- Philadelphia:
On Sunday, the 21st. Instant, Abraham Dewees, John Nice, Benjamin Barker and William Rax, being out after Pidgeons, in the Township of Germantown, with each of them a Gun loaded with Powder and Pidgeon-Shott, and seeing a Flock of Pidgeons in an old Field, they cock'd their Guns with design to shoot at them, but the Pidgeons flying away, they began to uncock their Guns, in doing of which the Gun of William Rax went off and Shott the said Abraham Dewees (who was then about 12 feet distant) in the right Arm and Side, occasioning about 40 or 50 Wounds, upon which he immediately cried out, O Lord! I wonder you'd be so foolish: O Lord, I am a Dead Body; And about half an Hour after died.
March 18 to March 25, 1742. Philadelphia. American Weekly Mercury 1160: 4.- Boston, April 1.
Last Tuesday Morning there was a prodigious Flight of wild Pidgeons, over the neighbouring Towns, insomuch as only two men, with their Nets, caught no less than one Hundred and Sixty Dozen that Morning, and so great was the Market of them that Day, that they fell from Eight Shillings per Doz. to Half-a-Crown. The like Numbers were scarcely ever known to fly so early in these Parts.
April 15, 1742. Pennsylvania Gazette 696: 3.