Marmaduke Johnson

Background

Johnson was born in England, the exact date is unknown. He had a brother, Thomas Johnson.

Career

Johnson came to Massachusetts in 1660. He is credited with political pamphlets; but the Registers of the Stationers' Company list no imprint by him. There are some by his brother Thomas, one of which is Ludgate, What It Is, Not What It Was, by M. Johnson, Typograph, a Late Prisoner There (1659). This brochure, written from Ludgate Chapel, November 7, 1659, is an account of the conditions within the prison. Since Samuel Green, the only printer in Massachusetts, was untrained, and Eliot's Indian translation of the Bible was ready for printing, the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in New England made a contract, April 21, 1660, with Marmaduke Johnson, "Citizen and Stationer of London, " whereby the latter agreed to go to Boston to serve the Society "in the Art of a Printer for Three years. " The Commissioners of the New England Confederation informed the Society, September 10, that "Mr. Johnson wilbee acomodated wee hope to content. " If Johnson was content, however, others were not; for on September 10, 1662, the Commissioners wrote the Society that he "hath Caryed heer very unworthyly of which hee hath bine openly Convicted . .. hee hath proued very Idle an nought. " His particular offense was trying to get Green's daughter to marry him in spite of her father. For this he was ordered to return to his wife in England, though he represented that she had died, but the banishment was deferred until he had completed his engagement with the Society.

In 1663 Green and Johnson completed the printing of the Indian Bible, one of the outstanding productions of the colonial press, and the Society decided to continue Johnson's contract for another year because, according to Eliot, he was "an able and vsefull man in the presse. " On August. 25, 1664, however, Eliot wrote, that Johnson was "now returning for England. " He was in the colony in May 1665 with his own press and types, and the town of Boston permitted him to locate there; but the General Court interposed, May 27, with an order "that there shall be no printing presse allowed but in Cambridge, " and renewed the censorship, which, first established October 8, 1662, had been repealed on May 27, 1663. Johnson went to Cambridge, where there was not enough business for two printers and little cordiality between himself and Green, who wrote that Johnson "was so high that [he] at last wrought me quite out of the Indian worke. " Yet they continued to issue joint imprints and probably occupied the same shop. The General Court finally heeded Johnson's petitions and permitted a Boston press, May 30, 1674, but he died soon after he moved into the city, so all his known imprints are Cambridge ones.

Achievements

• Johnson is best known as the partner of Samuel Green. Together they worked to print the Algonquian Bible as well as more than forty other works. After parting ways with Green, Johnson set up a rival printing operation in Cambridge and after a decade of legal issues, he eventually set up a printing shop in Boston.

Works

More photos

• book

  • The History of Printing in America: With a Biography of Printers, and an Account of Newspapers (Classic Reprint)

    (By ISAIAH THOMAS, LL.D. PRINTER, LATB XBNIDBNT OF THB AXB...)

Connections

Johnson married Ruth Cane of Cambridge, April 28, 1670, and had a daughter who probably died young. A son left in England evidently never came to the colony to claim the estate.

Spouse:

Ruth Cane

Brother:

Thomas Johnson

References

• History of Cambridge, Massachusetts. 1630-1877. With a genealogical register
• The Development of Freedom of the Press in Massachusetts
• Remarks On London: Being an Exact Survey of the Cities of London and Westminster, Borough of Southwark, and the Suburbs and Liberties Contiguous to Them, ... by W. Stow