
Nootka Sound
Research by Heather Davis-Fisch
Introduction
History
Reactivations
Media
Discussion
Bibliography
Introduction
In an article titled “Captain George Vancouver and British Columbia’s First Play,” published in Theatre Research in Canada in 2000, James Hoffman asserts that the 1790 British pantomime Nootka Sound; or, Britain Prepar’d might be considered British Columbia’s first play, based on “its direct engagement with both the locale and the politics of the west coast” (135). Although the script of Nootka Sound is unpublished, the Huntington Library, in San Marino, California, holds a manuscript copy of the play. For someone hoping to learn about how the territory that would become known as British Columbia was imagined in late eighteenth century London, the surviving script is kind of a disappointment. It suggests a performance that was very concerned with the foibles of the British Navy and a press gang in England, and very little concerned with the Pacific Northwest or with the Nootka Sound Crisis, a skirmish between England and Spain over the right to trade and settle on the Pacific Northwest Coast.
Nootka Sound was performed in June 1790, then was remounted twice, first as The Provocation! in October 1790, then as The Shipwreck; or French Ingratitude in 1793. No script for either remount seems to have survived. When my research assistant, Maegen Sargeant, did a search of newspaper coverage of the three performances, however, she located a detailed synopsis of The Provocation!, published on 5 October 1790. The synopsis tells us that The Provocation! was, unlike Nootka Sound, clearly set at Nootka Sound and was primarily a fictional dramatization of the Nootka Sound Crisis.
History
European interest in the Pacific Northwest began in the mid-eighteenth century. In the 1770s, Spain undertook three expeditions to “quietly and secretly […] take possession and establish sovereignty” of the shoreline north of San Francisco (Barman 22) and almost simultaneously, British interest in the region increased due to the belief that the Pacific Northwest was key to accessing a Northwest Passage (see Barman 21-24). In 1788, Spain took possession of Nootka Sound, with the Mexican viceroy erecting a fort there, and British trader John Meares, claiming that Nuu-chah-nulth chief Maquinna sold him land at Nootka Sound, set up a base at Nootka Sound that included semi-permanent workshops. The following year, Meares’ ships returned to Nootka Sound, under the command of James Colnett, with directions to establish a trading post there. On 5 May 1789, Captain Esteban José Martínez arrived at Nootka Sound with directions to build a structure to demonstrate that Spain was formally settling the area; he found three ships already at Nootka Sound, including Meares’s Iphigenia Nubiana. Spain seized the ship, then released it after a few days, and over the summer, other ships that arrived, including Colnett’s Argonaut, were in turn seized by the Spanish (Barman 28). Upon hearing this news, Meares sailed to England, arriving in April 1790 to reporting on the unfolding conflict.
From May until November 1790, during the runs of Nootka Sound and The Provocation!, rhetoric concerning the crisis dominated newspapers and Britain made preparations for war with Spain. Almost until The Provocation! closed, it was unclear how negotiations with Spain would unfold. The Nootka Sound Convention was signed on 28 October, giving both Britain and Spain “the right to trade in areas of the Pacific Northwest so far unoccupied” (Barman 29).
Nootka Sound Synopsis
The “Pantomimic Operatic Farce” Nootka Sound; or, Britain Prepar’d opened on 4 June 1790, a month after news of the actual events at Nootka Sound hit London newspapers. The play opens at the British naval base at Portsmouth, showing audiences the rehearsal of a “dramatic representation” of the “history of the transaction at Nootka Sound” “in dumb shew” (Whitehall Evening Post 5–8 June 1790). Two British sailors enter, one in English dress and the other in “an awkward Spanish dress” (Nootka 2). Capstern, in English clothing, insults Foremost, who is about to play a Spanish character named Don Martinez, calling him a “blood thirsty lubber!” (Nootka 6). When their Lieutenant tries to spur them into starting the performance, Foremast complains about having to play a Spanish character, and the Lieutenant replies, “it won’t be for long—The hour is coming, when the injuries of Britain will be redress’d, and the doubloons of the Spaniards will repay the insult to the british [sic] Flag” (Nootka 6). Apparently taking on the role of director, Lieutenant moves them to their places: “now, gentlemen, by only retiring three paces you’ll find yourselves safe on shore at Nootka Sound” (Nootka 6). Foremast resigns himself to play his role—“I never disobey orders—So here goes” (Nootka 6)—and the characters all exit, presumably to begin the reenactment.
Immediately following the exeunt, the script includes lyrics for a song performed by Mr. Bernard, the actor who played Capstern. Neither the script nor newspaper reviews tell us what occurred in the play-within-a-play, or provides context for Capstern’s musical performance. The song appears to be the only remnant of the historical representation that the play apparently included. In the song, encouraging “the Mates of my fortune [to] be cheary” and “warrant[ing] we’ll weather the Storm,” Capstern reminds his listeners that “As to British freedom we’re born, boys,” and asks them to “look on your Chains with a scorn, boys / So shall each still be free in his Soul” (Nootka 7–8). The lyrics then address the conflict between Britain and Spain: “The proud Dons then shall down with the ready / They shall either refund or shall fight / To refund they may give a denial / That denial shall crown all our joys” (Nootka 8). Based on the song lyrics, we might infer that the representation of events at Nootka Sound included the Spanish capture of British sailors, as the song seems to be directed at motivating imprisoned sailors, asking them to think ahead to when the Spanish would be put in their place.
Following Capstern’s song, the script does not engage with the specifics of the Nootka Sound Crisis, focusing instead on more general patriotic and anti-Spanish sentiment, encouraging public support for a potential military engagement with Spain, and (perhaps gently) mocking the British Navy. There is only one direct mention of Nootka Sound, when a Seaman tells Jack Marlingspike that if the Spanish ever “recover the blow” of the British “sufficiently to bear down upon us again in Nootka Sound, or any place within the Sound of the British Fleet, why, I am no prophet” (10).
Transcript of Synopsis of The Provocation!
Synopsis of The Provocation! (from Diary or Woodfall’s Register)
Although no script of The Provocation! has survived, the published synopsis allows us to imagine how it represented the conflict at Nootka Sound. The “ballet Pantomime,” “the whole” of which was “in dumb-shew,” opened “with a view of the sea, part of the Island of Nootka Sound” (Diary 5 October 1790). The first scene represented British and Indigenous characters celebrating the launch of a ship called the North-West America, likely through dance. The rejoicing is interrupted when the Spanish arrive and overpower the British, capturing them. The “natives” are left to “attempt in vain to assist their friends, and after an obstinate engagement… only effect the rescue of the brave Captain Collnett [sic], his Lady, and Boatswain.” Lady Colnett is quickly recaptured and Colnett tries to get help from “an old female cottager” who secretly hates the British and “treacherously contrives his murder.” Colnett tricks her, rescues his wife, and is then (re)captured by the Spanish. Lady Colnett disguises herself as a Spanish officer to visit her husband—too well, as the Indigenous characters mistakenly try to attack her. Colnett and his crew are “brought to view loaded with irons, and treated with the utmost indignity on their refusal to swear allegiance to their then conquerors.” Finally, a group of Indigenous characters, “a reinforcement of seamen, headed by Captain Douglas, and Collnett’s lady in her male attire” rescue Colnett and the sailors from prison. The play concludes with “the Spaniards meet[ing] a just reward for their treachery, the gallant Captain Collnett is made happy in the embraces of his wife, and […] a grand display of allegorical scenery.” We can assume that here, mirroring the beginning of the play, audience members were treated to a song and dance performance showcasing the pantomime creator James Byrne’s talents as ballet master of Covent Garden. While the play represented events at Nootka Sound, it took considerable liberties with history, including having “natives” rescue three of the British captives, its comic plot in which disguises and trickery led to the liberation of the sailors, and its fantastic conclusion of Spanish punishment.
Researching Eighteenth-Century British Theatre
There are a number of comprehensive tools available for eighteenth-century British theatre research, many of which are digital. The London Stage Database, originally an eleven-volume reference work, is a calendar of performances from 1660-1800. Created using playbills, newspaper notices, theatre reviews, published gossip, theatre records, and diaries, it provides comprehensive information about plays, theatres, box office revenues, casts, and creative teams. A second source for researching eighteenth-century theatre is the Burney Newspapers Collection, which is a digitized, full-text searchable collection of news media held by the British Library; the collection is invaluable for finding play reviews and other coverage of performances, as well as for contextualizing performances alongside current events.
Because of the Stage Licensing Act of 1737 (see below), an extensive collection of play manuscripts is held by the Huntington Library at San Marino. John Larpent (1741-1824), was examiner of plays from 1778 until his death. The Larpent Collection includes scripts, mainly in manuscript form, of 2503 plays, which were in Larpent’s possession at the time of his death. The Collection has been digitized and is available through the Eighteenth Century Drama: Censorship, Society and the Stage database.
Production History
While The Provocation!’s intervention into contemporary geopolitics was factually inaccurate, it was a successful commercial undertaking, making its (re)interpretation of events significant. Covent Garden, where both Nootka Sound and The Provocation! were performed, was a large theatre by today’s standards, seating approximately 2,170 people (Sheppard). Nootka Sound ran for six performances between 4 and 14 June 1790 and The Provocation! for fourteen performances between 4 October and 3 November 1790. Box office revenues listed in The London Stage indicate that The Provocation! played to respectably sized houses, averaging approximately £184 in box office receipts each night (for reference, Omai, or a Trip Around the World—arguably the most popular play of the preceding five years—grossed approximately £237/night over its first fourteen performances). Based on approximately 60 per cent capacity, which is suggested by comparing box office receipts for The Provocation! and Omai, I estimate that approximately 26,000 people saw the two plays. My estimate lacks nuance, of course: audience members paid different admission prices based on their seats, and not all audience members stayed for the entire evening’s entertainment.
The Stage Licensing Act and “Legitimate” Theatre
In 1737, the Stage Licensing Act was enacted, which provided the Lord Chamberlain with broader authority over performances in patent (licensed) theatres. The act required theatre managers at Drury Lane and Covent Garden to submit new scripts to the Lord Chamberlain for approval. While the act allowed the Lord Chamberlain to “prohibit the acting, performing or representing any Interlude, Tragedy, Comedy, Opera, Play, Farce or other Entertainment of the Stage” (qtd. in Thomas et al. 41), it was primarily “a system of textual censorship” (Moody 16) applied to the “legitimate” genres of comedy and tragedy. Throughout the eighteenth century, playwrights and theatre managers managed to find loopholes in the act, by staging works in unlicensed theatres as “entertainments” (Moody 17–18), working in “illegitimate” genres such as burletta, melodrama, or pantomime (Moody 79), and addressing contentious issues through songs or non-dialogic scenes. Dumb-shows were scenes that consisted of “silently mimed action, often quasi-symbolic, within a work otherwise couched in dialogue” (Dobson). By the eighteenth century, dumb shows were considered old fashioned when included in comedy or tragedy, however because of the Stage Licensing Act’s censorship of dialogue in legitimate theatres and prohibition of dialogue in illegitimate theatres, the Act “encouraged the evolution of a dramaturgy which foregrounded visible and musical signs (Moody 83).
The historiographical problem the surviving script of Nootka Sound poses—that it includes almost no indication of how the events at Nootka Sound were represented on stage because the events were staged in “dumb shew”—reflects the nuanced realities of theatre production in eighteenth-century Britain and likely signals Byrne’s strategic response to those conditions.
Reception and Reviews of Nootka Sound and The Provocation!
Reviews of Nootka Sound were mixed, with some critics granting the play grace because of the “obvious haste” in which it was prepared (London Chronicle 3–5 June 1790), and others demonstrating less generosity: “this piece is entirely unworthy of a Theatre Royal” (English Chronicle 3–5 June 1790). The World’s review perhaps best summarizes reception: “It was calculated to seize on the prejudices of the moment, but as there is no accounting for prejudices, some people did not seem prejudiced in its favour” (5 June 1790).
When the play was remounted as The Provocation!, no secret was made of its derivation from Nootka Sound. This lack of originality was not a problem for critics, who noted that The Provocation! was “an improvement and amplification” of Nootka Sound (Gazetteer 5 October 1790). In particular, critics praised “The force of the incidents, the beauty of the scenery, the vicissitudes of success and misfortune, and the general spirit of performance” (The World 11 October 1790).
The Provocation! was understood as providing more information about events than the British government was. Days after it opened, a letter to the editor of the Gazetteer asserted:
I shrewdly suspect [the play] to be got up by the Ministry themselves: The meeting of Parliament being so often postponed, left the nation no hopes of being informed of the real state of the quarrel between us and Spain; when lo, to their surprise and satisfaction, this piece conveyed the full particulars.[…] Ought it not in future to have a more dignified title, and be called Pit’s Pantomime, or a Substitute for the New Parliament?” (8 October 1790)
At the same time, some reviews hinted that The Provocation! threatened the delicate negotiations underway between Britain and Spain. Periodicals indicate great uncertainty about how negotiations with Spain would unfold and whether Britain would go to war and explicitly linked these worries to the play. For instance, the Argus noted on 21 October that “When BYRNE first represented the English sailor, in Provocation, he received a considerable wound in his hand from the Spaniard. Let it not however make us fear, we may all get a rap on the knuckles, if we go to war with that power.”
The Provocation!’s potential to upset diplomatic negotiations was clear. Ten days after it opened, the Argus reported that “The Lord CHANCELLOR, whose wisdom is equal to his valour, begins to think the suspension of Provocation a necessary piece of civility to the Spanish Ambassador” (15 October 1790). On 3 November, less than a week after the Nootka Sound Convention settled matters between Britain and Spain, The Provocation! had its final performance. The Public Advertiser suggested on 11 November that “Provocation has been, it is reported, interdicted at Covent-garden Theatre.—With some alteration, might not the Manager make a Convention of it?” A week later, the play’s withdrawal from Covent Garden’s repertoire and its relationship to peace negotiations were confirmed when the Gazetteer and New Daily Advertiser reported that:
Mr. Pitt is a complete judge of stage effect. In order to do away the remembrance of former injuries, he interdicted the Provocation at Covent-Garden, and, from the same laudable motive, he has taken care that there shall be no mention made of Nootka Sound in the Convention. (18 November 1790).
Nootka Sound and Settler Colonialism
In the two decades leading up to the Nootka Sound Crisis, European intentions in the Pacific Northwest shifted, from James Cook’s desire to explore the region, to Spanish and British plans to exploit sea otters as a resource, to the military tension arising over establishing semi-permanent settlements to support trade. In his theorization of settler colonialism, Lorenzo Veracini describes “animus manendi” as “the intention to stay (as opposed to sojourners’ intention to return)” and notes that “Animus manendi is thus manifested by residency, suitable reproduction, and possession” (53).
This desire to settle and create a new home appears in periodical coverage of The Provocation!, in the characterization of the “real state of the quarrel” being about “The original right, settlement, attack of the settlers, &c. &c.” (Gazetteer 8 October 1790). While the Gazetteer is not yet referring to settler colonialism as Veracini defines it, its terminology and its assumption concerning British rights in the Pacific Northwest open a door to this way of engaging with territory.
Eve Tuck and Marcia Mackenzie’s description of how understandings of land must shift in order for settler colonialism to be established resonates here. They explain:
Through the process and structuring of settler colonialism, land is remade into property, and human relationships to land are redefined/reduced to the relationship of owner to his property. When land is recast as property, place becomes exchangeable, saleable, and steal-able. The most important aim of recasting land as property is to make it ahistorical in order to hack away the narratives that invoke prior claims and thus reaffirm the myth of terra nullius. (64)
In order for land to become property, it needs to become known: it needs to be both quantifiable and qualitatively described. This process, according to Tuck and Mackenzie’s description, occurs before Indigenous understandings of land can be erased or overwritten.
Both visual and theatrical representations in British popular culture of the late 1700s contributed to the formation of knowledge that opened the door for settler colonialism. We can observe signs of this following Cook’s third expedition, when John Webber (the expedition’s artist)’s paintings were widely circulated in the British public. Webber’s visual representations transformed the Pacific Northwest into a recognizable locale in the British imagination.
John Webber’s drawing of King George’s Sound, 1778.
© The Trustees of the British Museum
The circulation of images did not stop with Webber’s drawings and paintings. The massively popular pantomime Omai, or a Trip Around the World, staged at Covent Garden in 1785–86, included a scene set at Nootka Sound.
Set model by Philip James de Loutherbourg for the Hut at Kamchatka in John O’Keeffe’s pantomime Omai. Theatre Royal, Covent Garden, London. 1785. Credit: Victoria and Albert Museum, London.
The image of de Loutherbourg’s preserved set model, while representing a scene set in Alaska rather than Nootka Sound, demonstrates the realistic quality and level of detail in the set design. With Jacques Phillippe de Loutherbourg, John Webber oversaw costume and set design and painted some of the backdrops. The scenography approximated the qualities of objects on display in museums as ethnographic artifacts and constituted a form of quasi-scientific visual observation (O’Quinn 75).
Omai, according to Daniel O’Quinn, had a “pedagogical imperative” (O’Quinn 75), and this was recognized by the press, which ”recommended the show for its capacity to impart knowledge of the world” (O’Quinn et al. 592). Similarly, The Provocation! taught the British public about current events about which the government was failing to release information. The Provocation! used scenography in the same way as Omai: to communicate imperial knowledge about place. The two plays might have even more in common: it was common practice during this period for sets to be reused by multiple productions, so it is possible that Covent Garden’s set representing Nootka Sound, used in Omai, was recycled for one or both of the 1790 productions. This possibility is supported if we note how quickly Nootka Sound’s “beautiful and picturesque” scenery was prepared (London Chronicle 3–5 June 1790). Tracing the visual genealogy through Webber’s paintings, the set of Omai, Nootka Sound, and The Provocation!, one can see that while British objectives in the Pacific Northwest shifted from exploration to commerce, the places of the Pacific Northwest were visually transformed into knowable, familiar spaces, opening the door for them to be formally surveyed and then exchanged as settlements in the nineteenth century.
Indigenous Presence
Critical attention to Nootka Sound and The Provocation! has generally emphasized the plays’ relationship to British imperial expansion (Worrall 127–28; Hoffman 146); however, less attention has been paid to two specific instances of Indigenous presence that arose during the run of The Provocation! The first occurs in relation to Indigenous characters within the play; the second concerns the attendance of six Cherokee Chiefs at the 1 November performance of The Provocation!, the first performance after the Nootka Convention was signed.
The Provocation! largely represented the alliance between British and Indigenous peoples as mutually beneficial. This does not mean, however, that The Provocation! recognized Indigenous sovereignty: questions of sovereignty only relate to Britain and Spain. Indigenous characters in the play are, furthermore, represented both as friendly and as prone to jealousy and violent vengeance. The most ominous example of this occurs when an “old female cottager […] having imbibed a hatred for the English (being formerly punished by them for theft), treacherously contrives [Colnett’s] murder” (Diary 5 October 1790). While the review does not identify the race of the cottager, the supposition that she is Indigenous is supported when we consider that a 1793 remount of the play—The Shipwreck—included in its cast list a character referred to as either “Female Savage” (True Briton 1 June 1793) or “Female Indian” (Chester Chronicle 23 August 1793), likely a reference to this character.
The play’s dancing around questions of resistance and sovereignty might signal an unspoken concern that perhaps neither Spain nor Britain could legitimately claim sovereignty over the region: it was performed less than thirty years after the 1763 Royal Proclamation, which dictated that Indigenous peoples “should not be molested or disturbed in the Possession of such Parts of Our Dominions and Territories as, not having been ceded to or purchased by Us, are reserved to them, or any of them, as their Hunting Grounds” (“Royal”).
The Cherokee Chiefs
These questions of sovereignty and resistance are further complicated if we consider the highly visible presence of Indigenous spectators at The Provocation!. In fall 1790, six “Indian Chiefs” were visiting London. The men were a public spectacle, drawing crowds to catch glimpses of them at events they attended. When they attended The Provocation! on 1 November, the Diary reported:
The six Cherokee Chiefs who were at Covent Garden Theatre last night, were wellcomed by the audience with gratulatory plaudits, which they returned by very graceful bows to all parts of the theatre. They appeared wonderfully pleased with the whole action of the pantomime, and gave direction to their conductor to secure the stage-box to see the Provocation again to-morrow. (2 November 1790)
The presence of the Cherokee Chiefs performed a legitimating function, sanctioning the action on stage, as the Gazetteer noted on 18 November: “The Cherokee Chiefs seem to have fixed at Covent-Garden the seat of their royalty, and to exercise their authority in the regulation of the pantomimes.” After the play closed, the Chiefs’ role in making theatrical meaning was expanded upon: on 16 November the Gazetteer reported that:
they already dictate our entertainments; and in a paper of yesterday they are noticed as constituting part of the fashionable company. Mr. Pitt will derive some credit from the politeness of his allies. It is said, that the Cherokee Chiefs received an offer to play in the pantomime of The Provocation; but the interdiction of that piece put a stop to their intended engagement.
The Cherokee were understood as significant and strategic allies against the Spanish, as the World recognized on 3 November:
We therefore think, that should our Ministry determine on a war with Spain, they will readily embrace the offers of the Cherokee Ambassadors, not only to make a diversion on the force of that Court, but to gain a territory which may compensate for the loss of North America.
The alliance was linked to the performativity of political life: “Mr. Pitt has found allies in the Cherokees. With such a Minister, and such allies, what has Britain to fear? Its character for wisdom and humanity will be equally established.[…] In order to grace his theatricals, Mr. Pitt has procured a band of Indians.” (Gazetteer 3 November 1790)
The Four Indian Kings Speech. Broadside with four woodcuts showing portraits of the “four Indian kings”; etched text of their speech to Queen Anne in 1710. Print made by: Sutton Nicholls © The Trustees of the British Museum
The appearance of the six Cherokee Chiefs at Covent Garden was citational, reminding those in the audience of similar appearances by Indigenous “diplomats” throughout the eighteenth century. The most notable of these was the visit of the four Indian Kings to London in 1710, which Robbie Richardson describes as “one of the first media events of the century” (26). Richardson writes that that visit “allowed British writers to consider the shape of identity and nationhood by imagining its own modernity in another culture’s eyes” (31). Richardson connects this visit to the War of Spanish Succession, specifically Britain’s switch to a “blue-water” strategy, and notes that the “embassy of the Indian kings was in many ways a carefully orchestrated event to achieve an immediate political effect, which was the renewal of the campaign against the French in North America” (31). Like the 1710 visit, the Cherokee Chiefs’ performance in 1790 served dual political purposes and explicitly participated in contemporary discourses surrounding Britain’s relationship to other imperial powers. It also recycled these older representational tactics for a new geopolitical moment.
Reactivations
The resources below offer examples of scholarly and/or artistic engagements with the artifact and/or its associated histories. These materials are also valuable to consult for classroom discussion and further research.
Coming soon.
Media
Discussion
Question 1
What challenges and opportunities are presented in using newspaper coverage to reconstruct performances?
Question 2
What can we tell about the role of theatre and performance in British society based on newspaper coverage, particularly about the roles theatre and performance played in shaping understandings of the world?
Question 3
Why was the appearance of the Cherokee Chiefs significant to reception of the play and understandings of Indigenous identity?
Question 4
How did these performances create understandings of the Pacific Northwest for a population in England?
Bibliography
Sources and Further Reading
“Advertisement and Notices.” Chester Chronicle, 23 August 1793. British Library Newspapers, link.gale.com/apps/doc/JE3231707254/GDCS?u=bcptstothepast&sid=bookmark-GDCS&xid= ce0a4476. Accessed 18 March 2022.
“Advertisements and Notices.” Diary or Woodfall’s Register, 5 October 1790. Slavery and Anti-Slavery: A Transnational Archive, link.gale.com/apps/doc/Z2000296456/GDCS?u=bcptstothepast&sid= bookmark-GDCS&xid=4cfaac04. Accessed 7 February 2022.
“Advertisements and Notices.” True Briton, 1 June 1793. Seventeenth and Eighteenth Century Burney Newspapers Collection, link.gale.com/apps/doc/Z2001552161/GDCS?u= bcptstothepast&sid=bookmark-GDCS&xid=d5b0a2b1. Accessed 18 March 2022.
“Arts and Culture.” Gazetteer and New Daily Advertiser, 5 October 1790. Seventeenth and Eighteenth Century Burney Newspapers Collection, link.gale.com/apps/doc/Z2000406904/GDCS?u=bcptstothepast&sid= bookmark-GDCS&xid=c0ce3446. Accessed 23 May 2022.
“Arts and Culture.” Gazetteer and New Daily Advertiser, 8 October 1790. Seventeenth and Eighteenth Century Burney Newspapers Collection, link.gale.com/apps/doc/Z2000406958/BBCN?u= bcptstothepast&sid=bookmark-BBCN&xid=dfdec25b. Accessed 17 June 2021.
Barman, Jean. The West Beyond the West: A History of British Columbia. University of Toronto Press, 2007.
Berg, Maxine. “Sea Otters and Iron: A Global Microhistory of Value and Exchange at Nootka Sound, 1774–1792.” Past and Present, Supplement, 2019, pp. 50-85.
Cook, James. A Voyage to the Pacific Ocean, vol. 1. Dublin, William Porter, 1784. Archive.org. Accessed 15 July 2022.
Dobson, Michael. “Dumb Show.” Oxford Encyclopedia of Theatre and Performance. Ed. Dennis Kennedy, online edition, 2005.
London Stage Database. University of Oregon, https://londonstagedatabase.uoregon.edu/guide.php. Accessed 15 October 2022.
Hoffman, James. “Captain George Vancouver and British Columbia’s First Play.” Theatre Research in Canada, vol. 21, no. 2, 2000, pp. 135-48.
Meares, John. Voyages Made in the Years 1788 and 1789 From China to the N.W. Coast of America. Vol. 1 (1791). BC Archives.
Moody, Jane. Illegitimate Theatre in London, 1770-1840. Cambridge, 2007. “News.” Argus, 15 October 1790. Seventeenth and Eighteenth Century Burney Newspapers Collection, link.gale.com/apps/doc/Z2000107720/BBCN?u=bcptstothepast&sid=bookmark-BBCN&xid=c2c320d5. Accessed 17 June 2021.
“News.” Argus, 21 October 1790. Seventeenth and Eighteenth Century Burney Newspapers Collection, link.gale.com/apps/doc/Z2000107779/GDCS?u=bcptstothepast&sid=bookmark-GDCS&xid=659fb655. Accessed 16 March 2022.
“News.” Diary or Woodfall’s Register, 2 November 1790. Seventeenth and Eighteenth Century Burney Newspapers Collection, link.gale.com/apps/doc/Z2000296723/GDCS?u=bcptstothepast&sid= bookmark-GDCS&xid=fb79c0dc. Accessed 23 May 2022.
“News.” English Chronicle, 3-5 June 1790. Seventeenth and Eighteenth Century Burney Newspapers Collection, link.gale.com/apps/doc/Z2001364742/GDCS?u=bcptstothepast&sid=bookmark- GDCS&xid=4e26a296. Accessed 3 March 2022.
“News.” Gazetteer and New Daily Advertiser, 3 November 1790. Seventeenth and Eighteenth Century Burney Newspapers Collection,link.gale.com/apps/doc/Z2000407226/GDCS?u=bcptstothepast&sid= bookmark-GDCS&xid=ab4573c9. Accessed 24 May 2022.
“News.” Gazetteer and New Daily Advertiser, 16 November 1790. Seventeenth and Eighteenth Century Burney Newspapers Collection,link.gale.com/apps/doc/Z2000407355/GDCS?u= bcptstothepast&sid=bookmark-GDCS&xid=03515573. Accessed 24 May 2022.
“News.” Gazetteer and New Daily Advertiser, 18 November 1790. Seventeenth and Eighteenth Century Burney Newspapers Collection,link.gale.com/apps/doc/Z2000407372/GDCS?u=bcptstothepast&sid= bookmark-GDCS&xid=650520c5. Accessed 17 March 2022.
“News.” London Chronicle, 3-5 June 1790. Seventeenth and Eighteenth Century BurneyNewspapers Collection, link.gale.com/apps/doc/Z2000592102/GDCS?u=bcptstothepast&sid=bookmark- GDCS&xid=93eb810b. Accessed 11 March 2022.
“News.” Public Advertiser, 11 November 1790, Seventeenth and Eighteenth Century Burney Newspapers Collection, link.gale.com/apps/doc/Z2001213915/GDCS?u=bcptstothepast&sid=bookmark- GDCS&xid=1a311eb8. Accessed 17 March 2022.
“News.” Whitehall Evening Post, 5-8 June 1790. Seventeenth and Eighteenth Century Burney Newspapers Collection,link.gale.com/apps/doc/Z2001629500/GDCS?u=bcptstothepast&sid= bookmark-GDCS&xid=3b6434d0. Accessed 3 March 2022.
“News.” World, 5 June 1790. Seventeenth and Eighteenth Century Burney Newspapers Collection, link.gale. com/apps/doc/Z2001521750/GDCS?u=bcptstothepast&sid=bookmark-GDCS&xid=db61c249. Accessed 11 March 2022.
“News.” World, 11 October 1790. Seventeenth and Eighteenth Century Burney Newspapers Collection, link.gale. com/apps/doc/Z2001524771/BBCN?u=bcptstothepast&sid=bookmark-BBCN&xid=1c545910. Accessed 17 June 2021.
“News.” World, 3 November 1790. Seventeenth and Eighteenth Century Burney Newspapers Collection, link.gale.com/apps/doc/Z2001525384/GDCS?u=bcptstothepast&sid=bookmark-GDCS&xid=5fa8ac4a. Accessed 24 May 2022.
Nootka Sound; Or, Britain Prepar’d. John Larpent Plays, The Huntington Library, San Marino, California, 1790. O’Quinn, Daniel. Staging Governance: Theatrical Imperialism in London 1770-1800. Johns Hopkins, 2005.
O’Quinn, Daniel, Kristina Straub, and Misty G. Anderson. The Routledge Anthology of Restoration and Eighteenth-Century Performance. Routledge, 2019.
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