| You are here: Home >> American Archives |
the barrier of civil society, and place their hopes of liberty in anarchy and devastation. Convinced as we are, by innumerable instances of your Majesty’s regard to our happy form of Government, we could safely trust our dearest rights in your hands; but as we are bound by every consideration to transmit those rights to our posterity, we cannot but protest against the principles of those men, who, by asserting the dependance of America on the Crown, exclusively of the Parliament of Great Britain, endeavour to point out a distinction, that in future times may be productive of the most fatal consequences to both. We thank you, Sire, for the paternal care you are taking of those Kingdoms, by, we hope, the effectual means you are pursuing, to reduce to the obedience of the laws these thoughtless men, whom neither gratitude for past assistance, nor the remembrance of blood and treasure shed and expended in their defence and support, nor even the ties of nature subsisting between us, can hold in peace. As friends to our excellent Constitution, we can but express our indignation against those who have been the promoters, the leaders, and the abetters of rebellion; but we rely on your wisdom, your moderation, and that attribute of Heaven, your mercy, that, when it shall please God to open their eyes to reason, and turn their hearts to peace, you will receive them with open arms, as your people and our fellow-subjects, and convince them that by taxation is not meant oppression, and that true liberty is not founded on licentiousness. The common seal of the said Corporation was hereunto affixed, on the 14th day of November, in the year of our Lord 1775. ADDRESS OF THE HIGH SHERIFF, ETC., OF THE COUNTY OF BERKS. Address of the High Sheriff, Gentry, Clergy, Freeholders, and other Inhabitants of the County of Berks, presented to His Majesty by Bartholomew Price, Esq., High Sheriff of the said County. To the King’s Most Excellent Majesty. The humble Address of the High Sheriff, Gentry, Clergy Freeholders, and other Inhabitants of the County of BERKS. We, your Majesty’s most dutiful, loyal, and affectionate subjects, the High Sheriff, Gentry, Clergy, Freeholders, any other Inhabitants of the County of Berks, beg leave to approach your royal throne with the strongest assurances of our steady attachment to your Majesty’s and this Nation’s united cause, in opposition to the insolent efforts of all the enemies of peace, order, and good Government, wherever exerted by factious clamour, or by rebellious insurrection. An experience, coeval with your Majesty’s reign, hath taught us, that your Majesty’s first and most zealous aim hath been to win the affection and cheerful obedience of all your subjects, by all those methods of indulgence, patronage, and gentleness, which do, in the nature of things, tend to dispose the minds of men to submit themselves, with all thankfulness, to so patriotick a sovereignty; and we cannot, without the deepest concern, observe, that the event of so gracious a trial hath, through the treacherous workings of Republican malevolence, so totally disappointed your Majesty’s just and reasonable expectations, and those of all good men; and that the good will and lenity, which pervade and adorn all your Majesty’s measures of Government, have served only to raise, to animate, to inflame the stubborn spirit of insult and rebellion, especially in your Majesty’s late highly favoured Provinces in America. The tender emotions of humanity, foreseeing the calamities of the storm which that spirit hath raised, cannot but incline us to wish, that the common sentiments of gratitude had so duly operated in the hearts of our fellow-subjects there, as to have retained them in their most bounden duty of cheerful submission to those mild laws and equitable regulations with which the Legislature of their Mother Country hath an undoubted right to require their most cheerful compliance. Such compliance, (against which no pleas of exemption have been offered, but what malice and chicane have laboriously set up, to be, by plain truth and fact, with no labour, overthrown,) such compliance would happily have prevented that lamentable indigence and distress of the Rebel Provinces, that miserable effusion of Christian blood, which, it is to be feared, are now become the necessary though harsh remedies of their pestilential disease. And since an obstinate and active rebellion, subsisting in any part of your Majesty’s Dominions, can hardly fail, unless it be seasonably suppressed, of producing events highly calamitous to the whole, and of consequence deeply afflictive to your Majesty’s paternal heart, we do, with all that alacrity and zeal of duty, which grateful subjects owe to such a Sovereign, assure your Majesty, that we are firmly determined, with our utmost ability and influence, to support such vigorous measures as your Majesty’s wisdom and prudence, in concert with that of the great Council of the Nation, may think proper to adopt, for reducing mad and ruinous revolt to quiet and wholesome submission; and for establishing, in its full force, the legislative authority of Great Britain over the Dominions of the British Crown, in their widest extent. With no small satisfaction we foresee, that, when your Majesty’s firmness and magnanimity shall have obtained this just triumph over the treacherous and ungrateful, you will celebrate one more highly pleasing to you, in “receiving the misled with tenderness and mercy.” COMMITTEE OF FAIRFAX COUNTY (VIRGINIA) TO GENERAL WASHINGTON. Alexandria, November 14, 1775. SIR: By order of the Committee of this County, there was shipped from hence by Messrs. Henley & Call, on the 18th of November, 1774, one hundred and fifty-seven barrels flour, in the Schooner Volatile, Captain Woodbury, amounting to £215 10s.; and the freight paid here, £23 11s.; also fifty bushels beans, amount, £10; and eleven barrels bread and five barrels of flour by the Captains Hiltan and Rust, amount, £14 9s. 3d.; the contingent charges paid here £5 3s. 6d.—makes in the whole £268 13.s. 9d., say two hundred and sixty eight pounds, thirteen shillings and nine pence. Our Committee has also, by the favour of John Cuith, Esq., sent £.53 13s. 3d. to be distributed, as you see necessary, among the deserving poor of Boston: there are still some more subscriptions to come in, which shall be forwarded as soon as they are received. This Committee has never been favoured with a line from the Committee in Boston, acknowledging the receipt of any thing being received from hence, which surprises them. You have too much business upon your hands to request an inquiry into it. May every happiness attend you, in your endeavours in establishing that liberty so essentially necessary for the good of mankind; and that you may return with laurels among your friends is the sincere wish of, Sir, your most obedient humble servants,
SAMUEL McMASTERS TO DR. JAMES TILTON. Lewes, November 14, 1775. SIR: This informs you, that an indictment was found by the Grand Jury of Sussex County, against a number of zealous friends to their Country, for, as is said, insulting a certain J. C. The particulars are as follows: J. C., some time in the month of September, came to Lewes, and in an open, profane manner, cursed the honourable Continental Congress, and all those that would not curse it; calling upon the Supreme Being, in a most solemn manner, to d—n the Congress, and all that would not d—d it; that d—d set would ruin the Country. For which expressions, and such like, it was thought proper he should be had up before the Committee of Inspection, as guilty of treason against the liberties of America, and also the Congress; for the Congress acting suitable to the power delegated, that body ought to be esteemed as King, and therefore whatever is said against that body should be deemed treason. C. being had up before the Committee, and the facts before mentioned sufficiently proved, one of the audience said “it sounded like a death warrant.” C., in an insulting, swearing way, said, “put it in execution.” However, upon
|