Excerpt from Remarks and Documents Relating to the Preservation and Keeping of the Public Archives Unfortunately for my purpose, I have succeeded in obtaining information from only sixteen states and four of the Departments at Washington, and that neither so full or positive in all cases as I hoped for but still it reveals an extent of destruction which will astonish any one who has not himself been raking among the ashes. Of the in stances, thus discovered, of damage to public records by fire, it is surprising how little is now known. Several of them had passed into utter oblivion, and have been brought to light by chance only. From these circumstances it may be inferred, that more thorough investigations would dis close other forgotten ruins. In six of the sixteen states from which I have some in formation, it is ascertained that the public archives have been partially destroyed by fire viz. In new-hampshire in 1736 in Massachusetts in 1747, besides having been thrown into confusion, if not otherwise damaged, by three previous fires; in new-york in 1740 - 1 and 1773; in new-jersey in 1686; in north-carolina in 1831 in south-carolina in 1698 - these were all accidental; in Virginia in 1781, by the enemy under Arnold. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.