THE HISTORY MYSTERY DECISION

Back in December I let my readers know that there was a chance that
the PBS series History Detectives might do a segment on a mystery
I'd posted about here concerning Revolutionary War figure James
Otis. Somehow or another the show had learned of my post and
contacted me about looking into it. I spoke and corresponded with
a very nice lady named Robin Hutchins and she told me I'd hear
back from her after the holidays.

I received an email from Robin today:

"Hi Bill,

I hope you had a good holiday. Unfortunately, we won’t be

able to use your investigation for the show. But I wanted to 

let you know what we learned. There is no entry in the Court’s

Docket of this case, which means that this case never went to

trial. This can mean many things, but none of them were recorded 

at this time. I don’t know if we can ever learn why as there will 

not be a paper trail.

But good luck with your investigation. You are free to post this on 

your blog now.

Best, Robin Hutchins"

So even though we didn't make the show, I'm still over the moon 

that they even considered the idea. And of course I plan to keep

digging away at this for my brother in law Peter, because that's 

what we genealogists and family historians do when we come

across a family mystery.

And as I told Robin, The History Detectives remains my favorite

television show!

OTIS V. GRAY: A HISTORY MYSTERY

A few Sundays ago I spent an enjoyable Sunday afternoon with my
brother in law Pete looking over some family heirlooms. Pete like myself
is of two heritages, one side of the family descended from immigrants,
the other from colonial New England stock. The items he showed me
come from the second side and included albums of beautiful century-old
postcards, greeting cards, and calling cards, and I'll relate the story
behind them in a later post. Another item is a legal document with a bit
of a mystery behind it, and we're hoping someone reading this can help
us solve it.

Many of Pete's ancestors came from the coastal town of Scituate, Ma.
and among them are members of the Otis family.The most famous
member of the family was James Ois, a mercurial figure who was 
prominent in Boston in the days leading up to the American Revolution. 
He battled mental illness which included violent outbursts of temper.
That, coupled with his sarcastic comments led to many confrontations
with the Tories of Boston.

The document Pete showed me is an indication of how heated those
confrontations became. It's a court wit for Lewis Grant, a prominent
Tory who'd been the target of some of Otis'  tirades. According to the
writ Gray had broken into Otis'  house and assaulted him on November
11th, 1771 and "beat wounded & evil intreated" Otis. Just how badly
Otis was beaten is unknown but he was able to file charges. Gray was
arrested and released the next day after promising to appear in court.

The question is, how did the trial turn out?

With Pete's permission I started searching the internet to try to discover
the outcome but had no luck. Then I turned to J L Bell of Boston 1776
but he had never heard of the case either. He suggested I contact Jeff
Purcell who is writing a biography of James Otis. Although Jeff hadn't
heard about the court case he did share some fascinating information
about Otis and I'm looking forward to reading his book when it's
published.

So at this point, we're at a dead end. I've attached a transcription Peter
sent me of the writ so you can read it, and if any of my readers have any
suggestions on how to further research this I'd appreciate hearing  from
you. I know there are resources not available on the Interenet; I just
need some idea of where to start looking.

Or perhaps we should submit it to the History Detectives?

What do you all think?