‘Vanishingly rare’ copy of US Declaration of Independence found by volunteer in UK archives

Michael Scurr, a volunteer at the National Archives in Kew, discovered a vanishingly rare copy of the US Declaration of Independence while cataloging 18th-century Royal Navy correspondence. This document is one of only eleven surviving Exeter printing copies and the only one known outside the US. Printed 250 years ago in New Hampshire, the rare find was previously unrecorded in detail within the British national collection after being taken from an American privateer ship.