Pennsylvania regim&nt"
" To the Hon. John Jos. Henry."

Though we have no account from an eye witness, of the barbarous manner
in which Capcain Boyd was tortured, yet we may conceive from the ap
pearance of his body, that the most malignant and hellish pains were ex
ercised upon it. The being emboweled, conveys an idea of a known mode
of Indian torment : the fixing an end of the entrails to the stake, and
compelling the prisoner by fire and blows to run till the conglomerated
mass is expended. Upon the subject of these tortures, look at Dr.
COL DEN S History of the Mohawks, and Judge SMITH S History of Ne c w York.

Colonel Campbell is of opinion, that the wound along the sole of Captain
Boyd s foot, was made before the savages brought him to their (castle) or
village. His reason is, that the wound was filled with bits of rotten
branches of wood, and small pieces of leaves. The conjecture may be
true, as Indian punishment, at its acme, is to give the greatest degree of
pain. Henry.



Campaign against Quebec, 1775. JI 9

with its importance, will be the first to arm. This has.
been, and ever will be, the disposition of men in all
ages, past or to come, whenever their privileges are
invaded. Offices of prime importance cannot be ob
tained by all. Men of talents, of genius and courage
must step into subordinate stations. Socrates, Alcibiades
and Demosthenes fought in the ranks.

God in his great goodness grant, in the future
vicissitudes of the world, that our countrymen, whenever
their essential rights shall be attacked, will divest them
selves of all party prejudice, and devote their lives and
properties in defence of the sacred liberties of their
country, without any view to emolument, but that which
springs from glorious and honorable actions. Pardon
me for frequent digression, upon this subject particularly,
as my whole soul was bound up in our cause, you must
forgive me. The real apology is, we were, all of us,
enthusiastic whigs.

When under guard, in the morning of the first of
January, Colonel M Dougal, a Scotch gentleman, near
noon, came to review us ; his person was known to me
at Detroit, as an intimate of an uncle, three years before
this time. The colonel was naturally polite and kind-
hearted. When it came to my turn to be examined, as
to name, place of birth, etc., besides making the proper
answers to his inquiries, I was emboldened to declare
that he was known to me. He seemed surprised, but
not displeased ; a request was immediately added " that
he would order me to be transferred to the quarters of
the officers." u No, my dear boy," said he, "you had
better remain where you are ; the officers, as you are in
rebellion, may be sent to England, and there be tried
for treason." The advice of this venerable veteran
made an impression on my mind, which was then agitated
by a thousand vagrant thoughts, and involved in doubt
and uncertainty as to our destination. We then well



I2O Campaign against Quebec ^ 1775.

knew of the voyage of Colonel Ethan Allen to England,
and the manner of it j 1 and that of George Merchant,



1 Of the treatment of Ethan Allen, at the time spoken of, we know
nothing but from report, which we then thought well. grounded, and the
truth of which, at this day, there is no reason to doubt. He was a man
of much peculiarity of character. Large, powerful of body, a most ferocious
temper (fearing neither God nor man), of a most daring courage, and a
perti nacity of disposition, which was unconquerable, and very astonishing
in all his undertakings : withal he had the art of making himself beloved,
and revered by all his followers. When he was taken in the Isle of
Montreal, in 1775, the government found it necessary to confine him in a
cage, as one would a wild beast, and thus aboard ship, he was transported
to Quebec. What his treatment was during this voyage to England, is
unknown to me.

This, however, i-j known, that for many years he was a prisoner in Eng
land, returning from his captivity to America, he brought with him a
manuscript, which he afterwards entitled The Oracle of Reason. My
beloved children, it is the farthest from my thought to confine your know
ledge to narrow bounds ; when you dip into scriptural history, dip deep, do
not skim the surface of the subject, as many fools have done of late days.
Upon a thorough inquiry, your hearts will be animated by a conviction
that there came a Saviour to redeem you from eternal perdition, and to
provide for you an eternal salvation and state of happiness.

That book was most certainly the composition of Ethan Allen. He was
very illiterate j he did not know the orthography of our language. The
extent of his learning, probably bounded by some historic chronicles, and
a few other books of little account, did not go beyond the scriptures. The
gentleman who gave me the above information, was an elegant scholar, bred
at Harvard college. Going to New York in thesummer of 1786, a friend,
from mere curiosity, requested me to purchase the book for him. Being
detained at New York six weeks by business, I frequently looked into the
detestable volume. The argument if so diabolical a work can be said to
contain argument, was in general arranged, and conducted in the same
manner as the Age of Reason, but in a coarser, and yet a more energetic
language, than that of the latter work. On my return to Philadelphia, in
a conversation with the Vermontese gentleman, who was still there, Ethan
Allen s Bible, became a topic of discourse. He gave me this curious an
ecdote which he averred upon his honor to be true. A young gentleman,
either a scholar of Harvard or Yale college, had come into Vermont, and
there taught a school. Allen labored under the want of an amanuensis
and transcriber of knowledge and learning. The scholar, to increase his
emoluments, became such. Allen attended him daily, standing, staff in hand,
at the back of the young man s chair. " Sir," he would say to Allen, " this
word is misspelled." " Amend it." Again, " this word is misplaced, the
sense is incorrect," etc. Allen, who was most profane, would swear (some
times raising his staff) " By G** sir, you shall insert it j you shall not alter
it." Thus the Oracle of Reason came into the world j which, of all books,



Campaign against Quebec^ 1775. 121

our fellow soldier, but the consequences were unknown.
It became my determination to take the fatherly advice



is the most bluntly vicious, as regards the well-being of society j the salva
tion of souls j and the happiness of those who have faith in the redemption
by the blood of our Saviour. But that which is very remarkable, is, that
long after the publication of Allen s book, which had fallen into oblivion,
even with its readers, that vile reprobate, Thomas Paine, loaded with every
crime which stains and dishonors the Christian and the gentleman (in ad
dition to his shameful practices in life, Paine, as an author, superadded
plagiarism), niched from Ethan Allen the great body of his deistical and
atheistical opinions, which from the time of Celsus, down to the age of
Chubb, Tindal and others, have been so often refuted by men of the utmost
respectability of character and fame. When we reflect upon the vicissitudes
of this world, its immense revolutions in temporal affairs, the awful perse
cutions which occurred in early times, the collisions of opinion and party
rage, in the article of religious belief; and the vast body of martyrs who
devoted their lives in support of their faith, ivc must believe that there is
something more than ordinary ; something really divine in the system of
our religion, springing from God himself. In the last ages, we know of
many of both sexes, of the soundest and best instructed minds, whom it is
almost needless to name, unless it be merely for the purpose of opposing
their virtues and characters to persons of a different mode of thinking.
All of them possessed a firm and solid credence in the celestial origin of
our holy faith, and some of them sealed their creed with their blood.
When such men suffer because of principle, some reliance should be placed
on their good sense and knowledge. The terms enthusiasm and madness,
have been too often coupled, as conveying the same idea. George Fox,
Captain Meade, and William Penn, have been called enthusiastic madmen,
but we now know that they acted through the course of the religious parts
of their lives, from a conviction of the principles of the gospel, being
genuine and absolutely true. However, on this subject, but a few names
need be repeated to convey to your minds its importance and solemnity.
Many of the greatest men, as it concerns worldly things, were Christians.
John Huss, Jerome of Prague, Martin Luther, John Calvin, Cranmer,
Hooker, Tillotson, of the clergy ; of the laity, Sir Thomas Moore, Sir
Matthew Hale, Spangenberg, Mosheim, Joseph Addison, Richard Steele,
Lord Henry Littleton, Soame Jenyns, and thousands of others, all men of
profound learning, have testified by their lives and writings, a reliance on
the merits of the redemption by the blood of Christ Jesus. But when we
find those men supported and reinforced by two of the strongest minded
men that ever lived, Sir Isaac Newton and John Locke, who can doubt ?
When we contrast their opinions with those of Hobbs, Chubb, Henry St.
John, Voltaire, J. J. Rousseau, Beringer, the great Frederick of Prussia,
or Mr. Gibbon, how deeply do the last not sink, by the weight of reason
and argument ? Allen and Paine are paltry wretches, mere scribblers, if
classed with the men last named. Those were beautiful writers, whose
languaee fascinates, but corrupts the vouth^ul mind, these are dull plodders,
11



122 Campaign against Quebec, 1775.

of Colonel M Dougal, for it was really delivered in the
parental style, and to adhere to it. He brought one of



who knew not the principles of their mother tongue ; but it is perhaps
from the circumstance of illiterateness, that Allen and Paine have attacked
Christianity in so gross and indecorous a manner. The maniac Paine, when
confined in the prison, Conciergerie, at Paris, seems to boast "that he kept
no bible." This may be true. But the expression shows that his proper
place, instead of a common jail, should have been a mad-house.

It shows, however, a vanity of mind beyond the bearing of men of under
standing. Indeed he was inflated by a supercilious pride, and an imaginary
importance, which made his society undesirable. He was one of that class
of men who, with a small spice of learning, in company, domineered as
if he had been a Johnson. He was almost unbearable to many men, who
patronized him because of the good effect of his works during the revolu
tion. To give you a few instances ; the late David Rittenhouse, Esq.,
one of the most amiable, most ingenious and best of men, treasurer of the
state, George Bryan, Esq., the vice-president of the council, a man of great
reading and much good sense, Jonathan Sergeant, the attorney general of
Pennsylvania, whose oratorical powers could scarcely be surpassed, and
your grand-father, and many other gentlemen of character, during the course
of the years 77, 78 and 79, were in habits of intimacy with him, but his
dogmatic disposition and obstinacy of mind, frequently caused great disgust.
Again, Colonel Samuel John Attlee, an excellent patriot, and a man of
note among us, both in the military and civil capacities of a citizen, gave
this anecdote to me, a few months after the occurrence happened. Though
all the gentlemen present, approved of the writings of Paine, as they con
cerned our political state, for they were all of them to a man, good whigs,
yet they abhorred him, because of his personal aberrations from virtue, and
the decencies of social life. A Mr. Mease of Philadelphia, who was clothier
general, had invited a number of gentlemen of the army, then in the city,
to dine with him. Among whom were Colonel Attlee, Colonel Francis
Johnson, General Nichols, and many members of the legislature of whom
there was Matthias Slough of Lancaster. You may readily suppose, that
the excellent wine of Mr. Mease exhilerated the company. When return
ing to their lodgings, Colonel Attlee observed Paine coming towards them
down Market-street. There comes " Common Sense," says Attlee to the
company. " Damn him," says Slough, "I shall common sense him." As
he approached the party, they took the wall. Mr. Slough tripped him,
and threw him on his back into a gutter, which at that time was very
offensive and filthy.

This is told, to communicate a trait to you, in the character of Thomas
Paine, who did some good, but avast deal of harm to mankind, "that the
very people who were most benefited by his literary labors, hated him."
The company I have spoken of, were all men of eminence in the state ;
men who staked their all on the issue of the revolution. The writings of
Paine as concerns j, are many of them handsomely worded, have pith and
much strength or argumentj and are in general correct, yet his domestic



Campaign against Quebec > 1775. I2 3

his sons, whom I had formerly known, to see me on the
following day. About mid-dav we were escorted to a



life and manners were so very incorrect, that a disgust, which was perhaps
right, destroyed every favorable personal feeling towards him. His in
delicacy was intolerable. His numbers of Common Sense, the Crisis, and
some other of his fugitive pieces, every American who recollects those
" trying times," must acknowledge to have been extremely beneficial to
our cause. This has often been admitted by our Generals Washington,
Gates, Greene, etc., but he was compensated, and had the secretaryship
for foreign affairs. Like all men of bad principles, he betrayed his trust,
and a virtuous congress displaced him, yet the different states more than
remunerated him for all his writings.

So it is, that that man who was without virtue, a disturber of society,
an ill husband, an unworthy citizen, cloaked by every vice, would now by
his Age of Reason, which he stole from the ignorant Ethan Allen,
who was as iniquitous as himself, destroy the peace of mind, and all the
hope of happiness in futurity, of those who rely on the redemption of their
souls by the blood of Christ 5 and that, without substituting, or even sug
gesting, any other manner of faith, tending to quiet the minds of sinners.
I knew Paine well, and that personally, for he lodged in the house of my
father, during the time that Generals Howe and Clinton were in Philadel
phia. His host often regretted the entertainment he gave him. His
manners were in opposition and hostile to the observances of the proprieties
and due ordinances of social life. Many who approved of his political
writings abominated his detestable mode of living and acting.

[I am justified in using these expressions, by an occurrence in 1794,
with my own mother. She was a woman of strong understanding, and of
unfeigned and rigid belief in the truths of gospel-history, yet a dispassionate,
placid and mild religionist. Her heart was so free from thinking ill of any
one, that of a truth of her it might be said " she knew no guile." One
day going to a bookseller s in Lancaster, I met with an extract in the shape
of a pamphlet of Doctor Joseph Priestley s History of the Corruption of
Christianity. Never having seen any of that gentleman s polemic works,
it was purchased. My mother as usual came in in the evening, to sit and
converse with my family. I was reading the pamphlet. " What have you
got ? " " A work of Doctor Priestley s on religion." I was then at the
chapter of the "Doctrine of the Atonement of Christ," for the sins of the
world. The title of the chapter excited the attention of my mother.
Before she came in the passage had been partly perused, and she eagerly
asked me " to read the whole of it to her." I began, but had scarcely pro
ceeded through two or three pages, when she rapped the book from my
hands, and threw it into the fire, where it was most deservedly burned.
Smilingly, I said "mother, why do you destroy my book?" The reply was
with an observable degree of anger : " Because your book would destroy my
happiness, in this and the world to come ! I know that I have a Savior,
who redeemed me, whose blood was shed upon the cross for me : of this,
I am convinced. Your book goes to make me doubt of the merits of the



124 Campaign against Qiiebec, 1775.

ruinous monastery of the order of St. Francis, called the
Reguliers. It was an immense quadrangular building,



sufferings of that Savior. The book would deprive me of the only staff
upon which my hope of salvation rests, and gives me none other, upon
which I can lean." These notions of my beloved mother, which accorded
fully with my own, on that topic, were submitted to with a juvenile frank
ness which pleased her, and of all the world I knew none whom I so
much wished to oblige, as that dear, amiable and instructive mother. My
father had been a mechanic of much respectability, and great skill.
During the war usually called " Braddock s war," and afterwards in Forbes s
campaign (in 1758), he was at the head of the armory, which in those
days was no mean station, and required talents of a superior grade.
Afterwards, having made a tolerable fortune, he entered into trade, but
his inclinations led him into chemical experiments. His evenings and
mornings were devoted to the laboratory. This gave rise to my mother s
acquaintance with Mr. Priestley, as an experimental philosopher. For the
instruction of his children, my father would discourse upon the subjects of
science and particularly of chemistry, which was his favorite theme, and in
which the names of Franklin and Priestley were sure to stand foremost.
My beloved parent s manner showed me that she was stung to the quick.
-My apology to her, had the desired effect, as her curiosity and mine
sprung from similar motives, " a desire to know the religious opinions of a
man of whom we had had superlative ideas," because of his acquirements
in many other branches of knowledge.

The position wished to be proved to you, by this relation which is true,
is " that for the sake of public and private comfort and genial happiness, it
is better not to disturb the devout mind by fanciful and newfangled schemes
of belief, and that those should be open only to the eyes of the learned."
My mother was a person of extensive reading j her religious tenets and
faith were solely grounded on the scriptures of the Old and New Testa
ments, as these, in her mind, were considered as clearly correct, but
nevertheless she was fearful of a disturbance of her mind by the quirks
and quibbles of deistical scribblers. Therefore to interfere with her
devotional principles, in so rude and heterodox a manner, tended to derange
her charming mind, and devastate those elegant maxims of Christian belief,
which the excellency of her maternal education had infused into her heart ;
in short, to destroy that firmness with which she relied on the merits and
sufferings of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.

Such men as Hobbs, Chubb, etc., seem not to have reflected on the
dreadful ills and calamities their writings would create, if their books came
into general circulation. If they did reflect, posterity ought to consider
them to have been the tigers and hyenas of human society, opposed to the
well being of the human race. Voltaire and John James Rousseau, in my
humble opinion, intended well to the people of France, but when speaking
of those gentlemen, we should recollect that they, as well as the virtuous
and celebrated Montesquieu, were the subjects of a prince who might, if he
pleased, be despotic : but that which was still worse, was, that the people



Campaign against g)ue bee, 1775. I2 5

containing, within its interior bounds, half an acre or
more, of an area, which seemed to be like a garden or



were abandoned to the control of a theological aristocracy bigoted,
wealthy, imperious and scandalously subjected to vices, in many instances,
greater than those of laymen, insomuch that in the reign of Louis XIV,
because of the infamous lives, and the oppressions of all classes of the
nation by the clergy, there was scarcely a gentleman in the kingdom, who
was not deistically inclined. For when the ministers of a religion of so
high sanctity, as that of our Holy Faith, demean themselves in a manner
which evinces to laymen their want of confidence in the religion (which
they had been consecrated to propagate and enforce), by an unholy life and
conduct, particularly in their cruel exactions from devotees; in the latter
instance, of enormous fees, and various demands of tithes of a most
exorbitant nature, which from time to time, they wickedly usurped.
Hence, it arose that Montesqueiu, Voltaire, Diderot, Rousseau, and
hundreds of others, of the learned men of France (considering the state of
that government), formed a phalanx of historic knowledge, genuine
reasoning, true wit, and an inexhaustible fund of humor, which slurred
their opponents to such a degree, as in the minds of the generality 0? Europe
gave them a deserved victory even over the government, which supported
the theocracy, with its vast power. It also, most probably, came from
thence, that those men under the clerical persecutions raised against them
( for many were confined in the dungeons), in the heat of controversy,
emitted opinions and ideas inconsistent with our pure, simple and holy
religion, according to the Augsburg creed, which we know has been adopted,
either in the whole or in parr, by all the reformed churches. In polemic
disputes, and perhaps more particularly in those which happened in
monarchies, there is an acrimony and irascibility of temper, inflaming the
minds of men generally, greater than is the case in democracies. The
cause seems to be, that in monarchies the priesthood becomes a machine
of government, in democracies it is the vehicle by which the people
simply adore God.

Those controversies, between the so styled philosophers of France and
the clergy, were conducted with such hatred and obloquy towards each
other, that they elicited sparks which enkindled that nation in a dreadful
flame of internal destruction ; and the brand has not only communicated
itself to all Europe, but in general to the world at large. Since the time
of Julius Caesar, nothing has occurred equal in barbarity, irruption, bloodshed,
murder, by public or domestic treason, as that which has happened in
Europe, since the year 1789. Gracious and omnipotent God, restore the
peace of the world ! ! !]

Such is the man who, upon his slight intercourse with the American
people, pluming himself with the well-earned celebrity of his political pieces,
that now presumes to become a reformer of our morals, our religious opin
ions and thinkings on Divine subjects. He himself a reprobate, cloaked by
every vice, would dictate to a great and independent Christian people, their
formulary of belief. Such insolence and presumption was never before



126 Campaign against Quebec , 1775.

shrubbery. The monks, priests or what not, who in
habited the house, must have been few in number, as



witnessed unless it was in the instance of Mahomet, or in those of the im
postures (such as Sabbati Sevi), who frequently as Messias, appeared to de
ceive the remnant of the Jewish people. Paine with all his other vices had
a foible injurious to our country. To keep up the spirits of the people it
was requisite that there should be a series of patriotic publications. Paine
was the most indolent of men ; if he was inspired by a muse, the
goddess most certainly made him but few visits. The office of secretary
of foreign affairs, was conferred upon him, because of the merit of his
Common Sense, or what are called the Crisis, under the signature to
Common Sense. It was to him personally a sinecure. He never went
to York (Penn.), where congress then sat, but occasionally, and stayed but
a day or two. His true employment was that of a political writer. In
the summer and winter of 1777, and 1778, he was an inmate of my
father s house, as were the late David Rittenhouse, the state-treasurer, and
John Hart, a member of the then executive council.

Paine would walk of a morning until twelve o clock ; come in and make
an inordinate dinner. The rising from table was between two and three
o clock. He would then retire to his bed-chamber, wrap a blanket around
him, and in a large arm-chair, take a nap, of two or three hours rise and
walk. These walks, and his indolence, surprised my parents 5 they knew
him as the author of Common Sense, who had written patriotically, and