Return to the MHS home page

Online

Guide to Online Features

Guide to Adams Resources on this Site

The Battle of Bunker Hill

Images of the Antislavery Movement

Jefferson Electronic Archive

 The Long Road to Justice

Maps of the French and Indian War

Object of the Month

Photographs

Slavery in Massachusetts
 Related Pages:
   About the Library
   Library Collections
   Links to Other Websites




The 4th of July
Independence Day
 To celebrate Independence Day, the MHS has assembled a short list of
online resources pertaining to this important moment in United States history.

The Declaration of Independence


The first printing of the Declaration of Independence

On 4 July 1776, the committee that had drafted the Declaration of Independence presented their corrected and approved text to the printing shop of John Dunlap. The small number of copies that he printed that night provided, as they went forth the next day, the first step in the official declaration of independence throughout the colonies. The broadside appears in the July 2002 From Our Cabinet exhibition, Declaration of Independence.

View the first printing

For additional background information, view our From Our Cabinet exhibition
John Adams's copy of the Declaration of Independence

At an early stage of the revisions, before it was even presented to the Committee of Five, Adams copied the entire document. The Adams copy demonstrates the evolution of the text from Jefferson's "original Rough draught," as he called it, which exists now only as a much marked-up document, to the Declaration so familiar today.
View the manuscript
View the document from the Adams Papers Digital Edition
Thomas Jefferson's manuscript copy of the Declaration of Independence

This manuscript copy of the Declaration of Independence, one of several in Jefferson's hand, represents the Declaration as drafted by the Committee of Five. Mr. and Mrs. Arthur C. Washburn gave this copy to the Massachusetts Historical Society in 1893, and it is sometimes refered to as the "Washburn copy of the "Declaration of Independence".
View the manuscript at Thomas Jefferson Papers: An Electronic Archive.

In Print

The MHS publishes a short book entitled Declarations of Independence, which is available through this website. The book draws on the Society's collections to illustrate the history of the Declaration of Independence-of its printing and distribution as well as its drafting. Pauline Maier's introduction gives a detailed history of the document's creation, placing it both in the context of key historical figures and the general populace of the new nation.
Learn more about the book.




Also in Independence Day History ...

A Fourth of July Feast, 1844 Style
Learn about a menu detailing the wide variety of foods served at the Fourth of July celebration for city officials held at Faneuil Hall in Boston in 1844. This sumptuous feast, featuring Fricasee Poulet, Compote de Pigeons, and boiled and roast meats (in addition to twenty-six kinds of dessert and fruit), was the finale to a very busy day for revelers in the city.
View the Faneuil Hall Menu