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The Printers of the Maryland Gazette and Baltimore Advertiser
emporary suspension of The Maryland Gazette. The first number of
the Maryland Gazette, and Annapolis Advertiser, judging from the date
and number of the only issue that has been located, probably appeared
on April 2, 1779. Less than a month later Frederick and Samuel Green
revived the Maryland Gazette and the competition of the older paper
soon forced Hayes to withdraw from the field.
There is no record of activity on the part of the Hayes Press, either
n Annapolis or Baltimore from July 9, 1779 to May 16, 1783 when the
Erst number of T'he Maryland Gazette, or the Baltimore General Advertiser
was printed by John Hayes. In the meantime James Hayes, Junior, had
joined his former employer in partnership and after many difficulties
set up a press in Richmond.
Virginia was suffering from the lack of an active printing press at
the new capital city during the Revolution, so Governor Jefferson was
authorized by the legislature in 1780 to invite a printer to settle at Rich-
mond and to employ him at public expense. Several months after receiv-
ing the invitation, John Dunlap and James Hayes, as partners, sent a
printing press, materials and paper by sea. The ship was driven ashore
during a storm and was captured by the British. The partners informed
the legislature of their misfortune and asked that they might be reim-
bursed so that they could make another attempt to establish a printing
business in the state. Apparently they received partial compensation for
their loss because James Hayes left Richmond for Philadelphia in Janu-
ary, 1781 to procure another printing outfit. The press and all of the
equipment of the new printing office were loaded on three wagons. To
justify the expense of the three hundred mile journey over rough and
muddy roads, Jefferson wrote on the bill amounting to over £14,000
Virginia money:
"The expense of transporting the printing materials of Mr. Hayes from Philadelphia here by
land was taken on the state rather than run the risk of their being lost a second time if brought
by water, and that to be again made good."6
Hayes established the Virginia Gazette, or, the American Advertiser on
December 22, 1781 independently of Dunlap whose name appeared only
on the state documents. The newspaper was discontinued in 1786 and
the partnership was dissolved on May 13, 1788. James Hayes died in
October, 1804, aged 44 years.
6 The documents relating to Hayes and Dunlap's partnership in Virginia are reprinted in Earl G. Swems's A Bibli-
ography of Virginia in Bulletin of the Virginia Slate Library, Vol. 10 (1917), pp. 1065-1067.
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