(BENJAMIN FRANKLIN) A scarce piece, the first reprinting of one his more noted literary hoaxes, his privately printed Supplement to the Boston Independent Chronicle, this variant bearing the title "Supplement to the Boston Chronicle", 2pp. folio, [London, 1817], but bearing the heading "Monday, March 13, 1782". This edition was printed to be included in Temple Franklin's The Memoirs of the Life and Writings of Benjamin Franklin (1817). The original edition, printed on Franklin's own press at Passy in 1782 are unobtainable. This mock newspaper ran a fictitious extract of a letter from "Captain Gerrish" of Albany relating the contents of a captured letter to "Colonel Haldimand, Governor of Canada." The supposed letter described the contents of eight bundles of scalps sent to the British in exchange for reward by "the Senneka [sic] chiefs...eight packs of scalps, cured, dried, hoped, and painted, with all the Indian triumphal marks...". Franklin (a.k.a. Gerrish) then poured in to rich and graphic detail of each pack of scalps which surely shocked its readers. The savage and grisly descriptions were considered so disturbing that no English paper dared reprint it. The second "letter" is "authored" by John Paul Jones who fills the entire second page with a mocking attack on his correspondent, Sir Joseph Yorke, for accusing Jones of piracy. "Jones" responded in small part: "A pirate is defined to be hostis humani generis, (an enemy to all mankind). It happens, sir, that I am an enemy to no part of mankind, except your nation, the English...A pirate makes war for the sake of rapine. That is not the kind of war I am engaged in against England. Ours is a war in defense of liberty— the most just of all wars; and of our properties, which your nation would have taken from us, without our consent, in violation of our rights, and by an armed force...". A scarce reprinting of a classic piece of Frankliniana. Margins a tad rough, a few minor foxed spits, otherwise very good. $200-300