LETTER OF TRANSMITTAL

Baltimore, December 1, 1947
To the Maryland Historical Society
GENTLEMEN :

The volume of the Archives of Maryland now offered you is the sixty-fourth
of the series, and the thirty-second volume of the sub-series of the Proceedings
and Acts of the General Assembly. It consists of the official record of the last
pre-Revolutionary sessions of the Assembly, the meeting or convention of
October 13-28, 1773, the session of November 16-December 23, 1773, and
the third session of the body elected in May 1773, the session that lasted from
March 23 to April 19, 1774. The first session of this Assembly was held in
June-July 1773, and its proceedings have already been printed in volume LXIII
of the Archives.

As has previously been done, the text that begins on page three and ends on
page 420 has been printed directly from photostats of the official libers which
are now in the Hall of Records in Annapolis, except for the Lower House
proceedings for two sessions. For the convention of October 13-29, 1773, and
for the session of November 16-December 23, 1773, there is no manuscript
now known to exist, so that recourse had to be had to the official printed version,
the work of Anne Catharine Green of Annapolis. Indeed, the printed version
itself is but little less rare than the manuscript. Wroth, in his History of Print-
ing in Colonial Maryland, lists only one of the three, but the Historical Society
has copies of all of them. Two came to light after Wroth wrote, when the
library of James McSherry was broken up.

As always, the manuscript has been followed with Chinese faithfulness.
End quotes have been inserted, in brackets, and in a few places missing words
have likewise been put in, but the cases have been very few. Although the
manuscript is the source, it has been compared with Green's printed version
throughout, and, where the differences seemed important enough, comment on
them has been made. The Votes and Proceedings, and the session laws, as
printed by Green, were the official version: they were sent to the high officials
at Annapolis and in the counties for their guidance. They may even be more
accurate than the original, for the clerks of the houses were often observably
careless. Printing from Green was less difficult than from the manuscript, and
the Lower House proceedings of the October 13-29 and the November 16-
December 23 sessions are presented as faithfully as a modern press can repro-
duce the eighteenth century product. Only one known change has been made.