Benjamin Franklin saw something of himself in young Haswell and had a hand in placing the boy with Isaiah Thomas. While possible, this seems unlikely. Franklin was in Europe most of that time, promoting the American cause. It’s more fitting that Thomas sensed a connection, also having been apprenticed to a newspaper through the Overseers of the Poor.

Like the fictional Tremain, Haswell found himself caught up in a whirlwind of revolution. The Sons of Liberty met in secret at the Spy and incendiary pamphlets were published there in the dead of night. Therefore, generational tales of Haswell being present at many of America’s early struggles, despite there being no written proof, have a basis for belief.

With the king’s troops occupying Boston, Thomas and Haswell packed up what they could of Thomas’s printing press, sent it across the Charles in a rowboat and relocated to Worcester. Paper, usually imported from England, was scarce. John Hancock arranged for 50 reams to be sent so that Thomas’ eyewitness reports of the battles at Lexington and Concord could be printed. These articles played a role in igniting the patriot cause throughout other colonies.

By 1783, Haswell was the official US government printer for Vermont. Residing in Bennington, Haswell also started a paper mill and became postmaster general. When Vermont congressman and free speech advocate ‘Mad Matt the Democrat’ Lyon was imprisoned under the Alien and Sedition Act, Haswell leapt to his defense by publishing a plea for funds to pay his bail. That plea was neither written nor paid for by Haswell. Regardless, Haswell was arrested for seditious libel.

Even with a dying daughter at home, Haswell was marched fifty miles overnight to a courthouse in Rutland, VT. Later tried in Windsor, the Federalist-weighted jury found Haswell guilty. Haswell was sentenced to two months in prison and a fine of that was equivalent to $5,000.00 today.

Haswell’s treatment became a battle cry for Federalist opponents. Vermont played a role in ousting President John Adams. Haswell’s imprisonment ended on July 9, 1800. The town of Bennington delayed its Independence Day celebration until his release. Met by 2,000 townsfolk in the jail yard, Haswell was paraded with fife and drum back into town. New President Thomas Jefferson abolished the Sedition Act and pardoned those jailed for it. Haswell and Jefferson communicated often and their letters are preserved.

Haswell’s memory shines in the words he wrote on his way to his trial in Windsor:

“And if truth is a libel – Alas and alas!

May the spirit of seventy-five,

Again be enkindled – a toast – let it pass!

For who would his freedom survive.”