Discovered in a shoebox in a Northern California garage, the long-lost Revolutionary War diary of John Claypoole is now on display at the Museum of the American Revolution in Philadelphia. Claypoole was the third husband of Betsy Ross, the seamstress and upholsterer who has long been celebrated by many as the creator of the first American flag.
Claypoole’s handwritten diary, which includes letters and songs he transcribed, was written during the years 1781 and 1782 and later published in the late 1800s, but its location has been unknown to scholars for nearly a century. That is, until Aileen Edge and her husband David discovered it last year as they cleaned the garage of Aileen’s mother, Claire Canby Keleher, a descendant of Ross and Claypoole, who passed away last summer. The small, unassuming book was wrapped in beige paper and tucked into a box beneath bundles of family letters from the 1950s.