The Life and Remarkable Adventures of Israel Potter has been read, when it has been read at all, in the same way as college sophomores studying Shakespeare read Plutarch’s Lives , not for the moral homilies of a great biographer but rather as notes for the study of Julius Caesar or Antony and Cleopatra . In the case of Israel Potter’s Life , however, such an approach can at least be partially justified, since its primary significance remains as a source for Herman Melville’s “Revolutionary narra

I WAS born of reputable parents in the town of Cranston, State of Rhode Island, August 1st, 1744.—I continued with my parents there in the full enjoyment of parental affection and indulgence, until I arrived at the age of 18, when, having formed an acquaintance with the daughter of a Mr. Richard Gardner, a near neighbour, for whom (in the opinion of my friends) entertaining too great a degree of partiality, I was reprimanded and threatened by them with more severe punishment, if my visits were n

From Lebanon I crossed the river to New-Hartford (then N. Y.) where I bargained with a Mr. Brink of that town for 200 acres of new land, lying in New Hampshire, and for which I was to labour for him four months. As this may appear to some a small consideration for so great a number of acres of land, it may be well here to acquaint the reader with the situation of the country in that quarter, at that early period of its settlement—which was an almost impenetrable wilderness, containing but few ci

Rhode Island District — Providence Aug. 6, 1823. The said John Vial, who is well known to me and is a creditable witness, made solemn oath to the truth of the foregoing deposition by him subscribed in my presence. DAVID HOWELL. District Judge. Herman Melville first conceived of retelling the tale of Israel Potter, the “Revolutionary beggar,” in 1849 after coming upon a tattered copy of the original book. When he finally wrote his own account in 1854, he drew as well on the narratives of Ethan Al

By HERMAN MELVILLE, AUTHOR OF “TYPEE,” “OMOO,” ETC. New York: G. P. PUTNAM & CO., 10 PARK PLACE. 1855. TO HIS HIGHNESS THE Bunker-Hill Monument . Biography , in its purer form, confined to the ended lives of the true and brave, may be held the fairest meed of human virtue—one given and received in entire disinterestedness—since neither can the biographer hope for acknowledgment from the subject, nor the subject at all avail himself of the biographical distinction conferred. Israel Potter

F OR the most part, what befell Israel during his forty years wanderings in the London deserts, surpassed the forty years in the natural wilderness of the outcast Hebrews under Moses. In that London fog, went before him the ever-present cloud by day, but no pillar of fire by the night, except the cold column of the monument, two hundred feet beneath the mocking gilt flames on whose top, at the stone base, the shiverer, of midnight, often laid down. But these experiences, both from their intensit

I T happened that the ship, gaining her port, was moored to the dock on a Fourth of July; and half an hour after landing, hustled by the riotous crowd near Faneuil Hall, the old man narrowly escaped being run over by a patriotic triumphal car in the procession, flying a broidered banner, inscribed with gilt letters: “BUNKER-HILL 1775. GLORY TO THE HEROES THAT FOUGHT!” It was on Copps’ Hill, within the city bounds, one of the enemy’s positions during the fight, that our wanderer found his best re