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An Early Colonial Historian: John Oldmixon and The British Empire in America

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  16 January 2009

Pat Rogers
Pat Rogers
Affiliation:
King's College, London
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Extract

For many years, Arthur M. Schlesinger observed, the American colonists were too occupied with living the present to explore their own past. Such historical works as were written generally confined themselves to a single province. Perhaps the most important intercolonial work of the early eighteenth century was compiled by an Englishman: Daniel Neal's History of New-England (1720). In the New Cambridge Bibliography of English Literature the entry for Neal is immediately preceded by that for John Oldmixon (1673–1742), miscellaneous Whig compiler and butt of the Tory wits. This may serve as a reminder that Oldmixon, too, wrote a pioneering work of colonial history – a flawed, prolix but deeply interesting book which merits more scrupulous attention than it generally gets.

Type
Research Article
Information
Journal of American Studies , Volume 7 , Issue 2 , August 1973 , pp. 113 - 123
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1973

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References

1 Schlesinger, Arthur M. Sr, The Birth of the Nation (London, 1969), p. 173.Google Scholar

2 The New Cambridge Bibliography of English Literature, ed. Watson, G. (Cambridge, 1971), II, cols. 1708–10Google Scholar. For Oldmixon and the wits, see my Grub Street (London, 1972), pp. 185–95Google Scholar. For evidence of colonial interest in Oldmixon's controversial works, see Cook, Elizabeth C., Literary Influences in Colonial Newspapers 1704–50 (New York, 1912).Google Scholar

3 Salley, Alexander S., Narratives of Early Carolina 1650–1708 (New York, 1911, rptd 1959), p. 315.Google Scholar

4 Andrews, Charles M., The Colonial Period of American History (New Haven, 1937), III, 244n.Google Scholar

5 See Beverley, Robert, The History and Present State of Virginia, ed. Wright, L. B. (Chapel Hill, 1947), pp. xvii–xixGoogle Scholar. All references are to this edition. The comments originally appeared in the London edition of 1722, sigs. A2r–A4v.

6 As Wright points out (p. xiv), Beverley may have been educated at Beverley Grammar School, as was the present writer.

7 Wright, , p. xviiiGoogle Scholar. But see The Prose Worlks of William Byrd of Westover, ed. Wright, L. B. (Cambridge, Mass., 1966), p. 17Google Scholar, where Dr Wright appears to interpret the passage as I do.

8 See Prose Works of Byrd, p. 17Google Scholar. Wright states that Byrd's material went into the Neu-gefundes Eden of Jenner, Samuel (1737).Google Scholar

9 The British Empire in America (London, 2nd ed., 1741), I, iiiGoogle Scholar. Unless otherwise stated, references are to this edition.

10 Salley's assertion that a new edition, ‘with a few unimportant additions, was published in 1730’ (p. 316) is wholly inaccurate.

11 Ettinger, A. A., James Edward Oglethorpe: Imperial Idealist (Oxford, 1936), p. 142n.Google Scholar

12 British Empire, I, viii–xvGoogle Scholar (misprinted ‘vx’). Future references are incorporated in the text, thus: I, 25.

13 Newman, Henry (1670–1743)Google Scholar, philanthropist, worker for the Society for the Promotion of Christian Knowledge, merchant of St John's, friend of Richard Steele.

14 For Mather's reactions to Oldmixon's work as a historian of England, see Illustrations of the Literary History of the Eighteenth Century, ed. Nichols, J. (London, 1822), IV, 282Google Scholar. See also Mather's letter to Daniel Neal of 5 July 1720.

15 See Winton, Calhoun, ‘Jeremiah Dummer: The “First American”?’, William & Mary Quarterly, 3rd ser., 26 (1969), 105–8.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

16 See Hodges, John C., William Congreve: Letters and Documents (London, 1964), pp. 82, 141Google Scholar, on Ralph (1669–1725) and William, (1671–1746)Google Scholar. For the possibility that it was Oldmixon who wrote the first life of the dramatist Congreve, see my article in Modern Language Quarterly, 31 (1970), 330–44.Google Scholar

17 See Andrews, , III, 171Google Scholar, as well as DAB.

18 These matters are discussed in an article, ‘Daniel Defoe, John Oldmixon, and the Bristol Riot’, Transactions of the Bristol and Gloucestershire Archaeological Society, forthcoming.

19 See DAB; Salley, , p. 223Google Scholar; Andrews, , III, 234–5Google Scholar. Oldmixon states in his History of England (1730)Google Scholar that he had information from ‘Mr. Pen, Mr. Arclidae, Mr. Ellwood, eminent Men among the Quakers, whom I knew intimately’ (p. 415). Arclidae is plainly a quaint mis-print for Archdale, as indicated by Oldmixon, 's History (1735), p. 191.Google Scholar

20 In the first edition, Oldmixon also specified sources he had consulted in the Temple records, and accounts sent to the Royal Society.

21 See also Salley, , p. 316Google Scholar. In the first edition, Oldmixon had mentioned Samuel Purchas and Richard Hakluyt. In his rapid survey of Louisiana, there is reference to Hennepin, Louis's famous Nouvelle Découverte (1698).Google Scholar

22 Wright, , p. xviiiGoogle Scholar. The following sections of the first edition refer directly or indirectly to Beverley: I, 215, 216, 217, 242, 243, 244, 283, 291, 298. I, 228–9 paraphrases Beverley, , pp. 36–7Google Scholar. As Wright points out (p. 352n), Oldmixon follows Beverley in an error at I, 235.

23 Oldmixon, , British Empire (1st ed., 1708), I, 243Google Scholar: cf. Beverley, , ed. Wright, pp. 63–4.Google Scholar

24 Further details are supplied in an article, ‘Sir John Bawden’, Notes & Queries for Somerset and Dorset, forthcomingGoogle Scholar. See also British Empire (1st ed.), II, 53–4Google Scholar; and, a muted version, (2nd ed.), II, 47. See also, on Gardner, Penson, Lillian M., The Colonial Agents of the British West Indies (London, 1924), p. 58.Google Scholar

25 On Heathcote (1651–1733), see DNB. At one point in the British Empire, Oldmixon quotes a story ‘which Sir Gilbert Heathcot told me, as he had it from Brigadier Hunter, Governor of this Province [New York]’ (I, 227). Oldmixon knew Crow when he was apprenticed to a Barbados merchant, Abraham Tillard (II, 64); cf. History (1735), p. 361.Google Scholar

26 British Empire, II, 437Google Scholar (misprinted ‘773’). See my article referred to in note 18 above.

27 Andrews, , III, 244nGoogle Scholar. See an article, ‘Oldmixon and the Family of Admiral Blake’, Notes & Queries for Somerset and Dorset, forthcoming.Google Scholar

28 Not all such passages were stale. For example, Oldmixon cites Penn's own account, delivered in conversation, of Iroquois courtesies that proved embarrassing (I, 308).

29 See British Empire, I, 148–58Google Scholar. The reference is to Calef, Robert's More Wonders of the Invisible World (1700)Google Scholar. Oldmixon's final summary is worth quoting: ‘It would be very unjust to make this Folly and Wickedness national and personal. A very great Majority of the reasonable Inhabitants of New-England abhorred these desperate Persecutions at the Time they were carrying on … The Learning, good Sense and Moderation of the present Ministers and Magistrates of New-England are as much opposite to the Enthusiasm and Rigour of those we are writing of, as Virtue is to Vice: And they would no more countenance such Doings as these, than the wisest and best of our Magistrates would do’ (I, 157).