Communication from His Honor the Mayor in relation to the Precautionary Measures Adopted by him to Secure the Public Peace at the Recent Election in this City, with Documents and a Report from the Controller Relative to the Expenses Incurred during said Election.
New York: Printed by Order of the Common Council, 1839.
Price: $650.00
About the item
First edition. Board of Alderman Doc. No. 29. [3], 294-350pp. 8vo. Publisher's lettered pink paper wrappers, minor soiling and tears.
Item #368279
An important report, largely concerning the July 1834 New York anti-abolitionist riot (aka the Tappan riot). Two issues of the report were published: the present Board of Alderman report dated January 28, 1839 and a Board of Assistants version dated February 18, 1839.
The founding of the New York female anti-slavery society by Tappan and others, which aroused accusations of the promotion of miscegenation, as well as Tappan attending church with a black clergyman, which prompted the accusation that the pastor had preached a sermon on Jesus being black, led to increased tensions in the city in the summer of 1834. On July 9 three interconnected race riots broke out at an anti-slavery meeting at Chatham Street Church, at the home of Lewis Tappan, and at the Bowery theater to avenge a perceived anti-American remark made by British stageman and abolitionist George P. Farren. Provacative hanbills and broadsides were quickly hung and violence escalated. Over two days the mob, numbering by some accounts as upwards of 4000, targeted homes, businesses, churches, and other buildings associated with the abolitionists and African Americans. Th New York First Division was called out by the Mayor on July 11 to support the police and put down the riot.
