Bickerstaff's genuine Boston almanack, or, Federal calendar, for 1791 Containing, besides what is usual, a true narrative of the shocking captivity of Robert White, among the Algerines (Printed by E. Russell, cheap to travelling- traders, &c, 1790)
Advertisement for books sold by E. Russell, p. [24]. - Bristol, B7322. - Drake, M. Almanacs, 3449. - Shipton & Mooney, 45833. - The Bickerstaff almanacs published by Russell for the years 1783-1793 are attributed to Benjamin West by Evans and others. The attribution is traditional, but most of these issues can be shown to be the probable work of other calculators. West issued no almanacs under his own name for the years between 1788 and 1803. This issue, like that for 1792, was probably calculated by Amos Pope. The notes on the calendar pages include the abbreviation P.N. (pointers north), e.g. P.N. 2.30, a reference which appears to have been peculiar to Pope's almanacs at this time. Nathaniel Low ceased to give it in 1787; and Daniel George, who also employed it, ceased publishing almanacs under his own name in 1787 and omitted the term from those he calculated anonymously for Isaiah Thomas from 1791 to 1794. - The cut portraying Robert White was also used in the broadside "An elegiac poem composed by F[reema]n H[earse]y" (probably printed by Russell in 1791) to represent Major Thomas Butler, wounded in a battle with the Indians near Fort Wayne, Nov. 4, 1791. - There is a striking frequency of correspondence between the calendar page notes generally in this issue of Bickerstaff and those in Pope's first signed almanac, An astronomical diary or almanack for 1792 (Boston). Calculators sometimes published their initial work anonymously, to test its acceptance