NOTICE.
The students and friends of Dartmouth University are informed that its immediate officers have resolved to suspend the course of instruction in that seminary. It is due to the public that the cause of this resolution should be explained. A few days ago the Rev. F. Brown requested me to give him possession of the Chapel &c—A request with which of course I could not comply the legal controversy being yet unsettled. Last evening I received from him a note, saying “the government of the College after consulting gentlemen of legal information have concluded to occupy the Chapel tomorrow morning.” Accordingly this morning the Chapel which was under lock and key was entered and wrested from the University by force. In like manner have been taken the tutors rooms and other apartments. I have nothing to say in regard to the motives which induced this determination to outstrip the steps of the law and to retake by force the buildings for the recovery of which a suit against me, by way of writ of ejectment has been brought by Charles Marsh Esq. of Vermont (the lessee of this very property under “The Trustees of the College” so-called) and is still pending in the Court of the United States. But being thus deprived of the Chapel and other conveniences, the officers of instruction in the University are reduced to the necessity of suspending the discharge of the duties in which by authority of the State they have been engaged.

WILLIAM ALLEN, President.

DARTMOUTH UNIVERSITY
Monday March 1st, 1819.¹William Allen, “Notice,” New Hampshire Patriot (9 March 1819), reprinted in John King Lord, A History of Dartmouth College 1815-1819 (Concord, N.H.: The Rumford Press, 1913), 164 (available at Google Books). A copy of the notice is found in Box 2, Folder 15 of the Papers of William Allen in Rauner Special Collections Library.

———-