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The reason I collected it: The Latimer Journal, And North Star…
November 13, 2026 by TimHughes · Leave a Comment
Although I have encountered many themed newspapers whether focused on sports, anti-slavery, literature, entertainment, presidential campaigns, and many other themes, this may be the first title I’ve encountered focused on a single cause. Hence, a great choice for the private collection.
The title is ‘The Latimer Journal And North Star’ from Boston, and this issue is dated Nov. 23, 1842.
As a bit of background, George Latimer was an escaped enslaved person whose case became a major political issue in Massachusetts. There is much on the internet concerning him and his legal case.
We credit the Rutgers School of Arts & Sciences for the following which ties this newspaper to the Latimer case: “George W. Latimer, was the first fugitive slave whose emancipation guided and influenced the American abolitionists of the 1850s. His flight to Boston, arrest, imprisonment, trial, and emancipation, as well as the numerous public meetings held all over Massachusetts on his behalf, made his a cause célèbre, fifteen years before the famous Dred Scott Decision. His supporters called it a “war on slavery.”
Supporters of the Latimer cause included Dr. Henry Bowditch, William Francis Channing, and Frederick Cabot. These men, described as “gentlemen of property and standing,” founded a newspaper called The Latimer Journal and North Star, which first appeared in Boston on November 11, 1842. Its purpose was “to meet the urgency of the first enslavement in Boston” and to rescue a fugitive slave from the custody in which he was detained. The editors of the Journal were determined to “discourage all intemperate and violent measures, even for the rescue of our citizens from enslavement.” [Note: A post featuring his son can be found at: “Who’s Who in Newspapers – Lewis H. Latimer edition”.]
Critics claimed that the Latimer Journal “greatly excited and alarmed the credulous, vexed the irritable, inflamed the passionate, and exasperated those whose sympathies ran beyond their judgments.”
Six [actually 7] issues appeared subsequently from November 11, 1842 to May 16, 1843, [the issue offered here is number 5]. The journal responded to a chain of events that had begun on October 4, 1842, when George Latimer, along with his wife Rebecca, ran away from slavery in Norfolk, Virginia, and fled to the North…” and more as can be seen on the link.
See the photos on the listing for “Great Massachusetts Petition” which would appear separately as a broadside, but consumes all of the back page of this issue.
The Great Massachusetts Petition sought to acquire signatures to put an end to the state’s “connection with domestic slavery” and to ensure that its citizens would be free from the “danger of enslavement.” The handwritten section reads: “This was the form sent to every town of Massachusetts for signature, the towns being organized for this purpose by correspondence, county conventions & public meetings.” The following is from the above mentioned newspaper: