GERRIT SMITH TO FREDERICK DOUGLASS
Peterboro[, N.Y.] 26 August [18]71.

My dear Douglass,
I have received from your boys their Circular of 23rd inst.¹ reached its one-year anniversary in August 1871 after undergoing significant changes in management and acquiring a new name. Lewis H. Douglass and Frederick Douglass, Jr., were credited on the masthead as the paper’s “publishers,” and their father served as “editor.” It is likely that Smith refers to a circular sent out by the younger Douglasses to subscribers and other potential supporters to solicit financial aid for the struggling newspaper. , 24 August 1871.

I have not the houses & land I once had. Nonetheless, I must do a
little for this good digest, which they lay before me. Please hand them the
enclosed draft.²No record of a contribution from Smith to the New National Era was recorded in that newspaper.

I prize your Paper. The Editorials of [this] paper are as wise & profound as those of your Paper.

Are you ever coming to see me again? Do take me in your way between Washington & Rochester.

In haste your friend

GERRIT SMITH

ALS: General Correspondence File, reel 2, frames 613, FD Papers, DLC.