IMAG0137.htm

PENNSYLVANIA COUNCIL.

At a Council held at Philadelphia, on Saturday, 7th of May, 1774:

Present, the Honorable John Perm, Esquire, Governor, Benjamin Chew, James Tilghman, Andrew Allen, Esqrs.

Mr. Tilghman, and Mr. Andrew Allen having agreed, at the particular request of the Governor, to undertake a journey to Williamsburg, as Commissioners from this Government, to treat with the Governor of Virginia on the subject of the disturbances in Westmoreland county, occasioned by his extending the jurisdiction of his Government within the western limits of this Province, and to negotiate such other matters with him as were agreed upon in Council the 21st of last month, one of the members laid before the Board a draught of a commission, and a letter of instructions, to the above named gentlemen; and also a letter to be sent with them to the Earl of Dunmore, which being severally considered, were fairly transcribed and signed by the Governor, and follow in these words, viz:

John Penn, Esq., one of the Proprietaries of the Province of Pennsylvania, and Counties of New Castle, Kent, and Sussex, on Delaware,

To James Tilghman and Andrew Allen, Esquires, two of the Council of the said Province and Counties, Greeting:

Whereas his Majesty King Charles the Second, by his letters patent, bearing date the fourth day of March, Anno Domini 1681, did, for the considerations therein mentioned, give and grant the Province of Pennsylvania, by the bounds and limits therein particularly set forth and described, to William Penn, Esquire, his heirs and assigns, forever, constituting him and them Proprietary and Proprietaries thereof, with divers powers, franchises and jurisdictions, for the better government thereof, as by the said letters patent may at large appear: And whereas the western lines and bounds of the said Province, specified in the said letters patent, having never yet been regularly and precisely run, marked out or ascertained, divers differences and disputes have of late arisen between the Right Honorable the Earl of

the Indian and frontier trade, in her last Assembly she has taken into consideration the state of her public roads, and levied several thousand pounds to render more tolerable, the capital pass over the Alleghany only. Virginia, regardless of emoluments of this kind, still continues in a profound lethargy; and while the transmontane Territories of Penn and Baltimore, during the space of several years past, have, notwithstanding the senseless prohibiting proclamation, been rapidly peopled, those of this Colony remain in a manner unseated, except a small spot bordering on Pennsylvania, seized on by needy or foreign adventurers. To apply a remedy to this evil, it was destined to the good sense and activity of Lord Dunmore, Not contented with the reports of partial or uncertain fame, disregarding his own ease, and the difficulties of a tedious journey through almost impassible and uninhabited mountains, his Lordship penetrated to the seat of our grievances, and on the spot rendered himself an eye and ear witness, of the indispensable necessity of granting the back lands; and, by doing this, not only to deal justice to his own people, hut with the same blow, to give a check to the aspiring and encroaching spirit of the princely Proprietor, who has been boldly venturing to extend his writs and precepts a hundred miles beyond his true limits, far into the Government of Virginia. To this end, his Lordship's leading step was appointing a militia officer to preside at Fort Pitt, and magistrates to transact the business incident to their office in that quarter of Augusta. By this judicious measure, our countrymen there might expect to be relieved from the intolerable inconvenience of being dragged before the tribunal of Penn. These were their hopes. How vain! for, behold the issue: These officers, the Captain commandant, and the Justices, were threatened with the horrours of a jail, if they hut ventured to act in virtue of their commissions. This, however, did not deter the spirited Captain Conolly from doing his duty. Notwithstanding these, I will not call them impotent threats, he ordered and appointed a muster; but an unlucky circumstance rendered the Captain incapable of giving attendance, for the day before he was to have met his officers and men, the. haughty Pennsylvanians realized their threats, and conducted him to prison.

To the guardians, therefore, of our rights and liberties, I venture. to drop these few loose hints, and shall detain neither you nor the public longer than just to close with this query: "Whether the establishing our Courts of Justice upon a certain footing, adjusting the boundaries of our Colony and counties, and in consequence determining what lands may or may not, with propriety and safety, be located and surveyed by the late military grantees, are not objects of that importance as to demand the immediate consideration of the Legislature; or if deferred until the summer, whether that short delay must not prove the sure fruitful source of litigation, confusion, and dispute."

WILLIAMSBURG, March 3, 1774.

Extract of a Letter received at WILLIAMSBURG, dated PITTSBURG, MARCH 26, 1774. "You may depend that no disturbances have happened with the Indians on the Ohio this winter, and that more is to be dreaded from the animosities subsisting between the Bottlers from Pennsylvania and Virginia than those barbarians. Governour Penn has sent up a Proclamation, strictly enjoining all Magistrates and Sheriffs to seize upon any twelve men that shall be found together, for the space of an hour, after being told to disperse. Doctor Conolly is relieved from his confinement, and has lately been qualified in Augusta Court as a Magistrate. Ha is daily expected to return, and will not let any insult piss that may be offered to the authority reposed in him by Lord Dunmore."

To his Excellency the Right Honorable JOHN Karl of DUNMORE, &c., &c, &c.

MY LORD: Though I know it is an established maxim with your Lordship that, as you are ever open to personal access, to take but little notice of addresses communicated to you through the channel of a common newspaper, yet I dare hope, that should some chance direct your Lordship's eye to this letter, it will engage your closest attention. I do not moan to spread abroad causeless apprehensions, or aggrevate reports that have been already disseminated through the country; but it is my intention to give you informations founded on undoubted veracity, and then leave it to your Lordship's wisdom to determine what is most expedient to be done. Doubt it not then my Lord, when I assure you, from testimony scarcely to be invalidated, that the situation of the frontier counties of this Colony is of the most alarming nature; a situation so truly critical, as to require the instant assistance of both the Executive and Legislative powers.

Our treacherous and clandestine foes, the Indians, have ever greedily embraced all opportunities of manifesting their inimical affections towards us; but some recent transactions of theirs, with which (if report speaks the language of truth) your Lordship has been already made acquainted, loaves us no room to doubt that the storm which has been so long gathering, will, ere long, break forth in all its fury. And should this ill-fated event take place while the inhabitants on the confines of the Colony remain in their present undisciplined, distressed situation, it will not be easy to give your Lordship an adequate idea of the horrid consequences that must ensue. The indiscriminate massacre of men, women and children, the depopulation of an infant Colony, whose fertility has already been sufficient to induce us to foster the most sanguine anticipations of its future value, the forcing from their peaceful habitations those adventurous people whom it ought ever to be the first object of Government to support; these, my Lord, with an infinite series of other melancholy circumstances, must be the certain concomitants of an Indian war, should we tamely suffer those savages to be the first invaders. It is neither by the suggestions of a blood-thirsty nor an avaricious disposition that I am instigated to dictate thus freely to your Lordship on this subject, but by the forebodings of a sympathetic apprehension of the impending destruction which awaits my countrymen in the frontier counties. Their emergency loudly calls for the relief of the Supreme Magistrate, and that, my Lord, must apologize for the freedom which an obscure individual has assumed with your Lordship, should yon suppose any apology on that score necessary. Ten thousand incidents conspire to render a war at this time necessary, nay, inevitable; and the innocent lives of numbers might be saved by the timely proclamation of it. The very smiles of those faithless tribes ought to be considered as the harbingers of perfidy; but when they dare openly to annoy us with acts of hostility, surely a more solid resentment is due. Should an instance of any hostile act of theirs be demanded, I need only mention the unhappy murder of young Russell, committed not long ago, and, as has since been ascertained, was perpetrated by a Cherokee Chief. Numberless other examples, of hostilities equally atrocious, might be adduced, were it not hoped that this of itself is sufficient. Whether it would be prudent to wait for a. second stroke lot the provident determine. The spring, it seems, is the stated period for an invasion; and, in all probability, the attack will be earlier on the more remote inhabitants. The month of May is the time appointed for the convention of the Assembly; so that it is more than probable to suppose those barbarians will be scattering havoc and desolation around, while our House of Burgesses are spending much time in debating in what manner to prohibit such outrages. By convening them a month or two sooner, what mischiefs might not be prevented? You have it now in your power, my Lord, to render the name of Dunmore as memorable in Virginia as that of Marlborough is in Great Britain. Do not let slip the golden opportunity.

WILLIAMSBURG, March 24, 1774.

The subscribers, patentees of land, at the Falls of the Ohio, hereby inform the public, that they intend to lay out a Town there in the most convenient place. The lots to be eighty feet front, and two hundred and forty deep. The number of lots that shall be. laid off at first, will depend on the number of applications. The purchase money of each lot to be four Spanish dollars, and one dollar per annum quit rent, for ever. The purchasers to build within the space of two years from the first day of December next, on each lot, a log house, not less than sixteen foot square, with a stone or brick chimney; and, as in that country, it will be necessary the first settlers should build compactly, the improvements must naturally join each other,. It is further proposed, for the convenience of the settlers, that an out lot, of ten acres, contigious to the town, shall be laid off for such as desire the same, at an easy rent, on a long lease.

Attendance will be given by the patentees at Pittsburg, till the middle of June, al which time one of them will set off to execute the plan. The advantageous situation of that place, formed by nature as a temporary magazine, or repository, to receive the produce of the very extensive and fertile country on the Ohio and its branches, as well as the necessary merchandise suitable for the inhabitants that shall emigrate into that country, (as boats of fifty tons may be navigated from New Orleans up to the town,) is sufficient to recommend it; but when it is considered how liberal, nay, profuse, nature has been to it otherwise, in stocking it so abundantly, that the slightest industry may supply the most numerous family with the greatest plenty and amazing variety of fish, fowl, and flesh; the fertility of the soil, and facility of cultivation, that fit it for producing commodities of great value with little labour; the wholesomeness of the waters, and serenity of the air, which render it healthy; and when property may be so easily acquired, we may with certainty affirm that it will in a short time be equalled by few inland places on the American continent.