Note 35 — X. Reminiscences.

As an improvement on the above, cartridge-paper of a peculiar kind was used in 1778. When the American army entered Philadelphia, in June, 1778, upon the evacuation of the English troops, there was a want of paper fitted for the construction of cartridges. It was advertised for, and but a small quantity procured. An order was then issued demanding its instant production by all people in that city who had it. This produced but little, and most probably on account of its scarcity. A file of soldiers was then ordered to make search for it in every place where any was likely to be found. Among other places visited in July, 1778, was a garret in a house in which Benjamin Franklin had previously had his printing-office. Here were discovered about twenty-five hundred copies of a sermon which the Rev. Gilbert Tennent had written (printed by Franklin) upon “Defensive War,” to rouse the colonists during the French troubles. They were all taken and used as cases for musket-cartridges, and at once sent to the army; and most of them were used at the battle of Monmouth. The requisites in cartridge-paper were, of course, thinness, strength, pliability, and inflammability; and such paper was necessarily scarce then.