News you can use, even after three centuries

It’s the oldest English-language daily paper still in publication, and on Monday its oldest surviving edition turns 275.

That age-weathered copy of the Belfast News-Letter, and General Advertiser, from October 1738, which is held at the Linen Hall Library in Belfast, will be reproduced at the start of next week inside the latest edition of what is now simply called the News Letter. (The previous editions of the paper, which was first published in September 1737, almost half a century before the London Times began, have been lost.)

At a glance, the 4,000 words of edition 113, dated October 3rd, 1738 – October 14th in the modern calendar – seem to offer little light relief. They are set in dense print without illustrations. But on closer inspection the two-page publication bursts with vitality. It is crammed with news and advertisements that offer a window on life in Ireland, early Georgian Britain and the world.

The first paragraphs are a report from St Petersburg of the tsarina ordering “Te Deum to be sung for the Victory obtained by the Russians, in the 10th Instant over the Infidels”.

Elsewhere we read: “We have advice from Rome, that a young woman of Stassano, who had resisted a certain Man’s Addresses for the Space of 18 Months, was surprized by him one morning as she went to bring water from a Draw-well, and that seeing herself on the point of being ravished by him, she drew a Knife out of her Pocket and killed him.”

There is a report of a death by a cannonball of a British aristocrat “in the fourth Action with the Turks”.

A ship from the American colonies is said to have brought news of “murders” of “four more families” in Virginia.

News and adverts almost fuse, with some paid-for space telling of noteworthy events: two ads in edition 113 ask for information about the theft of horses in Co Antrim.

Here are three of the stories that particularly catch the eye.

Dick Turpin and horse theft
This report describes the imprisonment of Dick Turpin's father for receiving stolen goods: a horse stolen by his highwayman son. Six months after this report, Dick Turpin was hanged for the theft. "A few Days since the Father of the noted Turpin was committed to Chelmsford Goal [sic], for having in his Possession a Horse supposed to be stolen out of Lincolnshire, which, he pleads, was left with him by his Son to pay for Diet and Lodging."

Attack by Native Americans in Virginia
Here it is reported that "we have a further Account that four more Families have been murdered by the Indians in Orange County, and that the whole County are under Apprehensions of great Danger from them, they having assembled together in great Numbers." The colony of Orange County in Virginia was only a few years old, having been established by Ulster Scots in 1734 and named after William of Orange. The report continues: "It is said that several Companies
will be sent from hence in order to suppress them."

Gays in the military
In this report about a court martial, "male practices" may be a euphemism for homosexuality. "By Letters from Portsmouth we hear, that a Court-Martial has sate every Day this Week on board the Princess Amelia, now lying at Spithead on the Trial of the three Captains of Men of War that are charged with Male Practices during their Command on the Irish Station; but that the Enquiries are of such important Consequence, as well as nice a Nature to get to the Bottom of the Affair, that it will take up more time than was expected."

Ben Lowry is the News Letter's news editor