The first news that the Irish public received of war in America came from a report in a Massachusetts newspaper, the Essex Gazette, which crossed the Atlantic several days ahead of official despatches and was reprinted in the Irish press in the first week of June 1775, more than a week before the official account of the actions at Lexington and Concord was carried by the pro-government press. This factor is likely to have influenced the pro-American stance adopted by newspapers that could not normally be described as organs of patriot opinion. In Dublin, Saunders' News-Letter reprinted the Essex Gazette's account of the engagements verbatim: ‘Last Wednesday the 19th of April, the troops of his Britannic Majesty commenced hostilities upon the people of this province, attended with circumstances of cruelty not less brutal than what our venerable ancestors received from the vilest savages of the wilderness.’ A comment in the next issue of the same paper was more balanced but still attributed most of the blame for the violent turn of events to government: ‘A correspondent, who calls the Americans obstinate, warmly censures the want of judgment, as well as humanity, in the conduct of our ministry towards the colonies. A small knowledge of history would teach them that the sword is as little likely to subdue an enthusiastic spirit of liberty, as fire and faggot are to suppress bigotry in religion.’