Beschreibung:

The Quaker unmask'd; or, Plain truth: Humbly address'd to the Consideration of all the Freemen of Pennsylvania.
Philadelphia: [Andrew Steuart], 1764. 15 pp., 8vo (165 x 105 mm). Uncut. Later three quarters olive morocco. Provenance : Frank T. Siebert (Sotheby’s New York, 21 May 1999, lot 172). This rare pamphlet, attributed to Dove (one of the earliest headmasters of Germantown Academy), is sympathetic to the Paxton Boys. “The Quaker Unmask'd began dispassionately enough, with an admission that the Paxton men had perhaps acted rashly; but it went on to argue that the frontiersmen were driven to their acts by Quaker neglect of their defense, and then devolved into the venomous satirical question about Quaker love of Indian squaws. The tract focused on the amazing hypocrisy of Quakers who were pacifists where Indians were concerned but militant against the Paxtonians … Dove's pamphlet mired the Quakers in at least half a dozen rejoinders” (Olson). The terminal two pages comprise a postscript praising Smith and Gibson’s Declaration and Remonstrance. For a response to this pamphlet, see Philalethes, The Quaker Vindicated and Philadelphiensis, Remarks on the Quaker Unmask’d. first edition, first issue with the terminal page blank (the subsequent issue having a publisher’s ad). Only this Siebert copy has appeared at auction in the last quarter century. Evans 9646; Olson, “The Pamphlet War over the Paxton Boys” in PMHB Vol. 123, No. 1; Sabin 66932; Siebert Sale 172 (this copy).