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Title: American Independence and the French Revolution - 1760-1801
Author: Winbolt, S. E. (Samuel Edward)
Language: English
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BELL’S ENGLISH HISTORY SOURCE BOOKS
_General Editors_: S. E. WINBOLT, M.A., and KENNETH BELL, M.A.
AMERICAN INDEPENDENCE
AND THE
FRENCH REVOLUTION
(1760-1801)
BELL’S ENGLISH HISTORY SOURCE BOOKS
Scope of the Series and Arrangement of Volumes
1. Roman Britain to 449.
2. 449-1066.
3. 1066-1154.
4. 1154-1216.
5. 1216-1307.
6. 1307-1399.
7. 1399-1485.
8. 1485-1547.
9. 1547-1603. _In Active Preparation._
10. 1603-1660. ” ”
11. 1660-1714. ” ”
12. 1714-1760. ” ”
13. 1760-1801. _Now Ready._
14. 1801-1815.
15. 1815-1837.
16. 1837-1856.
17. 1856-1876.
18. 1876-1887.
19. 1887-1901.
20. 1901-1912.
_The volumes are issued in Crown 8vo._
PRICE 1S. NET EACH.
AMERICAN INDEPENDENCE
AND THE
FRENCH REVOLUTION
(1760-1801)
COMPILED BY
S. E. WINBOLT, M.A.
(CHRIST’S HOSPITAL)
[Illustration]
LONDON
G. BELL AND SONS, LTD.
1912
INTRODUCTION
This series of English History Source Books is intended for use with
any ordinary textbook of English History. Experience has conclusively
shown that such apparatus is a valuable--nay, an indispensable--adjunct
to the history lesson. It is capable of two main uses: either by
way of lively illustration at the close of a lesson, or by way of
inference-drawing, before the textbook is read, at the beginning of
the lesson. The kind of problems and exercises that may be based on
the documents are legion, and are admirably illustrated in a _History
of England for Schools_, Part I., by Keatinge and Frazer, pp. 377-381.
However, we have no wish to prescribe for the teacher the manner in
which he shall exercise his craft, but simply to provide him and his
pupils with materials hitherto not readily accessible for school
purposes. The very moderate price of the books in this series should
bring them within the reach of every secondary school. Source books
enable the pupil to take a more active part than hitherto in the
history lesson. Here is the apparatus, the raw material: its use we
leave to teacher and taught.
Our belief is that the books may profitably be used by all grades
of historical students between the standards of fourth-form boys
in secondary schools and undergraduates at Universities. What
differentiates students at one extreme from those at the other is not
so much the kind of subject-matter dealt with, as the amount they can
read into or extract from it.
In regard to choice of subject-matter, while trying to satisfy the
natural demand for certain “stock” documents of vital importance, we
hope to introduce much fresh and novel matter. It is our intention
that the majority of the extracts should be lively in style--that is,
personal, or descriptive, or rhetorical, or even strongly partisan--and
should not so much profess to give the truth as supply data for
inference. We aim at the greatest possible variety, and lay under
contribution letters, biographies, ballads and poems, diaries, debates,
and newspaper accounts. Economics, London, municipal, and social life
generally, and local history, are represented in these pages.
The order of the extracts is strictly chronological, each being
numbered, titled, and dated, and its authority given. The text is
modernised, where necessary, to the extent of leaving no difficulties
in reading.
We shall be most grateful to teachers and students who may send us
suggestions for improvement.
S. E. WINBOLT.
KENNETH BELL.
NOTE TO THIS VOLUME
(1760-1801)
The difficulty which an editor of the period 1760-1801 has to face is
the wealth of contemporary sources available. I have drawn largely,
as will be seen, on the series of Home Office Papers in the Calendar
of State Papers, the series of the Acts of the Privy Council, the
_Gentleman’s Magazine_, and _Annual Register_. I trust that the foreign
relations of England are proportionately represented, though want of
space has been against the inclusion of much that naturally suggests
itself. In spite of defects, my hope is that teachers and pupils in
public schools and universities will find these pages useful.
S. E. W.
CHRIST’S HOSPITAL,
_April, 1912_.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
PAGE
INTRODUCTION v
1761. BRITISH VICTORIES--MR. BURKE _Horace Walpole_ 1
1761. HONOURS FOR MR. PITT _Correspondence of
Chatham_ 2
1766. THE STATE OF THE PRISONS _Goldsmith_ 7
1767. TOWNSHEND’S CONTUMACY _Correspondence of
Chatham: Shelburne
and Burke_ 10
1768. WILKES RIOTS _Home Office Papers_ 13
1768. RIOTS IN THE NORTH _Home Office Papers_ 14
1769. PETITION TO GEORGE III. _Letters of Junius_ 15
1770. CITY OF LONDON AND CHATHAM:
PARLIAMENTARY REFORM _Letters of Junius_ 20
1770. COMMENTS ON PARLIAMENTARY
EVENTS _Letters of Junius_ 22
1771. LETTERS OF THOMAS HUTCHINSON,
GOVERNOR OF MASSACHUSETTS
BAY _Home Office Papers_ 23
1771. ADVICE TO PARLIAMENTARY REFORMERS _Letters of Junius_ 30
1772. DISTRESS CAUSED BY HIGH PRICES _Home Office Papers_ 37
1773. WEAVERS’ PETITION TO
GEORGE III. _Home Office Papers_ 38
1773. DESTRUCTION OF TEA AT BOSTON _Home Office Papers_ 43
1774. WAR MATERIAL FOR AMERICA _Home Office Papers_ 46
1775. AMERICAN EXPEDITION TO CANADA _Home Office Papers_ 48
1775. CONCILIATION WITH AMERICA _Burke_ 51
1777. THE ARMIES UNDER HOWE AND “_GENTLEMAN’S MAGAZINE_”
CLINTON 54
1778. CHATHAM’S LAST LETTER AND _CORRESPONDENCE OF
SPEECH Chatham and
“London Magazine”_ 62
1779. GEORGE III.’S MESSAGE TO THE
HOUSES AND THE SPANISH MANIFESTO “_Gentleman’s Magazine_” 65
1779. SOCIETY AT BRIGHTHELMSTON _J. A. Erredge_ 69
1780. GORDON RIOTS _Horace Walpole_ 71
1781. SURRENDER OF CORNWALLIS “_Gentleman’s Magazine_” 72
1783. PRELIMINARIES OF EUROPEAN “_GENTLEMAN’S MAGAZINE_” 73
PEACE
1784. A VIOLENT ELECTION CONTEST _Cowper’s “Letters”_ 76
1785. THE COUNTRY POST _Cowper’s “Task”_ 77
1787. GEORGE III.’S SPEECH TO THE
HOUSES OF PARLIAMENT “_Annual Register_” 79
1788. CHARACTERISTICS OF THE EAST
INDIA COMPANY _Burke_ 80
1789. CORN IMPORTS AND EXPORTS “_Annual Register_” 84
1790. SPOLIATION OF THE CLERGY IN _BURKE_ 85
FRANCE
1792. SUSSEX ELECTION PETITIONS _Oldfield_ 90
1792. FRANCE AND SELF-GOVERNMENT _Cowper’s “Letters”_ 93
1794. IMPEACHMENT OF WARREN HASTINGS _Burke_ 94
1795. GEORGE III, MOBBED _Letters of Princess
Elizabeth_ 97
1797. MUTINY AT THE NORE “_Annual Register_” 98
1797. ENGLAND AND THE DIRECTORY _Correspondence of
Malmesbury_ 103
1798. BATTLE OF THE NILE “_Annual Register_” 106
1800. SUPPLIES FOR NAVY AND ARMY “_Annual Register_” 115
1801. GEORGE III.’S SPEECH TO THE FIRST
UNION PARLIAMENT “_Annual Register_” 119
AMERICAN INDEPENDENCE
AND THE
FRENCH REVOLUTION
(1760-1801)
BRITISH VICTORIES--“A YOUNG MR. BURKE” (1761).
=Source.=--_Letters of Horace Walpole._ Edited by P. Cunningham London:
Bentley. Vol. iii., pp. 419-421. 1891.
_To George Montagu, Esq., Strawberry Hill, July 22, 1761._
For my part, I believe Mademoiselle Scuderi drew the plan of this
year. It is all royal marriages, coronations and victories; they come
tumbling so over one another from distant parts of the globe, that
it looks just like the handy-work of a lady romance writer, whom it
costs nothing but a little false geography to make the great Mogul in
love with a princess of ----, and defeat two marshals of France as he
rides post on an elephant to his nuptials. I don’t know where I am. I
had scarce found Mecklenburgh Strelitz with a magnifying glass, before
I am whisked to Pondicherri--well, I take it, and raze it. I begin
to grow acquainted with Colonel Coote, and to figure him packing up
chests of diamonds, and sending them to his wife against the King’s
wedding--thunder go the Tower guns, and behold Broglio and Soubise are
totally defeated; if the mob have not much stronger heads and quicker
conceptions than I have, they will conclude my lord Granby is become
nabob. How the deuce in two days can one digest all this? Why is not
Pondicherri in Westphalia? I don’t know how the Romans did, but I
cannot support two victories every week. Well, but you will want to
know the particulars. Broglio and Soubise, united, attacked our army
on the fifteenth, but were repulsed; the next day, the prince Mahomet
Alli Cawn--no, no, I mean prince Ferdinand, returned the attack, and
the French threw down their arms, and fled, run over my lord Harcourt,
who was going to fetch the new queen; in short, I don’t know how it
was, but Mr. Conway is safe, and I am as happy as Mr. Pitt himself. We
have only lost a lieutenant-colonel Keith; colonel Marlay and Harry
Townshend are wounded.... I dined with your secretary yesterday; there
were Garrick and a young Mr. Burke, who wrote a book in the style of
lord Bolingbroke, that was much admired. He is a sensible man, but has
not worn off his authorism yet, and thinks there is nothing so charming
as writers, and to be one. He will know better one of these days. I
like Hamilton’s little Marly; we walked in the great allée, and drank
tea in the arbour of treillage; they talked of Shakspeare and Booth,
of Swift and my lord Bath, and I was thinking of Madame Sévigné. Good
night! I have a dozen other letters to write; I must tell my friends
how happy I am--not as an Englishman, but as a cousin.
Yours ever.
HONOURS FOR MR. PITT (1761).
=Source.=--_Correspondence of William Pitt, Earl of Chatham._ Vol. ii.,
pp. 146 _et seq._ London, 1838-1840.
_The Earl of Bute to Mr. Pitt, October 6, 1761._
SIR,
I take up the pen with more than ordinary desire to succeed in the
business I am, by the King’s command, to write to you upon. I earnestly
wished to have carried to his Majesty some little opening of your mind;
something that might have pointed towards that mark of his royal favour
he seems impatient to bestow upon you.[1]
As that was not in my power, the King has desired me to mention two
ideas; wishing to have the one most agreeable to you carried into
immediate execution: but, if neither should be suitable to your
inclinations, it is hoped that you will not be averse to give his
Majesty a little insight into your own thoughts upon this subject. The
government of the province of Canada, with a salary of five thousand
pounds, seemed to strike the King most; and that for two reasons:
the first, as you would preside over a province acquired by your own
ability and firmness; secondly, as it would convey to all the world his
Majesty’s intentions of never parting with that great and important
conquest. The objection of its not being tenable with a seat in
parliament is foreseen; but a short bill might remedy that in this new
case; in the preamble of which the King’s reasons for this appointment
would be set forth. If, however, this should not strike you in the same
light it does his Majesty, the next thing I am ordered to mention is
the chancellor of the duchy, with the salary annexed to it as before
mentioned.
You will please, Sir, to consider these as proofs of the King’s earnest
desire to show this country the high opinion he has of your merit. If
they do not entirely please, impute it to the want of information I
before hinted at; and do me the justice to believe, that I never shall
execute any commission with more pleasure than I have done this.
I am, Sir, with the highest regard,
Your most obedient humble servant,
BUTE.[2]
_Mr. Pitt to the Earl of Bute, October 7, 1761._
[From a rough draught in Mr. Pitt’s handwriting.]
MY LORD,
Overwhelmed with the extent of his Majesty’s gracious goodness towards
me, I desire the favour of your Lordship to lay me at the royal feet,
with the humble tribute of the most unfeigned and respectful gratitude.
Penetrated with the bounteous favour of a most benign sovereign and
master, I am confounded with his condescension in deigning to bestow
one thought about any inclination of his servant, with regard to the
modes of extending to me marks of his royal beneficence.
Any public mark of his Majesty’s approbation, flowing from such a
spontaneous source of clemency, will be my comfort and my glory; and I
cannot but be highly sensible of all those circumstances, so peculiarly
honourable, which, attending the first of the two ideas suggested to me
by his Majesty’s direction, have been mentioned. Commanded, however, as
I am by the King, in a manner so infinitely gracious, not to suppress
my thoughts on a subject of this extreme delicacy, I trust it will be
judged obedience, not presumption, if I express the doubts I have as
to the propriety of my going into either of the offices mentioned, or
indeed, considering that which I have resigned, going again into any
whatever.
Thus much in general I have presumed, not without pain and fear, to
submit to his Majesty’s consideration; too proud to receive any mark
of the King’s countenance and favour, but above all doubly happy could
I see those dearer to me than myself comprehended in that monument of
royal approbation and goodness, with which his Majesty shall condescend
to distinguish me.
I cannot conclude this letter, already much too long, without
expressing my warm thanks to your Lordship for the most obliging manner
in which you have conveyed to me his Majesty’s gracious intentions, and
assuring your Lordship, that I shall always set a high value on the
favourable sentiments which you are pleased to express on my subject. I
have the honour to be, with great truth and respect,
Yours, &c.
W. PITT.
_The Earl of Bute to Mr. Pitt, October 8, 1761._
SIR,
I laid the contents of your letter before his Majesty; who was
graciously pleased to admit of the reasons you gave for not accepting
office, and to approve of the respectful openings some part of the
letter afforded.
Having received the King’s commands to consider of the most becoming
method of carrying his intentions into execution, I have lost no time
in my researches. The English civil list would by no means answer;
the Irish had objections: one only thing remained, that could possibly
serve the King’s generous purpose. This his Majesty approves of, and
has directed me accordingly to acquaint you, that as you declined
accepting any office, his Majesty will confer the dignity of peerage on
Lady Hester Pitt, to descend through her ladyship to your sons, with a
grant of three thousand pounds per annum, on the plantation duties, to
yourself and any two other lives you shall name. These unusual marks of
the royal approbation cannot fail to be agreeable to a mind like yours.
Permit me to assure you, that the communicating of them gives me the
greatest pleasure.
I am, Sir, with unfeigned regard,
Your most obedient humble servant,
BUTE.
_Mr. Pitt to the Earl of Bute, October 8, 1761._
[From a draught in Mr. Pitt’s handwriting.]
I have not words to express the sentiments of veneration and gratitude
with which I receive the unbounded effects of beneficence and grace,
which the most benign of sovereigns has condescended to bestow on me,
and on those most dear to me.
Your Lordship will not wonder if the sensations which possess my whole
breast refuse me the power of describing their extent, and leave me
only to beg your Lordship will be so good as to lay me and Lady Hester
at the King’s feet, and to offer for us to his Majesty the genuine
tribute of the truly feeling heart; which I will dare to hope, the same
royal benevolence which showers on the unmeritorious such unlimited
benefits may deign to accept with equal condescension and goodness.
I am, &c.
W. PITT.
THE STATE OF THE PRISONS.
=Source.=--Goldsmith’s _Vicar of Wakefield_ (Chap. XXVII.).
The next morning I communicated to my wife and children the scheme
I had planned of reforming the prisoners, which they received with
universal disapprobation, alleging the impossibility and impropriety
of it; adding that my endeavours would no way contribute to their
amendment, but might probably disgrace my calling.
“Excuse me,” returned I, “these people, however fallen, are still men;
and that is a very good title to my affections. Good counsel rejected
returns to enrich the giver’s bosom; and though the instruction I
communicate may not mend them, yet it will assuredly mend myself. If
these wretches, my children, were princes, there would be thousands
ready to offer their ministry; but in my opinion the heart that is
buried in a dungeon is as precious as that seated upon a throne. Yes,
my treasures, if I can mend them I will; perhaps they will not all
despise me; perhaps I may catch up even one from the gulf, and there
will be great gain; for is there upon earth a gem so precious as the
human soul?”
Thus saying, I left them and descended to the common prison, where I
found the prisoners very merry, expecting my arrival; and each prepared
with some gaol-trick to play upon the doctor. Thus, as I was going to
begin, one turned my wig awry; as if by accident, and then asked my
pardon. A second, who stood at some distance, had a knack of spitting
through his teeth, which fell in showers upon my book. A third would
cry, “Amen!” in such an affected tone as gave the rest great delight.
A fourth had slily picked my pocket of my spectacles. But there was
one whose trick gave more universal pleasure than all the rest; for
observing the manner in which I had disposed my books on the table
before me, he very dexterously displaced one of them, and put an
obscene jest-book of his own in the place. However, I took no notice of
all that this mischievous group of little beings could do, but went
on, perfectly sensible that what was ridiculous in my attempt would
excite mirth only the first or second time, while what was serious
would be permanent. My design succeeded, and in less than six days some
were penitent, and all attentive.
It was now that I applauded my perseverance and address, at thus
giving sensibility to wretches divested of every moral feeling, and
now began to think of doing them temporal service also, by rendering
their situation somewhat more comfortable. Their time had hitherto
been divided between famine and excess, tumultuous riot and bitter
repining. Their only employment was quarrelling among each other,
playing at cribbage, and cutting tobacco-stoppers. From this last mode
of idle industry I took the hint of setting such as chose to work at
cutting pegs for tobacconists and shoemakers, the proper wood being
bought by a general subscription, and, when manufactured, sold by my
appointment; so that each earned something every day--a trifle, indeed,
but sufficient to maintain him.
I did not stop here, but instituted fines for the punishment of
immorality, and rewards for peculiar industry. Thus in less than a
fortnight I had formed them into something social and humane, and had
the pleasure of regarding myself as a legislator, who had brought men
from their native ferocity into friendship and obedience.
And it were highly to be wished that legislative power would thus
direct the law rather to reformation than to severity; that it would
seem convinced that the work of eradicating crimes is not by making
punishments familiar, but formidable. Then, instead of our present
prisons, which find or make men guilty, which enclose wretches for
the commission of one crime, and return them, if returned alive,
fitted for the perpetration of thousands, we should see, as in other
parts of Europe, places of penitence and solitude, where the accused
might be attended by such as could give them repentance if guilty, or
new motives to virtue if innocent. And this, but not the increasing
punishments, is the way to mend a State: nor can I avoid even
questioning the validity of that right which social combinations have
assumed of capitally punishing offences of a slight nature. In cases
of murder, their right is obvious, as it is the duty of us all, from
the law of self-defence, to cut off that man who has shown a disregard
for the life of another. Against such all nature rises in arms, but it
is not so against him who steals my property. Natural law gives me no
right to take away his life, as by that the horse he steals is as much
his property as mine. If, then, I have any right, it must be from a
compact made between us, that he who deprives the other of his horse
shall die. But this is a false compact; because no man has a right to
barter his life, any more than to take it away, as it is not his own.
And, besides, the compact is inadequate, and would be set aside even
in a court of modern equity, as there is a great penalty for a very
trifling inconvenience, since it is far better that two men should live
than that one man should ride. But a compact that is false between two
men is equally so between a hundred and a hundred thousand; for as ten
millions of circles can never make a square, so the united voice of
myriads cannot lend the smallest foundation to falsehood. It is thus
that reason speaks, and untutored nature says the same thing. Savages
that are directed by natural law alone are very tender of the lives of
each other; they seldom shed blood but to retaliate former cruelty.
Our Saxon ancestors, fierce as they were in war, had but few executions
in times of peace; and in all commencing governments, that have the
print of nature still strong upon them, scarcely any crime is held
capital.
It is among the citizens of a refined community that penal laws, which
are in the hands of the rich, are laid upon the poor. Government,
while it grows older, seems to acquire the moroseness of age; and as
if our property were become dearer in proportion as it increased--as
if the more enormous our wealth, the more extensive our fears--all our
possessions are paled up with new edicts every day, and hung round with
gibbets to scare every invader.
I cannot tell whether it is from the number of our penal laws, or
the licentiousness of our people, that this country should show more
convicts in a year than half the dominions of Europe united. Perhaps
it is owing to both; for they mutually produce each other. When by
indiscriminate penal laws a nation beholds the same punishment affixed
to dissimilar degrees of guilt, from perceiving no distinction in the
penalty, the people are led to lose all sense of distinction in the
crime; and this distinction is the bulwark of all morality: thus the
multitude of laws produce new vices, and new vices call for fresh
restraints.
It were to be wished, then, that power, instead of contriving new laws
to punish vice, instead of drawing hard the cords of society till a
convulsion come to burst them, instead of cutting away wretches as
useless before we have tried their utility, instead of converting
correction into vengeance; it were to be wished that we tried the
restrictive arts of government, and made law the protector, but not the
tyrant, of the people. We should then find that creatures, whose souls
are held as dross, only wanted the hand of a refiner; we should then
find that wretches, now stuck up for long tortures, lest luxury should
feel a momentary pang, might, if properly treated, serve to sinew the
State in times of danger; that as their faces are like ours, their
hearts are so too; that few minds are so base as that perseverance
cannot amend; that a man may see his last crime without dying for it;
and that very little blood will serve to cement our security.
TOWNSHEND’S CONTUMACY (1767).
=Source.=--_Correspondence of William Pitt, Earl of Chatham._ Vol.
iii., pp. 233 _et seq._ London, 1838-1840.
Mr. Townshend then mentioned the extraordinaries of America, and
the necessity of voting a particular sum; which he said he neither
could nor would move, unless the cabinet previously took the whole
state of America into consideration, and enabled him to declare to
the House the opinion of administration as to the forts, the Indian
trade, the disposition of the troops, in short the whole arrangements,
considered with a view to a general reduction of expense, and a duty
which he undertook should be laid to defray what remained: that he had
promised this to the House, and upon the authority of what passed in
the cabinet; and if he could not make it good, he should be obliged to
consider the best means, by what he should say or by his conduct, to
make it appear that it was not his fault, and against his opinion.[3]
I acquainted your Lordship of this the last time I had the honour of
waiting on you from Lord Barrington; the difficulty greatly arising
from several conjectural estimates being laid by him before the
House. I was surprised at Mr. Townshend’s conduct, which really
continues excessive on every occasion, till I afterwards understood in
conversation, that he declared he knew of Lord North’s refusal, and
from himself. The Duke of Grafton told me, and I suppose may tell your
Lordship, that he sent to Lord North to ask him. It appears to me quite
impossible that Mr. Townshend can mean to go on in the King’s service;
but of this your Lordship will judge much better than I can, after the
Duke of Grafton has given you a farther account.
I have the honour to be, with great respect,
Your Lordship’s most obliged humble servant,
SHELBURNE.
WILKES RIOTS (1768).
=Source.=--_Calendar of Home Office Papers, 1766-1769._ Pp. 322, 323.
London, 1879.
_Robert Wood to Sir J. Fielding._
_5 and 6 April._--Lord Weymouth has been informed that Mr. Stuart, the
wine merchant, upon application to you for assistance against the mob
on the night of the illumination, had not met with that support which
he had reason to expect from the civil magistrate. Though this account
does not agree with what his Lordship had conceived of your vigilance
and activity, yet he has ordered me to acquaint you with it, and to
add that though, on the one hand, he relies much on your zeal, and is
ready to do justice to your diligence at the time of the late riotous
proceedings, yet, on the other, he thinks it his indispensable duty to
take notice of any remissness in a magistrate upon whom so much of the
public order and tranquillity depends; and if Mr. Stuart’s account of
this matter be founded, his Lordship desires that I will let you know
it will very much change that favourable opinion which he wishes to
preserve of you. His Lordship thinks it would be unfair towards you as
well as to the public to keep this matter from you, though Mr. Stuart
has not given it in as matter of formal complaint, but merely for the
Secretary of State’s information. Lord Weymouth is willing to suppose
there must be some mistake in what he has heard.
P.S.--As Lord Weymouth had taken every precaution that could be
imagined in order to support magistracy and give weight to your
proceedings, he is disappointed to find that there should be any
complaint; and though he despises clamour, he must pay attention to
facts urged by a citizen of character; and I heartily wish you may put
it in his power to set you clear of imputation, which is his wish also.
* * * * *
The reply to this letter is dated the 5th.
Sir John Fielding gives a history of the transactions of the night,
and says that, to the best of his knowledge, and to the best of his
abilities, with unwearied attention, diligence, and application, he has
done everything in his power to preserve peace and good order, and to
detect offenders and bring them to justice, from the beginning to the
conclusion of the late unhappy disturbances. Is sincerely concerned
if in any respect Mr. Steward mistook his meaning, and more so that
Lord Weymouth should be dissatisfied with his conduct as a magistrate.
Unfortunate he has always been; at present particularly so, when his
warmest endeavours to discharge a public trust with loyalty to his
Sovereign, fidelity to his country, and obedience to his superiors,
have been so far ineffectual as not to secure him the confidence of
those by whom he would wish to be approved.--Bow Street.
RIOTS IN THE NORTH (1768).
=Source.=--_Calendar of Home Office Papers, 1766-1769._ Pp. 839, 840.
London, 1879.
_Duke of Northumberland to H.M.’s Principal Secretaries of State._
_12 and 14 April._--Has received within these few days several letters
from Newcastle, giving an account of a very riotous spirit having
broken out among the sailors and other persons in that place and its
neighbourhood, who have committed many outrages, a continuance of
which is still greatly to be apprehended. His Grace enters into full
particulars. The Mayor and other magistrates of Newcastle, and the
justices of Northumberland and Durham, have been very vigilant and
active on this occasion, but it is their united request, in which
his Grace joins, that a regiment might be quartered and continued in
Newcastle and the neighbourhood.--Northumberland House, 12 April.
* * * * *
Reply from Lord Weymouth, dated the 14th, enclosing a copy of the
letter written in consequence to the Secretary-at-War, directing
him to give orders for detaining the troops at Newcastle and the
neighbourhood which are now there, and to report whether the present
disposition of the troops in that part of the world may not admit of
an alteration which may answer the purposes of support to the civil
magistrate.
_The Same to the Same._
_13 and 14 April._--Submitting whether it may not be expedient that
certain arms belonging to the Middlesex militia, deposited in the
vestry rooms and other places of little security in Westminster and the
neighbourhood of London, should be removed to the Tower, in case there
should be reason to fear a renewal of the mobs and riotous assemblies.
_Lord Weymouth’s Reply, dated the 14th._
It is highly improper that arms should at any time be deposited in
places of little security, and particularly at present when so riotous
a disposition appears among the populace. But as there are objections
to depositing those arms now in the Tower, his Grace is to take all
possible precautions for the present by giving the necessary orders
for particular attention and vigilance upon this occasion; and in
case of an attempt by the populace to possess themselves of the
arms, is to call out the military, orders having been issued to the
Secretary-at-War to support the civil magistrate upon every necessary
occasion.
A PETITION TO GEORGE III. FROM THE FREEHOLDERS OF THE COUNTY OF
MIDDLESEX (1769).
=Source.=--_Letters of Junius._ London: G. Bell and Sons. Vol. ii. 1911.
_To the King’s Most Excellent Majesty._
The humble petition of the Freeholders of the County of Middlesex.
MOST GRACIOUS SOVEREIGN,
We, your Majesty’s dutiful and loyal subjects, the Freeholders of the
County of Middlesex, beg leave, with all affectionate submission and
humility, to throw ourselves at your royal feet, and humbly to implore
your paternal attention to those grievances of which this county and
the whole nation complain, and those fearful apprehensions with which
the whole British Empire is most justly alarmed.
With great grief and sorrow we have long beheld the endeavours of
certain evil-minded persons, who attempt to infuse into your royal mind
notions and opinions of the most dangerous and pernicious tendency, and
who promote and counsel such measures as cannot fail to destroy that
harmony and confidence which should ever subsist between a just and
virtuous prince and a free and loyal people.
For this disaffected purpose they have introduced into every part of
the administration of our happy legal constitution a certain unlimited
and indefinite discretionary power, to prevent which is the sole aim
of all our laws, and was the sole cause of all those disturbances
and revolutions which formerly distracted this unhappy country; for
our ancestors, by their own fatal experience, well knew that in a
state where discretion begins, law, liberty, and safety end. Under
the pretence of this discretion, or, as it was formerly, and has been
lately, called, Law of state, we have seen
English subjects, and even a member of the British Legislature,
arrested by virtue of a general warrant issued by a secretary of state,
contrary to the law of the land.
Their houses rifled and plundered, their papers seized, and used as
evidence upon trial.
Their bodies committed to close imprisonment.
The Habeas Corpus eluded.
Trial by jury discountenanced, and the first law officer of the crown
publicly insinuating that juries are not to be trusted.
Printers punished by the ministry in the supreme court without a trial
by their equals, without any trial at all.
The remedy of the law for false imprisonment debarred and defeated.
The plaintiff and his attorney, for their appeal to the law of the
land, punished by expenses and imprisonment, and made, by forced
engagements, to desist from their legal claim.
A writing determined to be a libel by a court where it was not
cognizable in the first instance; contrary to law, because all appeal
is thereby cut off, and inferior courts and juries influenced by such
predetermination.
A person condemned in the said courts as the author of the supposed
libel, unheard, without defence or trial.
Unjust treatment of petitions, by selecting only such parts as might be
wrested to criminate the petitioner, and refusing to hear those which
might procure him redress.
The thanks of one branch of the Legislature proposed by a minister to
be given to an acknowledged offender for his offence, with the declared
intention of screening him from the law.
Attachments wrested from their original intent of removing obstructions
to the proceedings of law, to punish by sentence of arbitrary fine and
imprisonment, without trial or appeal, supposed offences committed out
of court.
Perpetual imprisonment of an Englishman without trial, conviction, or
sentence, by the same mode of attachment, wherein the same person is at
once party, accuser, judge, and jury.
Instead of the ancient and legal civil police, the military introduced
at every opportunity, unnecessarily and unlawfully patrolling the
streets, to the alarm and terror of the inhabitants.
The lives of many of your Majesty’s innocent subjects destroyed by
military execution.
Such military execution solemnly adjudged to be legal.
Murder abetted, encouraged, and rewarded.
The civil magistracy rendered contemptible by the appointment of
improper and incapable persons.
The civil magistrates tampered with by administration, and neglecting
and refusing to discharge their duty.
Mobs and riots hired and raised by the ministry, in order to justify
and recommend their own illegal proceedings, and to prejudice your
Majesty’s mind by false insinuations against the loyalty of your
Majesty’s subjects.
The freedom of election violated by corrupt and undue influence, by
unpunished violence and murder.
The just verdicts of juries and the opinion of the judges overruled
by false representations to your Majesty; and the determinations of
the law set aside, by new, unprecedented, and dangerous means; thereby
leaving the guilty without restraint, and the injured without redress,
and the lives of your Majesty’s subjects at the mercy of every ruffian
protected by administration.
Obsolete and vexatious claims of the crown set on foot for partial and
election purposes.
Partial attacks on the liberty of the press, the most daring and
pernicious libels against the constitution and against the liberty of
the subject being allowed to pass unnoticed, whilst the slightest libel
against a minister is punished with the utmost rigour.
Wicked attempts to increase and establish a standing army, by
endeavouring to vest in the crown an unlimited power over the militia,
which, should they succeed, must, sooner or later, subvert the
constitution, by augmenting the power of administration in proportion
to their delinquency.
Repeated endeavours to diminish the importance of members of parliament
individually, in order to render them more dependent on administration
collectively. Even threats having been employed by ministers to
suppress the freedom of debate; and the wrath of parliament denounced
against measures authorized by the law of the land.
Resolutions of one branch of the legislature set up as the law of
the land, being a direct usurpation of the rights of the two other
branches, and therefore a manifest infringement of the constitution.
Public money shamefully squandered and unaccounted for, and all inquiry
into the cause of arrears in the civil list prevented by the ministry.
Inquiry into a paymaster’s public accounts stopped in the exchequer,
though the sums accounted for by that paymaster amount to above forty
millions sterling.
Public loans perverted to private ministerial purposes.
Prostitution of public honours and rewards to men who can neither plead
public virtue nor services.
Irreligion and immorality, so eminently discountenanced by your
Majesty’s royal example, encouraged by administration, both by example
and precept.
The same discretion has been extended by the same evil counsellors to
your Majesty’s dominions in America, and has produced to our suffering
fellow-subjects in that part of the world grievances and apprehensions
similar to those which we complain of at home.
* * * * *
MOST GRACIOUS SOVEREIGN,
Such are the grievances and apprehensions which have long discontented
and disturbed the greatest and best part of your Majesty’s loyal
subjects. Unwilling, however, to interrupt your royal repose,
though ready to lay down our lives and fortunes for your Majesty’s
service, and for the constitution as by law established, we have
waited patiently, expecting a constitutional remedy by the means of
our own representatives, but our legal and free choice having been
repeatedly rejected, and the right of election now finally taken from
us by the unprecedented seating of a candidate who was never chosen
by the county, and who, even to become a candidate, was obliged
fraudulently to vacate his seat in parliament, under the pretence of
an insignificant place, invited thereto by the prior declaration of a
minister, that whoever opposed our choice, though but with four votes,
should be declared member for the county. We see ourselves, by this
last act, deprived even of the franchises of Englishmen, reduced to
the most abject state of slavery, and left without hopes or means of
redress but from your Majesty or God.
Deign then, most gracious Sovereign, to listen to the prayer of the
most faithful of your Majesty’s subjects; and to banish from your royal
favour, trust, and confidence, for ever, those evil and pernicious
counsellors who have endeavoured to alienate the affection of your
Majesty’s most sincere and dutiful subjects, and whose suggestions tend
to deprive your people of their dearest and most essential rights, and
who have traitorously dared to depart from the spirit and letter of
those laws which have secured the crown of these realms to the House of
Brunswick, in which we make our most earnest prayers to God that it may
continue untarnished to the latest posterity.
Signed by 1565 Freeholders.
THE CITY OF LONDON AND THE EARL OF CHATHAM ON PARLIAMENTARY REFORM
(1770).
=Source.=--_Letters of Junius._ London: G. Bell and Sons. 1910. Vol. i.
At a Common Council holden on the 14th of May, 1770, it was resolved:
“That the grateful thanks of this court be presented to the Right
Hon. William Earl of Chatham, for the zeal he has shown in support of
those most valuable and sacred privileges, the right of election, and
the right of petition; and for his wishes and declaration, that his
endeavours shall hereafter be used that parliaments may be restored to
their original purity, by shortening their duration, and introducing a
more full and equal representation, an act which will render his name
more honoured by posterity than the memorable successes of the glorious
war he conducted.”
* * * * *
To this vote of thanks the Earl of Chatham made the following reply to
the committee deputed to present it to his Lordship:
* * * * *
GENTLEMEN,
It is not easy for me to give expression to all I feel on the
extraordinary honour done to my public conduct by the city of London; a
body so highly respectable on every account, but above all, for their
constant assertion of the birthrights of Englishmen in every great
crisis of the constitution.
In our present unhappy situation my duty shall be, on all proper
occasions, to add the zealous endeavours of an individual to those
legal exertions of constitutional rights, which, to their everlasting
honour, the city of London has made in defence of freedom of election
and freedom of petition, and for obtaining effectual reparation to the
electors of Great Britain.
As to the point among the declarations which I am understood to have
made, of my wishes for the public, permit me to say there has been
some misapprehension, for with all my deference to the sentiments of
the city, I am bound to declare, that I cannot recommend triennial
parliaments[4] as a remedy against that canker of the constitution,
venality in elections; but I am ready to submit my opinion to better
judgment if the wish for that measure shall become prevalent in the
kingdom. Purity of parliament is the corner-stone in the commonwealth;
and as one obvious means towards this necessary end is to strengthen
and extend the natural relation between the constituents and the
elected, I have, in this view, publicly expressed my earnest wishes for
a more full and equal representation by the addition of one knight of
the shire in a county, as a further balance to the mercenary boroughs.
I have thrown out this idea with the just diffidence of a private man
when he presumes to suggest anything new on a high matter. Animated by
your approbation, I shall with better hope continue humbly to submit
it to the public wisdom, as an object most deliberately to be weighed,
accurately examined, and maturely digested.
Having many times, when in the service of the crown, and when retired
from it, experienced, with gratitude, the favour of my fellow-citizens,
I am now particularly fortunate, that, with their good liking, I can
offer anything towards upholding this wisely-combined frame of mixed
government against the decays of time, and the deviations incident to
all human institutions; and I shall esteem my life honoured indeed, if
the city of London can vouchsafe to think that my endeavours have not
been wanting to maintain the national honour, to defend the colonies,
and extend the commercial greatness of my country, as well as to
preserve from violation the law of the land, and the essential rights
of the constitution.
COMMENTS ON PARLIAMENTARY HAPPENINGS (DECEMBER, 1770).
=Source.=--_Letters of Junius_ (Letter LXXXI.). London: G. Bell and
Sons. 1911. Vol. ii.
_For the “Public Advertiser,” December 14, 1770._
SECOND CHAPTER OF FACTS, OR MATERIALS FOR HISTORY.
1. The Earl of Chatham having asserted, on Tuesday last, in the House
of Lords, that Gibraltar was open to an attack from the sea, and that,
if the enemy were masters of the bay, the place could not make any
long resistance, he was answered in the following words by that great
statesman the Earl of Sandwich:--“Supposing the noble Lord’s argument
to be well founded, and _supposing Gibraltar to be now unluckily
taken_, still, according to the noble Lord’s own doctrine, it would be
no great matter. For although we are not masters of the sea at present,
we probably shall be so some time or other, and then, my Lords, there
will be no difficulty in retaking Gibraltar.” N.B. This Earl is a privy
counsellor, and appeared to have concerted this satisfactory answer
with Peg Trentham at the fire-side.
2. Sir Edward Hawke, on Wednesday last, gave the House of Commons a
very pompous account of the fleet. Being asked why, if our navy was so
numerous and ready for service, a squadron was not sent to Gibraltar
and the West Indies? his answer was candid:--“That for his part he
did not understand sending ships abroad when, for aught he knew, they
might be wanted to defend our own coast.” Such is the care taken of
our possessions abroad! One great minister tells us they may be easily
retaken; another assures us that they cannot be defended. Will that
man who sleepeth never awake until destruction comes upon him? Has he
no friend, no servant, to draw his curtain, until Troy is actually in
flames?
3. Lord North informed the House of Commons on Wednesday that, although
he wished for an honourable accommodation, he thought it his duty to
tell the House, that he feared _war was too probable_; that he intended
to move for a further augmentation of ten thousand seamen, and that,
at any rate, he should advise the keeping up the naval and military
force upon the augmented establishment, for that, notwithstanding the
language held by the French and Spanish ministers, there was, all over
France and Spain, the greatest appearance of hostile preparations.
4. The riot in the House of Lords has shocked the delicacy of Sir
Fletcher Norton. Upon occasion of some clamour yesterday, he called to
them, with all the softness of a bassoon, _Pray, gentlemen, be orderly;
you are almost as bad as the other House_.
5. On Tuesday last, Lord Camden delivered into the House of Lords a
paper containing three questions, relative to the doctrine laid down in
Lord Mansfield’s paper, which he desired that Lord would answer, if he
could. Lord Mansfield was very angry at being taken by surprise upon a
subject he had never had an opportunity of considering, and said that
he valued the constitutional liberty of the subject too much to _answer
interrogatories_.
THOMAS HUTCHINSON TO LORD HILLSBOROUGH (1771).
=Source.=--_Calendar of Home Office Papers, 1770-1772._ Pp. 191-193.
_Thos. Hutchinson, Governor of [Massachusetts Bay], to Lord
[Hillsborough]._
_22 Jan._--The disorders in the colonies do not seem to have been
caused by the defects in the forms or constitutions of government. They
have not prevailed in proportion as one has been under a more popular
form of government than another. They must be attributed to a cause,
common to all the colonies,--a loose, false, and absurd notion of the
nature of government, spread by designing, artful men, setting bounds
to the supreme authority, and admitting parts of the community, and
even individuals, to judge when those bounds are exceeded, and to obey
or disobey accordingly. These principles prevailing, there can be no
interior force exerted, and disorder and confusion must be the effect;
and when there is no apprehension of force from the supreme authority,
the effect is the same in the distinct parts as in the whole. Under
these circumstances measures for reforming the constitution of any
people will probably be ineffectual, and tend to increase their
disorders. The colonies were under these circumstances when he wrote
his first private letter. There was a general opinion prevailing that
they could distress the kingdom by withdrawing their commerce from it,
and that there was not the least danger of any compulsory measures. In
this colony there was room to hope for a change of circumstances, but
it was uncertain, and probably at a distance. They had just felt the
shock of that most fortunate stroke which freed the Castle from any
dependence upon the people, and kept the harbour and town of Boston
under the command of the King’s ships; but the effects did not appear.
He was striving for a just decision in the case of the soldiers, and
not without hope, but far from being certain of success. There was a
prospect of the dissolution of the confederacies against importation,
though several of the colonies appeared to be more resolute. There was
also an expectation of a rupture between Great Britain and France or
Spain, or both, which would tend to show the people their dependence
on the kingdom, and the reasonableness of their submission to the
supreme authority. He was not insensible of the peculiar defects in the
constitution of this province, and he has complained of the Council as
being under undue influence, and casting their weight into that scale
which had much too great proportion before; but was doubtful himself,
and there were others doubtful also, whether, while the body of the
people continued in the state they were then in, councillors appointed
by the Crown would dare to undertake the trust; or, if they should do
it, whether the people in general would not refuse to submit to their
authority; and he feared the consequences of either would more than
countervail the advantages to arise merely from an alteration in the
constitution. To this must be attributed the want of determination
which appeared in his private letters, and not to any unwillingness to
trust his Lordship with his real sentiments.
The change in the temper of the people has been brought about sooner,
and to a greater degree, than anybody could expect; and they seem now
to be as well prepared to receive such a change in the constitution
as at any future time; or, if it should be deferred, they will
probably remain in tolerably good order until such time as may be
judged convenient, provided something is done in the meantime to
discover the resentment of the kingdom against their avowed principles
and practices, which shall give them cause to imagine that further
measures are to be taken with them. Such resentment has been everywhere
expected. If omitted, they will go back to their former disorders. That
wise step of changing the garrison at the Castle began their cure. In
the height of this confusion a citadel upon Fort Hill seemed also to
be necessary. Now thinks the same end is answered without it. It may,
however, be proper for the King to have the actual possession of the
spot, either by erecting a warehouse or magazine, or by making some
kind of enclosure to restrain encroachments, and yet not prevent the
inhabitants from using the place to walk and air themselves in; as they
now frequently do. There is a vote of the town for selling it. Will
watch their motions, and, if anything further is attempted, will take
public notice of it. If no further advances are made for securing good
behaviour, there certainly will be no receding. To depart suddenly
from what has been done at the Castle, &c., would be very dangerous.
Every Act of Parliament carried into execution in the colonies tends
to strengthen Government there. A firm persuasion that Parliament
is determined at all events to maintain the supreme authority is all
they want; few or none are so weak as to question the power to do it.
If Acts were passed more or less to control them every Session, they
would soon be familiarized to them; their erroneous opinions would
die away, and peace and order would revive. An Act to enable the King
to alter the bounds of the province by his commission, the charter
notwithstanding, by making the province of Main, and country east of
it, a distinct and separate province, and to annex or not, as His
Majesty should think fit, New Hampshire to the Massachusetts, or to
separate the country east of Penobscot and annex it to Nova Scotia,
might either be kept as a rod over them, or, if executed immediately,
would show a just resentment against the province for countenancing the
intrusions in the eastern country, whereby the King’s timber is exposed
to waste and havoc, and would be a striking instance of the power and
authority of Parliament. Gives his reasons for thinking that the Act
would be executed. Suggests that whenever the charter and case of the
province comes under consideration, instead of expressly declaring that
the power of electing councillors by the Assembly shall determine, the
King should be enabled by his Royal order of declaration to determine
it, and to appoint a Council instead, as he shall think proper. The
late Act permitting the issue of bills of credit at New York was
extremely well adapted to maintain the authority of Parliament.
Makes application in behalf of Capt. Phillips, the late commanding
officer, who is by far the greatest sufferer of any belonging to the
late garrison.
Is taking every measure, consistent with the honour of Government,
to reconcile civil and military, whigs and tories. They begin to be
sensible that it must be a very bad constitution indeed which is
not preferable to the savage state they have been in for some years
past.--Boston. Private. R. 30th March.
_Thos. Hutchinson, Governor of [Massachusetts Bay], to [Lord
Hillsborough]._
_25 Aug._--Mr. Henry Barnes, who lately arrived from England, has
requested him, the Governor, to cover a letter from him to his
Lordship, and to represent his sufferings and services in the cause
of Government. Has not been made acquainted with the contents of the
letter. Mr. Barnes has certainly suffered greatly by refusing to
comply with the scheme of non-importation, and by his endeavours to
support the authority of the magistrate; but in his solicitations for
compensation he shows more impatience than could be wished. Is willing
to attribute it to a mind chafed with his troubles, and impressed with
a strong sense of his merit, which he supposes to exceed that of many
others who have received the favours of Government. He complains of
his, the Governor’s, neglecting him, in not particularly recommending
his case when he went to England. Though he did not ask it, he yet
concluded it had been done in the course of public correspondence. He,
the Governor, transmitted an account of the incendiary letters, and
would have been more particular had he been requested. Thought that for
his general character, which is very good, he depended on Sir Francis
Barnard, who held him in esteem, and to whom he was more particularly
known. If there were anything in the province in his, the Governor’s,
disposal worth accepting, would give it him, but there is not.
Makes his grateful acknowledgments to his Lordship for H.M.’s warrant
to the Commissioners of the Customs for the payment of his salary. The
fund on which the warrant is charged would rise to a very large sum if
the illicit trade with Holland could be prevented.
The consumption of tea in America exceeds what anybody in England
imagines. Some suppose five-sixths of the consumption in the last two
years has been smuggled, and in Philadelphia and New York it is judged
nine-tenths. The traders make such an extravagant profit that it will
require more frequent seizures to discourage them than there is any
reason to hope for. If the India Company had continued the sale of
their teas at 2s. 2d. to 2s. 4d., as they sold them two years ago,
the Dutch trade would have been over by this time; but now that teas
are 3s. and upwards in England, the illicit trader can afford to lose
one chest in three, whereas not one in a hundred has been seized. The
custom-house officers on shore have strong inducements to do their
duty, being entitled to a proportion of one-third or more, but they
are really afraid of the rage of the people. The sea officers have of
late been more active, and Admiral Montague appears disposed to keep
out his cruisers. Doubts, however, whether this trade will ever be
discouraged in any other way than by reducing the price in England to
the exporter very near the price it is at in Holland. For want of this,
the revenue has lost, the last and present years, at least 60,000_l._
sterling, from the 3d. duty only. Believes the cruisers are capable of
doing more. Suggests that a greater proportion is necessary for the
particular officer who makes the seizure under a commission from the
Customs than what he is now entitled to. Has discovered, when he has
sworn some of the Navy officers to qualify them for their commissions
from the Customs, a great indifference and disinclination to make
themselves obnoxious to the people without any great advantage to
themselves.--Boston. R. 29th Oct.
_Thos. Hutchinson, Governor of [Massachusetts Bay], to Lord
[Hillsborough]._
_10 Sept._--In reply to his Lordship’s private letter of 30 May, not
received till he had closed his letter of the 25th August. Now submits
an estimate of the consumption of Bohea tea in America. The two towns
of Boston and Charlestown consume a chest, or about 340 lbs., per day.
The towns are not more than one-eighth, perhaps not more than one-tenth
of the province. Suppose they consume only 300 chests in the year, and
allow that they are one-eighth, it will make 2,400 chests for the
whole province. This is much short, for in the country towns there
is much more tea drunk in proportion than at Boston. This province
is not one-eighth part of the colonies; and in other Governments,
New York especially, they consume tea in much greater proportion. If
it be one-eighth, the whole continent consumes 19,200 chests, which
at 4_l._ per chest, the 3d. duty only, amounts to 76,800_l._ But the
computation is short in every part. In New York they import scarce
any other than Dutch teas. In Rhode Island and Pennsylvania it is
little better. In this province the Dutch traders are increasing. Has
frequent information of large quantities when too late; and sometimes
such persons are concerned as he thought could not have been capable
of countenancing perjury or fraud. Cannot help repeating that unless
the East India Company bring the price of tea so near to the price in
Holland as to make the profit of importing from thence not equal to
the risk, there will scarce be any imported from England. The acting
collector at Falmouth, in Casco Bay, acknowledged it to be true that
the Acts of Trade were broken every day in his district, but said the
officers on shore could not prevent it. He suggested that the only way
to prevent it was to increase the number of small schooners, and to
keep one or more constantly cruising in the bay, rigged and fitted like
schooners. “We have not virtue enough to become obnoxious to the people
merely from a sense of duty.” It seems, therefore, best to have one
officer only in each vessel with a commission from the Customs, and he
to have the command, and to be entitled to all but the King’s half of
the forfeiture; which would give him a good chance of making a small
fortune. There does not seem to be the same reason for sharing any part
among the crew or other officers as in cases of prizes taken in war,
where all their lives are exposed; for in the present case there is no
danger of resistance to an armed vessel, seeing that all the smugglers
are themselves unarmed and depend entirely on concealment.--Boston. R.
29 October.
REFORMERS IN PARLIAMENT RECOMMENDED TO SINK DIFFERENCES AND PROMOTE
UNION (1771).
=Source.=--_Letters of Junius_ (Letter LIX.). London: G. Bell and Sons.
1910. Vol. i.
_To the Printer of the “Public Advertiser,” October 5, 1771._
SIR,
No man laments more sincerely than I do the unhappy differences which
have arisen among the friends of the people, and divided them from
each other. The cause undoubtedly suffers as well by the diminution of
that strength which union carries with it as by the separate loss of
personal reputation, which every man sustains when his character and
conduct are frequently held forth in odious or contemptible colours.
These differences are only advantageous to the common enemy of the
country; the hearty friends of the cause are provoked and disgusted;
the lukewarm advocate avails himself of any pretence to relapse into
that indolent indifference about everything that ought to interest
an Englishman, so unjustly dignified with the title of moderation;
the false, insidious partisan, who creates or foments the disorder,
sees the fruit of his dishonest industry ripen beyond his hopes,
and rejoices in the promise of a banquet, only delicious to such an
appetite as his own. It is time for those who really mean the _cause_
and the _people_, who have no view to private advantage, and who have
virtue enough to prefer the general good of the community to the
gratification of personal animosities,--it is time for such men to
interpose; let us try whether these fatal dissensions may not yet be
reconciled; or, if that be impracticable, let us guard at least against
the worst effects of division, and endeavour to persuade these furious
partisans, if they will not consent to draw together, to be separately
useful to that cause which they all pretend to be attached to. Honour
and honesty must not be renounced, although a thousand modes of right
and wrong were to occupy the degrees of morality between Zeno and
Epicurus. The fundamental principles of Christianity may still be
preserved, though every zealous sectary adheres to his own exclusive
doctrine, and pious ecclesiastics make it part of their religion to
persecute one another. The civil constitution, too, that legal liberty,
that general creed, which every Englishman professes, may still be
supported, though Wilkes and Horne, Townshend and Sawbridge, should
obstinately refuse to communicate; and even if the fathers of the
church, if Savile, Richmond, Camden, Rockingham, and Chatham, should
disagree in the ceremonies of their political worship, and even in
the interpretation of twenty texts in Magna Charta. I speak to the
people as one of the people. Let us employ these men in whatever
departments their various abilities are best suited to, and as much to
the advantage of the common cause as their different inclinations will
permit. They cannot serve _us_ without essentially serving themselves.
If Mr. Nash be elected, he will hardly venture, after so recent a mark
of the personal esteem of his fellow-citizens, to declare himself
immediately a courtier. The spirit and activity of the sheriffs will, I
hope, be sufficient to counteract any sinister intentions of the lord
mayor; in collision with _their_ virtue, perhaps he may take fire.
It is not necessary to exact from Mr. Wilkes the virtues of a Stoic.
_They_ were inconsistent with themselves who, almost at the same
moment, represented him as the basest of mankind, yet seemed to
expect from him such instances of fortitude and self-denial as would
do honour to an apostle; it is not, however, flattery to say, that
he is obstinate, intrepid, and fertile in expedients; that he has no
possible resource but in the public favour, is, in my judgment, a
considerable recommendation of him. I wish that every man who pretended
to popularity were in the same predicament; I wish that a retreat to
St. James’s were not so easy and open as patriots have found it. To
Mr. Wilkes there is no access. However he may be misled by passion or
imprudence, I think he cannot be guilty of a deliberate treachery to
the public; the favour of his country constitutes the shield which
defends him against a thousand daggers, desertion would disarm him....
I have too much respect for the abilities of Mr. Horne to flatter
myself that these gentlemen will ever be cordially reunited; it is
not, however, unreasonable to expect that each of them should act
his separate part with honour and integrity to the public. As for
differences of opinion upon speculative questions, if we wait until
_they_ are reconciled, the action of human affairs must be suspended
for ever. But neither are we to look for perfection in any one man, nor
for agreement among many. When Lord Chatham affirms that the authority
of the British legislature is not supreme over the colonies in the
same sense in which it is supreme over Great Britain; when Lord Camden
supposes a necessity (which the king is to judge of), and, founded upon
that necessity, attributes to the crown a legal power (not given by
the Act itself) to suspend the operation of an act of the legislature,
I listen to them both with diffidence and respect, but without the
smallest degree of conviction or assent; yet I doubt not they delivered
their real sentiments, nor ought they to be hastily condemned. I,
_too_, have a claim to the candid interpretation of my country, when
I acknowledge an involuntary compulsive assent to one very unpopular
opinion. I lament the unhappy necessity, whenever it arises, of
providing for the safety of the state by a temporary invasion of the
personal liberty of the subject. Would to God it were practicable to
reconcile these important objects in every possible situation of public
affairs! I regard the legal liberty of the meanest man in Britain as
much as my own, and would defend it with the same zeal. I know we must
stand or fall together. But I never can doubt that the community has a
right to command, as well as to purchase, the service of its members.
I see that right founded originally upon a necessity which supersedes
all argument; I see it established by usage immemorial, and admitted
by more than a tacit assent of the legislature. I conclude there is no
remedy in the nature of things for the grievance complained of; for if
there were, it must long since have been redressed. Though numberless
opportunities have presented themselves highly favourable to public
liberty, no successful attempt has ever been made for the relief of the
subject in this article. Yet it has been felt and complained of ever
since England had a navy. The conditions which constitute this right
must be taken together; separately, they have little weight. It is not
fair to argue from any abuse in the execution to the illegality of the
power, much less is a conclusion to be drawn from the navy to the land
service. A seaman can never be employed but against the enemies of his
country. The only case in which the king can have a right to arm his
subjects in general is that of a foreign force being actually landed
upon our coast. Whenever that case happens, no true Englishman will
inquire whether the king’s right to compel him to defend his country
be the custom of England or a grant of the legislature. With regard
to the press for seamen, it does not follow that the symptoms may not
be softened, although the distemper cannot be cured. Let bounties be
increased as far as the public purse can support them.[5] Still they
have a limit, and when every reasonable expense is incurred, it will be
found, in fact, that the spur of the press is wanted to give operation
to the bounty.
Upon the whole, I never had a doubt about the strict right of pressing,
until I heard that Lord Mansfield had applauded Lord Chatham for
delivering something like this doctrine in the House of Lords. That
consideration staggered me not a little. But, upon reflection, his
conduct accounts naturally for itself. He knew the doctrine was
unpopular, and was eager to fix it upon the man who is the first object
of his fear and detestation. The cunning Scotchman never speaks truth
without a fraudulent design. In council he generally affects to take
a moderate part. Besides his natural timidity, it makes part of his
political plan never to be known to recommend violent measures. When
the guards are called forth to murder their fellow-subjects, it is not
by the ostensible advice of Lord Mansfield. That odious office, his
prudence tells him, is better left to such men as Gower and Weymouth,
as Barrington and Grafton. Lord Hillsborough wisely confines _his_
firmness to the distant Americans. The designs of Mansfield are more
subtle, more effectual, and secure.--Who attacks the liberty of the
press?--Lord Mansfield. Who invades the constitutional power of
juries?--Lord Mansfield. What judge ever challenged a juryman, but
Lord Mansfield? Who was that judge, who, to save the king’s brother,
affirmed that a man of the first rank and quality, who obtains a
verdict in a suit for criminal conversation, is entitled to no greater
damages than the meanest mechanic?--Lord Mansfield? Who is it makes
commissioners of the great seal?--Lord Mansfield? Who is it forms a
decree for those commissioners, deciding against Lord Chatham,[6]
and afterwards (finding himself opposed by the judges) declares in
Parliament that he never had a doubt that the law was in direct
opposition to that decree?--Lord Mansfield. Who is he that has made
it the study and practice of his life to undermine and alter the
whole system of jurisprudence in the Court of King’s Bench?--Lord
Mansfield. There never existed a man but himself who answered exactly
to so complicated a description. Compared to these enormities, his
original attachment to the Pretender (to whom his dearest brother was
confidential secretary) is a virtue of the first magnitude. But the
hour of impeachment _will_ come, and neither he nor Grafton shall
escape me. Now let them make common cause against England and the House
of Hanover. A Stuart and a Murray should sympathize with each other.
When I refer to signal instances of unpopular opinions delivered and
maintained by men who may well be supposed to have no view but the
public good, I do not mean to renew the discussion of such opinions.
I should be sorry to revive the dormant questions of _Stamp Act_,
_Corn Bill_, or _Press Warrant_. I mean only to illustrate one
useful proposition, which it is the intention of this paper to
inculcate:--_That we should not generally reject the friendship
or services of any man because he differs from us in a particular
opinion_. This will not appear a superfluous caution if we observe the
ordinary conduct of mankind. In public affairs, there is the least
chance of a perfect concurrence of sentiment or inclination. Yet every
man is able to contribute something to the common stock, and no man’s
contribution should be rejected. If individuals have no virtues, their
vices may be of use to us. I care not with what principle the new-born
patriot is animated, if the measures he supports are beneficial to the
community. The nation is interested in his conduct. His motives are
his own. The properties of a patriot are perishable in the individual,
but there is a quick succession of subjects, and the breed is worth
preserving. The spirit of the Americans may be an useful example to
us. Our dogs and horses are English only upon English ground; but
patriotism, it seems, may be improved by transplanting. I will not
reject a bill which tends to confine parliamentary privilege within
reasonable bounds, though it should be stolen from the House of
Cavendish, and introduced by Mr. Onslow. The features of the infant are
a proof of the descent, and vindicate the noble birth from the baseness
of the adoption. I willingly accept of a sarcasm from Colonel Barré,
or a simile from Mr. Burke. Even the silent vote of Mr. Calcraft is
worth reckoning in a division. What though he riots in the plunder of
the army, and has only determined to be a patriot when he could not
be a peer? Let us profit by the assistance of such men while they are
with us, and place them, if it be possible, in the post of danger, to
prevent desertion. The wary Wedderburne, the pompous Suffolk, never
threw away the scabbard, nor ever went upon a forlorn hope. They always
treated the king’s servants as men with whom, some time or other,
they might possibly be in friendship. When a man who stands forth for
the public has gone that length from which there is no practicable
retreat, when he has given that kind of personal offence, which a pious
monarch never pardons, I then begin to think him in earnest, and that
he never will have occasion to solicit the forgiveness of his country.
But instances of a determination so entire and unreserved are rarely
met with. Let us take mankind _as they are_. Let us distribute the
virtues and abilities of individuals according to the offices they
affect, and, when they quit the service, let us endeavour to supply
their places with better men than we have lost. In this country there
are always candidates enough for popular favour. The temple of _fame_
is the shortest passage to riches and preferment.
Above all things, let me guard my countrymen against the meanness
and folly of accepting of a trifling or moderate compensation for
extraordinary and essential injuries. Our enemies treat us as the
cunning trader does the unskilful Indian. They magnify their generosity
when they give us baubles, of little proportionate value, for ivory
and gold. The same House of Commons, who robbed the constituent body
of their right of free election; who presumed to _make_ a law under
pretence of _declaring_ it; who paid our good king’s debts, without
once inquiring how they were incurred; who gave thanks for repeated
murders committed at home, and for national infamy incurred abroad;
who screened Lord Mansfield; who imprisoned the magistrates of the
metropolis for asserting the subject’s right to the protection of
the laws; who erased a judicial record, and ordered all proceedings
in a criminal suit to be suspended;--this very House of Commons have
graciously consented that their own members may be compelled to pay
their debts, and that contested elections shall for the future be
determined with some decent regard to the merits of the case. The event
of the suit is of no consequence to the crown. While parliaments are
septennial, the purchase of the sitting member or of the petitioner
makes but the difference of a day. Concessions such as these are of
little moment to the sum of things; unless it be to prove that the
worst of men are sensible of the injuries they have done us, and
perhaps to demonstrate to us the imminent danger of our situation. In
the shipwreck of the state, trifles float and are preserved, while
everything solid and valuable sinks to the bottom, and is lost for ever.
JUNIUS.
DISTRESS CAUSED BY HIGH PRICES (1772).
=Source.=--_Calendar of Home Office Papers, 1770-1772._ P. 479.
_Forestalling and Engrossing._
_11 April._--A paper signed “near Dorchester,” addressed to the King
(the newspapers taking notice of His Majesty’s desire to see the price
of provisions lowered), to lay before him the evils of forestalling
and engrossing. As examples of engrossing in the neighbourhood of
Dorchester, the writer instances the manors of Came, Whitcomb, Muncton,
and Bockhampton. The first, he says, about thirty years before, had
many inhabitants, many holding leasehold estates under the lord of the
manor for three lives. Some of these had estates of 15_l._, 20_l._, and
30_l._ a year, being for the most part careful, industrious people,
obliged to be careful to keep a little cash in order to keep the estate
in the family if a life should drop. Their corn was brought to market,
and they were content with the market price. Their cattle were sold
in the same manner. Their children when of proper age were married,
and children begotten, without fear of poverty. But the lord had since
turned out all the people, and the whole place was in his own hands,
while not half the quantity of corn was sown that formerly had been.
The writer also gives an account how one Wm. Taunton, though only a
tenant of the Dean and Chapter of Exon, was gradually getting the
whole parish into his own hands. He says, comparing his own with past
times, that formerly a farmer that occupied 100_l._ a year was thought
a tolerable one, and he that occupied four or five hundred pounds a
very great one indeed; but now they had farmers that occupied from
one thousand to two thousand per annum, who did not want money to pay
their rent, as did the little farmers, who were obliged to sell their
corn, &c. The writer gives it as the general opinion that the kingdom
had become greatly depopulated, some averring the population to have
decreased by a fourth within the preceding hundred years. He further
says: “Your Majesty must put a stop to inclosures, or oblige yᵉ lord of
yᵉ manor to keep up yᵉ antient custom of it, and not suffer him to buy
his tenant’s interest; to have all the houses pulled down, and yᵉ whole
parish turn’d into a farm: this is a fashionable practice, and by none
more yⁿ Jnᵒ Damer, Esq., yᵉ owner of Came, and his brother Lord Milton.”
MEETINGS OF WEAVERS AND OTHERS TO PETITION THE KING (1773).
=Source.=--_Calendar of Home Office Papers, 1773-1775._ Pp. 39-42, and
65.
_13-27 April._--A series of letters and other papers about meetings of
weavers, coalheavers, &c. A printed handbill, calling them together,
was first dispersed in Spitalfields on the 12th April. Next day notice
of it was given to Lord Rochford by Sir John Fielding. The handbill to
the weavers is signed “Ten Thousand,” and exhorts them “to stand up
and carry the truth to the King.” “Let us rise up as one man and wait
humbly upon the King at St. James’ every day. He will then grant the
humble petition of the worthy Lord Mayor and liverymen of London, who
have begged him to have pity upon the poor, and to remove those evil
ministers who will not lower the price of provisions to relieve us,
and who will take no care of our trade. Let us go daily and repeat our
prayer to the King, and he will at length hearken to us, and remove
his evil counsellors. Then shall we and our poor families be able to
gain an honest and comfortable livelihood by a reasonable industry; if
not, our trade will be lost for ever. We all remember that some years
ago more than 20,000 of our trade waited on the King for several days
together, and he was convinced of their distress. N.B.--Do not be
guilty of any disorder; only show yourselves to the King, that he may
see your distress every day.”
The magistrates in Bethnal Green granted a privy search-warrant, to
“set aside all tumults and riots which might happen,” and next day
reported that everything had been quiet the night before.
On the 16th April it was reported that printed handbills, verbatim the
same as those to the weavers, except the address [and the signature,
“One of Two Thousand”] had been distributed among the coalheavers in
Shadwell. Everything was quiet, but (say the justices) “we greatly fear
some evil agents are abroad sowing sedition.”
On the 17th April Mr. Justice Wilmot acquainted Lord Suffolk that
everything was quiet among the Spitalfields weavers, but that he was
afraid the City Marshal was making himself “too busy” among them. Their
intention then was to rise in a body on the 26th and proceed to the
House of Commons. The sworn information of a victualler in Bethnal
Green states that the City Marshal came to his house to inquire into
the grievances of the weavers, that it was agreed that eight or ten
men should meet at the informant’s house to present a petition to the
Lord Mayor; but on his objecting to this proposal, the City Marshal
desired them to meet at any place they thought proper, or come into
the city, and he would protect them, and assured them my Lord Mayor
would serve them so long as they kept peace and good order. The Lord
Mayor’s account is that he sent the City Marshal with the Sheriffs
into Spitalfields, and that the former got himself introduced the same
evening to about 50 weavers, when, the handbill distributed the day
before becoming the subject of conversation, he expostulated with them
on the imprudence and danger of such a proceeding, and convinced them
it must have been some enemy to their well-being who had suggested it.
The City Marshal’s account convinced the Lord Mayor that the intention
of assembling did not originate with the weavers. The Lord Mayor
encloses a letter from “A Citizen,” in a disguised hand, in which the
hope is expressed that his Lordship, now that the people had become
the “messengers of their own distress,” would not use his authority
to interpose “any unnecessary obstruction to the miserable people,”
the success of his own endeavours for the service of his country not
having proved equal to the “honourable part” he had acted, and the
“late remonstrance” having been “treated with a contempt which nothing
but a persuasion of its falsity could justify.” In order to discover
the origin of the hand-bills, Sir John Fielding suggested that they
should be shown to printers who might learn something from the type, he
himself having once been very successful in discovering the forgery of
a banknote by an application to the copper-plate printers, who detected
it to have been done by a gun engraver. He also advised the offer of a
reward from the justices at Hicks’ Hall.
On the 23rd April Mr. Justice Wilmot wrote from the Globe Tavern in
Moorfields that he had just received the handbill which he enclosed,
in consequence of which he had come to Moorfields. He found 300 or
400 weavers gathered, “and by their coming in it’s likely there will
be thousands.” The body of the handbill is in the same terms as
those already referred to, but addressed in this case to the “poor
watermen, porters, and carmen, and their families, &c.,” and signed
“Two Thousand.” There is the same postscript deprecating disorder. A
similar handbill was also distributed, addressed to the weavers as
before. On this occasion the Lord Mayor, being applied to, quitted his
chair at the Old Bailey, took a hackney coach, and went to the scene to
disperse the mob. Before he reached the spot, however, the “three or
four hundred weavers” who had assembled had quietly dispersed. It was
Mr. Justice Sherwood who succeeded in getting the crowd to disperse on
this occasion. He went alone to Moorfields. The weavers could not tell
him what they had come together for. Their only complaint was that they
had a bill before the House of Commons which they were afraid would not
pass. He promised to convey any application they had to make to the
King or the Ministry, a promise which they cheerfully accepted, and
then immediately dispersed.
The night before Mr. Alderman Oliver had received a letter in a large
feigned hand from “A Citizen,” intimating that nothing was intended
but that the poor people should go in large bodies to convey that
conviction which every gentler method had been so repeatedly yet so
vainly tried to produce, and asking him “if a body of starving people”
should be found assembling in Moorfields, in order to be under the
protection of the city magistrates to consult how to make their sorrows
known to their Sovereign, not to let them be hunted by the ill-timed
zeal of the neighbouring justices who might apply for his assistance
in suppressing a disturbance when the only design was to excite the
emotions of humanity in favour of the wretched. For the discovery of
the writer of this letter and of the one to the Lord Mayor, already
referred to, a reward of 100_l._ was offered, with a pardon to an
accomplice.
On the same day (23rd April) Mr. Robert Pell, chairman of the Tower
Sessions, wrote that after diligent secret inquiry after the printed
handbills said to have been distributed among the coalheavers in the
Tower division, he had been induced to believe that their distribution,
if real, had not been general. He had within the last few days,
however, noticed a person (for some time in the commission of the
peace for the county, but whose name had been struck out on account of
certain transactions with the riotous coalheavers) in better plight
as to garb and outward appearances than he had been seen in since
his disgrace, and in close familiar conference with labouring people
in the streets of the neighbourhood. Upon this man he said he had
set a watch. In this letter is a printed petition signed by several
persons, whose places of residence are also given, addressed “To the
nobility, gentry, &c. who are real lovers of the King and country’s
prosperity,” attributing the distresses of the silkweavers to the
great encouragement given to the importation and wearing of foreign
wrought silks, and imploring their assistance to discountenance such
“impolitic and unnatural” practices by refusing to wear or purchase
such goods.
On 24th April Sir John Fielding proposed that the magistrates of each
division should sit for a week every morning from 8 till 11, having
the high constable and all the petty constables stationed near them
with proper messengers to reconnoitre and inquire. He thought that
nothing else would counteract the endeavours which were being made to
disturb the public peace by inviting ignorant and illiterate bodies to
assemble. He mentioned the plan to “avoid different opinions in the
magistrates, and that the whole might be uniform and the force united.”
Monday, Thursday, and Friday were the particular days of apprehension.
As the general constables were men of business, and must necessarily
lose much time in the execution of this plan, he suggested that Sir
John Hawkins should be authorised to make them amends.
The weavers were summoned to meet again on Monday, 26th April, when
they were promised they should “absolutely see a petition to be
delivered to His Majesty’s person by the hands of people who have no
reason to be ashamed or afraid to appear in behalf of such distress.”
Mr. Wilmot, Mr. Sherwood, and Mr. Pell proceeded to Moorfields, the
place of meeting. After a conference with a posse of about 200 weavers
they succeeded in getting possession of the proposed petition, which
was “artfully drawn up,” and then retired to a public-house while the
weavers elected a committee of six or eight to meet them. These made
certain proposals to the magistrates, who gave an answer next day which
thoroughly satisfied the committee, who sincerely promised on behalf
of their body to have no more irregular meetings on the magistrates’
engaging to consider of some mode of subjecting their wages to the
decision of the magistrates in their quarter sessions.
_Sir John Fielding to the Earl of Suffolk._
_9 July._--Assisted yesterday at the Middlesex General Quarter Sessions
to carry into execution the late Act of Parliament for regulating
the wages of journeymen weavers in Spitalfields, &c.; and the wages
were then settled by a numerous and unanimous Bench to the entire
satisfaction of those masters and journeymen weavers who appeared
there. I sincerely hope this step will prove a radical cure for all
tumultuous assemblies from that quarter. By this statute your Lordship
has conveyed contentment to the minds of thousands of His Majesty’s
subjects. The Act for appointing clergymen with proper salaries to
attend the gaols, according to my proposals, was also carried into
execution. This preventive step will, I am persuaded be attended with
very salutary effects. I hope your Lordship will take advantage of my
Lord North’s leisure to settle the affair regarding my preventive plan
now lying before him for His Majesty’s approbation.
DESTRUCTION OF TEA (CARGOES) AT BOSTON (DECEMBER, 1773).
=Source.=--_Calendar of Home Office Papers (1773-1775)._ Pp. 175 _et
seq._
_Lords of the Admiralty to the Earl of Dartmouth._
_27 Jan._--Enclosing a copy of another letter from Rear-Admiral
Montague, dated at Boston, the 17th Dec. last, give an account of a mob
having assembled and destroyed the tea exported from England by the
East India Company.--Admiralty Office.
The enclosure. On the evening of 16 Dec., between 6 and 7 o’clock, a
large mob assembled with axes, &c., encouraged by Mr. John Hancock,
Samuel Adams, and others, and marched in a body to where the ships lay,
and there destroyed the whole by starting it into the sea. During the
whole of this transaction neither the Governor, Magistrates, owners,
nor Revenue officers ever called for the Admiral’s assistance. If they
had, he could easily have prevented the execution of the plan, but must
have endangered the lives of many innocent people by firing on the town.
_Lord Viscount Barrington to the Earl of Dartmouth._
_28 Jan._--Enclosing copies of two letters from Lieut.-Col. Leslie,
commanding the 64th Regiment at Castle William, Boston.--War Office.
The enclosures, dated respectively the 6th and 17th Dec., 1773. In the
first Col. Leslie says that the four Commissioners of the Custom-house
and the five tea agents had taken refuge with him that day week, and
were likely to continue some time. The Governor had not mentioned any
desire of marching the regiment to town. Only two of the tea ships had
then arrived, and Mr. Hancock, “the Governor’s Captain of his Cadet
Company,” was mounting guard on board them, to prevent the landing of
that part of the cargo, “a most daring insult to his Excellency.” In
the second letter he states that the Sons of Liberty had destroyed 340
chests of tea that lay altogether at one of the wharfs. The fourth
vessel was stranded near to Cape Cod; but the tea was got safe on
shore, and it was expected it had shared the same fate as the last.
The regiment was ready, had it been called upon. The Council would
not agree to the troops going to town. “However, it must end in that.
Lenity won’t do now with the people here.” The gentlemen who had taken
refuge in Castle William still continued there.
_Chairman of the East India Company to Lord Dartmouth._
? _29 Jan._--Transmitting copies of several papers lately received
relative to the tea affair in America.--East India House, Saturday
night.
The enclosures; viz., (_b_) Petition from the Company’s agents in
Boston (Richard Clarke and Sons, Benjamin Faneuil, jun., and Thos. and
Elisha Hutchinson) to the Governor and Council; and minutes of the
meetings of the Council held thereupon.
(_c_) Letters from the agents to the Directors of the East India
Company, dated Castle William, near Boston, respectively the 2nd and
9th Dec. 1773.
(_d_) Letters from the Company’s agents (Roger Smith and Leger and
Greenwood) at Charlestown, South Carolina, dated respectively 4 and 18
Dec. 1773.
(_e_) Letter from the Boston agents to the Directors, dated Castle
William, 17 Dec. 1773.
The Boston agents petitioned the Governor and Council to take charge
of the tea on its arrival. The meetings of the Council when this
petition was taken into consideration were several times adjourned
between 19 and 29 Nov. Finally, on the latter date a committee of
Council, consisting of James Bowdoin, Samuel Dexter, and John Winthrop,
Esq., having been previously appointed to draw up a report of the
debate, to be presented to the Governor, their report was discussed
and accepted. It described the origin of the disturbances to be the
Act laying a duty upon tea in America, and, in regard to the petition,
referred the petitioners for personal protection to the justices of
the peace, and declared they had no authority to take the tea, or any
other merchandise, out of the agent’s care, while, if they advised the
landing of it, the duty would have to be paid or secured, and they
would therefore be advising a measure inconsistent with the declared
sentiments of both Houses in the last winter session of the General
Court, advice which they considered to be altogether inexpedient and
improper. They said they had seen with regret some late disturbances,
and had advised the prosecution of their authors. The letters of the
agents give an account of the people’s proceedings, and that they
themselves had been obliged to take refuge in Castle William. The
letter of 17 Dec. announces the destruction of the tea.
In Charlestown, after several meetings of the townspeople, it was
decided that the teas should not be allowed to be landed, whilst six
months was allowed to consume the teas then on hand, after which time
no teas were to be used on any pretence whilst the duty payable in
America continued.
WAR MATERIAL FOR AMERICA (1774).
=Source.=--_Calendar of Home Office Papers (1773-1775)._ Pp. 240 _et
seq._
_Earl of Suffolk to the Earl of Dartmouth._
_31 Aug._--Sends extracts from two letters from Sir Joseph Yorke
relative to large quantities of gunpowder said to be purchased in
Holland and shipped for some of the ports in North America.--St.
James’s.
The enclosures. It was the house of Crommelin at Amsterdam which was
chiefly concerned in this trade. A great quantity of war material was
exported by the Dutch to St. Eustatia, the centre of all contraband in
that part of the world.
_Earl of Suffolk to the Earl of Dartmouth._
_24 Sept._--Giving notice of intelligence received from Sir Joseph
Yorke that it was being confirmed to his Excellency more and more every
day that North America is largely supplied by way of St. Eustatia with
what it does not choose to take from England, or to export directly
from Holland, in which the Dutch find their account and will not let
the market want.--St. James’s.
_Earl of Suffolk to the Earl of Dartmouth._
_25 Oct._--Enclosing an extract from a letter from Sir Joseph Yorke,
stating the steps taken by him in consequence of the instructions
transmitted to him by messenger on the 17th instant.--St. James’s.
The enclosure. Sir Joseph found the Pensionary as well disposed to
satisfy the King as the most zealous wishes could expect. He said that
whatever depended upon him to stop such a dangerous traffic should
be done, though the manner of doing it could not be immediately
determined, because it might not be advisable to exert an extraordinary
power which might occasion both a clamour and alarm. He explained, in
conversation, that in the present temper of the magistracy of Amsterdam
it would be difficult for the Ministry at the Hague to work at all
through that channel. He imagined that the channel of the Admiralty at
Amsterdam, which is at the same time charged with the department of the
Customs, might be preferred. Afterwards saw M. Fagel, whose attachment
and zeal are too well known to require any new assurances. He soon
brought a letter to M. Boreel, Fiscal of the Admiralty, and said the
Prince did not think it necessary or advisable to use any extraordinary
methods, but that he had desired M. Boreel to examine strictly into
the affair, to prevent in every way the departure of any vessel with
such a cargo, &c. Calling on the Prince to thank him in the King’s
name, the Prince said he should always contribute with joy to the ease
and welfare of His Majesty and his dominions, but that he, Sir Joseph,
knew the merchants well enough to be convinced they would sell arms and
ammunition to besiege Amsterdam itself.
_Lords of the Admiralty to the Earl of Dartmouth._
_9 Dec._--Send copies of letters of 1st and 11 Nov. and 6th inst.
from Lieut. Walton, of the _Wells_ cutter, giving an account of his
proceedings consequent on Lord Dartmouth’s letter of 18 Oct.--Admiralty
Office.
The enclosures. The vessel Lieut. Walton was sent to watch at
Amsterdam, after one attempt to sail, was finally unladen of her
cargo and partly unrigged. Information was also obtained that if she
attempted to go down the river she would certainly be searched at the
Texel by the Dutch Admiralty.
AMERICAN EXPEDITION TO CANADA (1775).
=Source.=--_Calendar of Home Office Papers (1773-1775)._ Pp. 407-409.
_Hugh Finlay to_ ? _Anthony Todd._
_19 and 20 Sept._--The army under General Gage at Boston cannot be of
much service there; it would require a very great force to penetrate
any way into the country. Every American able to bear arms will take
the field; they will avoid meeting the King’s troops openly, will
harass and pick them off from behind trees, hedges, or any cover, and
will ever take possession of the ground left by the King’s troops. The
provincials, by handling arms, will become soldiers. They seem not to
foresee the great misery that their non-importation and non-exportation
will occasion among them. I am inclined to think that they entered into
this association more with a design to cause troubles and commotions
in England than from a conception that they can subsist for any time
without our manufactures. The agreement not to export their produce
will of itself bring them to implore Britain to permit them to send
it out; thousands must starve else. As long as the King’s troops act
against the rebellious colonists, they will hang together, and be
obedient to their leaders. If the troops shall be withdrawn, the people
will have nothing to divert their attention from their situation; they
will more forcibly feel the sad distress that non-exportation will
inevitably spread in every province: every man will think for himself,
they will become discontented, and will insist on making up the affair
with the mother country. I am persuaded that after they are left to
reflect coolly on their conduct they will return to their duty. They,
no doubt, at present imagine that they will be supplied from Holland
and France; indeed, it will hardly be possible wholly to hinder this;
yet it will be as impossible for the Americans to get a twentieth
part of what they’ll want. A few ships of war can block up all their
principal harbours, and a chain of small cruisers can do the rest.
Necessity is the mother of invention. They will become expert in many
manufactures, but without money in the country the manufacturer will
find but little encouragement. Without foreign trade they’ll have no
money.
Every soldier on the continent would be well employed to drive the
rebels from this province. The provincial troops have executed their
plan so far. A body of them have gone round our works at St. John’s,
and have taken post on Sorrel River. By this means they cut off
all communication with our little army by water, and they are now
endeavouring to cut off the communication between St. John’s and
Montreal. If they succeed, our troops at St. John’s can have no supply
of provisions from any quarter, as the rebels are posted also at Isle
aux Noix. We are not above 500 strong at Quebec. We lately had 900
Indian warriors in our interest; they have made their peace with the
provincials, and are about returning to their homes. The rebels have
nothing to fear from the Canadians; nine in ten are in their interests,
and heartily wish them success. How have we been deceived in the
Canadians! Many Englishmen in this province have taken infinite pains
to set the Quebec Act in a most horrid light to the Canadians, and
they have succeeded but too well. The Canadians look upon the rebels
as their best friends. I shall not be surprised if many join them. We
are in a bad situation in this place. The walls are in bad repair;
in many places an enemy may easily enter the town. We have no cannon
mounted. We have not a single armed vessel in our harbour. General
Carleton, in whose military abilities we have great confidence, is
at Montreal. Our Lieut.-Governor (Mr. Cramahé) and Col. McLean are
doing everything in their power to put the town in a proper posture of
defence. The British militia amount to 300, many of them well-wishers
to the rebels. The Canadians muster about 600; few of them, I fear,
willing to use their arms in defence of Quebec. I cannot suppose the
provincials can bring artillery against this place. They know our
strength, and I imagine they intend to take the town by assault. If
they cannot effect it this fall, they will quarter themselves in the
parishes round the town, and intercept all our supplies. If they cannot
take us by assault nor starve us out, we hope to be reinforced from
England very early in spring, for we can expect no assistance from the
Canadian peasantry. Many of them have told me that they look on this
rebellion only as a quarrel among Englishmen, in which they are no way
immediately concerned, but that hereafter they’ll reap great benefit
if the colonists shall succeed in their plans. They have the notion
that if the rebels get entire possession of the country, they’ll be
for ever exempted from paying taxes. If one asks them what will become
of them when the British forces re-take the town in the spring, they
answer that everything will be settled before that time; for that
when the Ministry find Quebec in the hands of the Americans, they’ll
readily comply with every American demand. My opinion on the whole is
this: Unless our troops at St. John’s can join us here, the rebels will
starve us; and even if they do, the flying parties of our enemies will
intimidate the Canadians so much that no provisions will be brought to
town. If the 500 at St. John’s shall be able to join us, the rebels
will not be able to enter the town unless hunger shall force us to
abandon it. We are about 6,000 souls in Quebec. Perhaps the Canadians
may return to their duty; in that case we have nothing to fear from the
combined force of North America with such a General as our Governor at
our head.
_20 Sept._--There is advice from Montreal that the party on the Sorrel
consists of 150 Canadians, headed by one Duggan, formerly a hairdresser
of this place, and one James Livingstone, son of an Albany Dutchman,
who resided long in Montreal. It is not known whether there are any
provincials with them; it is supposed there are. It is imagined that it
was this band of villains who fired on an artillery batteau loaded with
stores for St. John’s; they killed the men, 11 in number, and took her.
Since the Governor’s proclamation offering pardon to the Canadians of
Duggan’s party, many of them have deserted him, and they hourly expect
to see Duggan and Livingstone brought dead or alive into Montreal.
General Schuyler, commanding the expedition against this country, has
commanded the parishes on the Sorrel or Richlieu River &c. to send 50
men from each, armed and properly provided, under pain of having fire
and sword carried among them on refusal. I hope this mandate will open
the eyes of the Canadians. The rebels could not have done us greater
service.
Extract of a letter I received to-day from Montreal:--“The behaviour
and appearance of our militia surpasses my most sanguine expectations,
both as to numbers and conduct. Courage, loyalty, and cheerfulness are
conspicuous in their countenances, and they do their duty cheerfully. I
cannot help likewise expressing the pleasure I feel at the appearance
of the peasantry returning to their duty.”--Quebec.
RESOLUTIONS FAVOURING THE AMERICAN COLONIES (1775).
=Source.=--“Speech on Conciliation with America,” _Edmund Burke_. Vol.
i. of his Collected Works. London: G. Bell and Sons. 1909.
I wish, Sir, to repeal the Boston Port Bill, because (independently
of the dangerous precedent of suspending the rights of the subject
during the king’s pleasure) it was passed, as I apprehend, with
less regularity, and on more partial principles, than it ought. The
corporation of Boston was not heard before it was condemned. Other
towns, full as guilty as she was, have not had their ports blocked
up. Even the restraining bill of the present session does not go to
the length of the Boston Port Act. The same ideas of prudence, which
induced you not to extend equal punishment to equal guilt, even
when you were punishing, induced me, who mean not to chastise, but
to reconcile, to be satisfied with the punishment already partially
inflicted.
Ideas of prudence and accommodation to circumstances, prevent you
from taking away the charters of Connecticut and Rhode Island, as
you have taken away that of Massachusetts colony, though the crown
has far less power in the two former provinces than it enjoyed in the
latter; and though the abuses have been full as great, and as flagrant,
in the exempted as in the punished. The same reasons of prudence
and accommodation have weight with me in restoring the charter of
Massachusetts Bay. Besides, Sir, the act which changes the charter of
Massachusetts is in many particulars so exceptionable, that if I did
not wish absolutely to repeal, I would by all means desire to alter it;
as several of its provisions tend to the subversion of all public and
private justice. Such, among others, is the power in the governor to
change the sheriff at his pleasure; and to make a new returning officer
for every special cause. It is shameful to behold such a regulation
standing among English laws.
The act for bringing persons accused of committing murder under the
orders of government to England for trial is but temporary. That act
has calculated the probable duration of our quarrel with the colonies;
and is accommodated to that supposed duration. I would hasten the happy
moment of reconciliation; and therefore must, on my principle, get rid
of that most justly obnoxious act.
The act of Henry the Eighth, for the trial of treasons, I do not mean
to take away, but to confine it to its proper bounds and original
intention; to make it expressly for trial of treasons (and the greatest
treasons may be committed) in places where the jurisdiction of the
crown does not extend.
Having guarded the privileges of local legislature, I would next secure
to the colonies a fair and unbiassed judicature; for which purpose,
Sir, I propose the following resolution: “That, from the time when the
general assembly or general court of any colony or plantation in North
America, shall have appointed by act of assembly, duly confirmed, a
settled salary to the offices of the chief justice and other judges of
the superior court, it may be proper that the said chief justice and
other judges of the superior courts of such colony, shall hold his and
their office and offices during their good behaviour; and shall not
be removed therefrom, but when the said removal shall be adjudged by
his Majesty in council, upon a hearing on complaint from the general
assembly, or on a complaint from the governor, or council, or the house
of representatives severally, or of the colony in which the said chief
justice and other judges have exercised the said offices.”
The next resolution relates to the courts of admiralty.
It is this:--“That it may be proper to regulate the courts of
admiralty, or vice-admiralty, authorized by the fifteenth chapter of
the fourth of George the Third, in such a manner as to make the same
more commodious to those who sue, or are sued, in the said courts, and
to provide for the more decent maintenance of the judges in the same.”
These courts I do not wish to take away; they are in themselves proper
establishments. This court is one of the capital securities of the
act of navigation. The extent of its jurisdiction, indeed, has been
increased; but this is altogether as proper, and is indeed on many
accounts more eligible, where new powers were wanted, than a court
absolutely new. But courts incommodiously situated, in effect, deny
justice; and a court, partaking in the fruits of its own condemnation,
is a robber. The congress complain, and complain justly, of this
grievance.[7]
These are the three consequential propositions. I have thought of
two or three more; but they come rather too near detail, and to the
province of executive government; which I wish parliament always to
superintend, never to assume. If the first six are granted, congruity
will carry the latter three. If not, the things that remain unrepealed
will be, I hope, rather unseemly encumbrances on the building, than
very materially detrimental to its strength and stability.
THE ARMIES UNDER HOWE AND CLINTON (1777).
=Source.=--_Gentleman’s Magazine._ Vol. xlvii. (1777), pp. 573 _et seq._
_An Historical Account of the Proceedings of the Armies under General
Howe and Maj. Gen. Clinton, extracted from the Gazette Extraordinary,
dated Tuesday, December 2._
These advices were brought by Maj. Cuyler, first aide-de-camp to
General Sir William Howe, and are dated German Town, Oct. 10, 1777.
On the 30th of August the army under Gen. Howe landed on the West side
of Elk river, and divided into two columns; one under the command of
Lord Cornwallis, the other commanded by Lieut. Gen. Knyphausen.
On Sept. 3 (Major-General Grant, with six battalions, remaining at
the head of Elk to preserve the communication with the fleet) the two
columns joined on the road to Christien bridge. The Hessian and Anspach
chasseurs defeated on their march a chosen corps of one thousand men
from the enemy’s army, with the loss of only 2 officers wounded, 3 men
killed, and 19 wounded, when that of the enemy was not less than 50
killed, and many more wounded.
On the 6th Major-General Grant joined the army.
The whole marched on the 8th by Newark, and encamped that evening
within four miles of the enemy, who moved early in the night, taking
post on the heights on the eastern side of Brandywine creek.
On the 9th Lieut. Gen. Knyphausen marched with the left, as did
Lord Cornwallis with the right, and both joined the next morning at
Kennett’s-square.
On the 11th the army advanced in two columns, that under Gen.
Knyphausen to Chad’s Ford, and arrived in front of the enemy about 10
o’clock; while the other column, under Lord Cornwallis &c., having
marched 12 miles round to the forks of the Brandywine, crossed both
branches, taking from thence the road to Dilworth in order to turn the
enemy’s right at Chad’s Ford.
Gen. Washington, having intelligence of this movement, detached
Gen. Sullivan to his right, with near 10,000 men, who took a strong
position, with his left near to the Brandywine, both flanks being
covered by very thick woods, and his artillery advantageously disposed.
About 4 o’clock the King’s troops advanced, and Ld. Cornwallis having
formed the line, the light infantry and chasseurs began the attack;
the guards and grenadiers instantly advanced from the right, the whole
under a heavy fire of artillery and musquetry: but they pushed on with
an impetuosity not to be sustained by the enemy, who falling back into
the woods in their rear, the King’s troops entered with them, and
pursued closely for near two miles.
After this success, a part of the enemy’s right took a second position
in a wood, from whence the 2d light infantry and chasseurs soon
dislodged them; and from this time they did not rally again in force.
The 2d light infantry, 2d grenadiers and 4th brigade, moved forward
a mile beyond Dilworth, where they attacked a corps of the enemy,
strongly posted to cover the retreat of their army, which corps not
being forced until after it was dark, the enemy’s army escaped a total
overthrow.
From the most correct accounts, the strength of the enemy’s army was
not less than 15,000 men, a part of which retired to Chester, and
remained there that night; but the greater body did not stop until they
reached Philadelphia. They had about 300 men killed, 600 wounded, and
near 400 made prisoners.
The loss on the side of his Majesty’s troops amounted to about 100
killed, and 488 wounded. Eight pieces of cannon, and a great quantity
of military stores were taken from the enemy.
The army lay this night on the field of battle, and on the 12th Maj.
Gen. Grant, with the first and second brigades, marched to Concord.
Lord Cornwallis, with the light infantry and British grenadiers, joined
him next day, and proceeded to Ash-Town within five miles of Chester.
On the same day Major M’Donell made Mr. McKinley, the new appointed
President of the Lower Counties on Delaware, his prisoner.
Lieut. Col. Loos, with the combined battalion of Rhall’s brigade,
escorted the wounded and sick to Wilmington on the 14th.
On the 16th intelligence being received that the enemy were advancing
on the Lancaster road, it was immediately determined to push forward
and attack them; but a most violent fall of rain setting in, the
intended attack became impracticable.
The enemy, apprised of the approach of the army, marched the whole
night, and got to Yellow Springs, having, as is since known, all their
small ammunition damaged by the rain. In their retreat they lost about
18 men killed, and some wounded.
On the 18th a detachment of light infantry was sent to the Valley
Forge upon Schuylkill, where the enemy had a variety of stores, and
a considerable magazine of flour, and were joined on the 20th by the
guards.
Upon intelligence that Gen. Wayne was lying in the woods with a corps
of 1,500 men, and four pieces of cannon, Maj. Gen. Grey was detached on
the 20th to surprize him; and having, by the bayonet only, forced his
pickets, he rushed in upon his encampment, killed and wounded not less
than 300 on the spot, taking between 70 and 80 prisoners, including
officers, their arms, and eight waggons loaded with baggage and stores.
One captain of light infantry and three men were killed in the attack,
and four men wounded. Gallantry in the troops, and good conduct in the
General, were fully manifested upon this critical service.
On the 22d the army crossed the Schuylkill, at Fat Land Ford, without
opposition; and on the 25th marched in two columns to German Town. Lord
Cornwallis, with the British grenadiers, and two battalions of Hessian
grenadiers, took possession of Philadelphia the next morning.
In the evening of the 26th, three batteries were begun, to act against
the enemy’s shipping that might approach the town. These batteries were
unfinished when they were attacked by a number of gallies, gondolas,
and other armed vessels; and the largest frigate, the _Delaware_,
mounting 30 guns, anchored within 500 yards of the town. About ten in
the morning they began a heavy cannonade; but the tide falling, the
_Delaware_ grounded, and was taken possession of by the marine company
of grenadiers, commanded by Capt. Averne.
The smaller frigates and armed vessels were forced (except a schooner
that was driven on shore) to return under the protection of a fort,
where there were two floating batteries, with three range of sunken
machines, to obstruct the passage of the river, the lowest row being
three miles below the fort.
The enemy had a redoubt upon the Jersey shore at Billing’s Point, with
heavy guns in it, to prevent these machines from being weighed up,
which 300 men posted there evacuated on the 1st of October; and Capt.
Hammond immediately opened the navigation at that place, by removing a
part of the chevaux de frize.
The enemy having received a reinforcement of 1,500 men from Peek’s
Kill, and 1,000 from Virginia, and presuming on the army being much
weakened by the detachments to Philadelphia and Jersey, thought it a
favourable time for them to risk an action. They accordingly marched
at six in the evening of the 3d from their camp near Skippach-creek to
German-Town, (about 16 miles,) where the bulk of the army was posted.
At three in the morning of the 4th the patrols discovered the enemy’s
approach, and the army was immediately ordered under arms.
About break of day the enemy began their attack; but the light
infantry, being well supported, sustained the same with such determined
bravery, that they could not make the least impression on them; and
Major-Gen. Grant advancing with the right wing, the enemy’s left gave
way, and was pursued through a strong country between four and five
miles: but such was the expedition with which they fled, that it was
not possible to overtake them.
The enemy retired near twenty miles by several roads to Perkiomy-creek,
and encamped upon Skippach-creek.
They saved all their cannon by withdrawing them early in the day.
By the best accounts, their loss was between two and three hundred
killed, about 600 wounded, and upwards of 400 taken. Among the killed
was Gen. Nash, with many other officers of all ranks, and 54 officers
among the prisoners.
Since the battle of Brandywine 72 of their officers have been taken,
exclusive of 10 belonging to the _Delaware_ frigate.
On the 19th the army removed from German-Town to Philadelphia, as a
more convenient situation for the reduction of Fort Island, which at
present is an obstruction to the passage of the river, as the upper
chevaux de frize cannot be removed until we have possession of that
post; near which the enemy having intrenched about 800 men upon the
Jersey shore, Col. Donop, with three battalions of Hessian grenadiers,
the regiment of Mirback, and the infantry chasseurs, crossed the
Delaware on the 21st instant, with directions to proceed to the attack
of that post. Col. Donop led on the troops in the most gallant manner
to the assault. They carried an extensive out-work, from whence the
enemy were driven into an interior intrenchment, which could not be
forced without ladders. The detachment, in moving up and returning
from the attack, was much galled by the enemy’s gallies and floating
batteries.
Col. Donop and Lieut. Col. Minningerode being both wounded, the command
devolved upon Lieut. Col. Linsing, who, after collecting all the
wounded that could be brought off, returned with the detachment to camp.
There were several brave officers lost upon this occasion, in which the
utmost ardour and courage were displayed by both officers and soldiers.
On the 23d, the _Augusta_, in coming up the river with some other ships
of war, to engage the enemy’s gallies near the fort, got aground, and,
by some accident taking fire in the action, was unavoidably consumed.
The _Merlin_ sloop also grounded, and the other ships being obliged
to remove to a distance from the explosion of the _Augusta_, it became
expedient to evacuate and burn her also.
His Excellency concludes his letters with requesting additional
cloathing for 5,000 Provincials, which, by including the new levies
expected to be raised in that and the neighbouring countries, will
certainly be wanting.
While these important services were transacting in Pennsylvania, Lieut.
Gen. Clinton meditated an incursion into Jersey: his principal motive
was to attempt a stroke against any detached corps of the enemy, if one
offered; or, if not, to collect a considerable number of cattle, which
would at the same time prove a seasonable refreshment to the troops,
and deprive the enemy of resources which they much depended on.
The result of this expedition, after a little skirmishing with small
parties of the enemy, was the collecting about 400 head of cattle,
including 20 milch cows for the use of the hospital, 400 sheep, and a
few horses, with the loss of about 40 men, killed, wounded, prisoners,
and missing.
By a letter from Brig.-Gen. Campbell to Sir Henry Clinton, dated Staten
Island, Aug. 23, it appears, that the enemy effected almost a total
surprize of two battalions of the Jersey Provincials on that island;
but that they had suffered severely for their temerity in making the
descent, Col. Dongan having come up with their rear at the very instant
when the rebels were using the greatest diligence in transporting their
troops to the Jersey shore; and being joined by Brig.-Gen. Campbell
with cannon, who took them in flank, about 150 surrendered themselves
prisoners of war; and the remainder, of nearly the same number,
retreating towards the extremity of the island, found means to cross
over near Amboy.
Col. Buskirk’s battalion being ordered to attack a party left to cover
the enemy’s boats, they did it with charge of bayonet, and obliged the
party to retreat to the Jersey shore.
It further appears, that this descent was carried on by select and
chosen troops, formed from three brigades, Sullivan’s, Smallwood’s, and
De Bore’s, and headed by their respective Generals, besides Drayton’s
and Ogden’s battalions. There were taken in all 259 prisoners, among
whom are 1 Lieut.-Colonel, 3 Majors, 2 Captains, and 15 inferior
officers. Their loss in killed cannot be ascertained, but must have
been considerable.[8]
In a letter from Lieut.-Gen. Sir Henry Clinton to Gen. Sir William
Howe, dated Fort Montgomery, Oct. 9, an account is given of an attack
upon Fort Clinton, Montgomery, &c. which reflects the greatest military
honour on the conquerors.
The difficulties of the march over mountains, every natural
obstruction, and all that art could invent to add to them, being
surmounted, General Vaughan’s corps was ordered to begin the attack on
Fort Clinton, and dislodge, if possible, the enemy from their advanced
station behind a stone breastwork, having in front, for half a mile, a
most impenetrable abbatis. This the General, by his good disposition,
obliged the enemy to quit, tho’ supported by cannon, got possession of
the wall, and there waited till Lieut.-Col. Campbell began his attack.
The Colonel waited a favourable moment to attack Fort Clinton, which
was a circular height, defended by a line for musquetry, with a barbet
battery of three guns in the center, and flanked by two redoubts; the
approaches to it thro’ a continued abbatis of 400 yards, defensive
every inch, and exposed to the fire of ten pieces of cannon. A brisk
attack on the Montgomery side; the gallies with their oars approaching,
firing, and even striking the fort; the men of war that moment
appearing; the extreme ardour of the troops; in short, all determined
the General to order the attack: Gen. Vaughan’s spirited behaviour and
good conduct did the rest. Having no time to lose, he particularly
ordered that not a shot should be fired; in this he was strictly
obeyed, and both redoubts &c. were stormed. Gen. Tryon advanced with
one battalion to support Gen. Vaughan in case it might be necessary,
and he arrived in time to join the cry of Victory!
A summons was sent to Fort Constitution; but the flag meeting with
an insolent reception, unknown in any war, the General determined to
chastise, and therefore an embarkation was ordered; but they found the
fort evacuated in the greatest confusion, the storehouses burnt, but
the cannon left unspiked.
Major-Gen. Tryon was detached to destroy the rebel settlement called
the Continental Village, who burnt barracks for 1,500 men, several
storehouses, and loaded waggons, this being the only establishment of
the rebels in that part of the highlands, and the place from whence any
neighbouring body of troops drew their supplies.
Sir James Wallace was ordered up the river at the same time, to find
a passage through the chevaux de frize between Polypus Island and the
Main, having under his protection a large detachment from the army,
headed by Major Gen. Vaughan, from whose report, dated on board the
_Friendship_ off Esopus, Oct. 17, Gen. Howe takes occasion to applaud
a very spirited piece of service performed by those two officers, who
attacked the batteries, drove the rebels from their works, spiked and
destroyed their guns; and Esopus “being a nursery for almost every
villain in the country,” the General landed and reduced every house to
ashes, while Sir James Wallace burnt their shipping and small craft.
_Return of Cannon, Stores, Ammunition, etc., taken and destroyed on
this Expedition._
Cannon 67, from six to two pounders. Two frigates built for 30 and 36
guns were burnt by the rebels on the forts being taken. The guns aboard
them, and two gallies, which were likewise burnt, amounted to above 30.
One sloop with 10 guns fell into our hands. The whole loss above 100
pieces.
Powder, cartridges fitted, cannon and musquet shot, immense quantities.
Every article belonging to the laboratory in the greatest perfection.
Other stores, such as portfires, match, harness, spare gun-carriages,
tools, instruments, &c. &c. in great plenty. A large quantity of
provisions. The boom and chain which ran across the river from Fort
Montgomery to St. Anthony’s Nose is supposed to have cost 70,000_l._
Another boom which was destroyed near Fort Constitution must likewise
have cost the rebels much money and labour. Barracks for 1,500 men were
destroyed by Major-Gen. Tryon at Continental Village, besides several
storehouses and loaded waggons, of the articles contained in which no
accounts could be taken.
CHATHAM’S LAST LETTER AND SPEECH (1778).
=Source.=--_Correspondence of William Pitt, Earl of Chatham._ Vol. iv.,
pp. 518 _et seq._
[From a draught in the handwriting of Lord Pitt.]
_The Earl of Chatham to the Duke of Richmond, April 6, 1778._
Lord Chatham presents his respects to the Duke of Richmond, and desires
to express his best thanks for the great honour of the communication of
the motion intended by his Grace on Tuesday.
It is an unspeakable concern to him, to find himself under so very wide
a difference with the Duke of Richmond, as between the _sovereignty_
and _allegiance_ of America, that he despairs of bringing about
successfully any honourable issue. He is inclined to try it, before
_this bad_ grows worse. Some weakness still continues in his hands; but
he hopes to be in town to-morrow.[9]
[_Report of the Earl of Chatham’s Last Speech, from the “London
Magazine.”_]
The Earl of Chatham followed Lord Weymouth.--
He appeared to be extremely feeble, and spoke with that difficulty
of utterance which is the characteristic of severe indisposition.
His Lordship began with declaring that his ill health had for some
time obliged him to absent himself from the performance of his
parliamentary duty; he rejoiced, however, that he was yet alive to
give his vote against so impolitic, so inglorious a measure as the
acknowledgment of the independency of America; and declared he would
much rather be in his grave than see the lustre of the British throne
tarnished, the dignity of the empire disgraced, the glory of the nation
sunk to such a degree as it must be, when the dependency of America on
the sovereignty of Great Britain was given up. The Earl next adverted
to the conduct of the court of France, and observed, that at a crisis
like the present, he would openly speak his sentiments, although they
might turn out to be dangerous. As a reason for throwing off reserve,
he said he did not approve of halting between two opinions, when there
was no middle path; that it was necessary absolutely to declare either
for peace or war, and when the former could not be preserved with
honour, the latter ought to be declared without hesitation. Having made
this remark, he asked, where was the ancient spirit of the nation,
that a foreign power was suffered to bargain for that commerce which
was her natural right, and enter into a treaty with her own subjects,
without instantly resenting it? Could it be possible that we were the
same people who but fifteen years ago were the envy and admiration of
all the world? How were we altered! and what had made the alteration?
He feared there was something in the dark, something lurking near
the throne, which gave motion to administration--something unseen,
which caused such pusillanimous, such timid, such dastardly councils.
What! were we to sit down in an ignominious tameness? to say, “Take
from us what you will, but in God’s name let us be at peace?” Were we
blinded by despair? Could we forget that we were Englishmen? Could we
forget that the nation had stood the Danish irruptions? had stood the
irruptions of other nations! had stood the inroads of the Scotch! had
stood the Norman conquests! had stood the threatened invasion by the
famous Spanish armada, and the various efforts of the Bourbon compacts!
Why, then, should we now give up all, without endeavouring to prevent
our losses, without a blow, without an attempt to resent the insults
offered us? If France and Spain were for war, why not try an issue with
them? If we fell afterwards, we should fall decently, and like men.
Having spoken with some enthusiasm upon these points, his Lordship
said he waged war against no set of men, neither did he wish for any
of their employments: he then reverted to the subject of American
independency; and after recalling the attention of their lordships to
the extent and revenue of the estate of the crown of England, when
the present King came into the possession of it, asked what right the
Houses of Parliament had to deprive the Prince of Wales, the Bishop of
Osnaburgh, and the other rising hopes of the beloved royal family, of
the inheritance of the thirteen American provinces? Sooner than consent
to take away from any of the heirs of the Princess Sophia what they had
a legal and natural right to expect to possess, he declared he would
see the Prince of Wales, the Bishop of Osnaburgh, and the rest of the
young princes, brought down to the committee, and hear them consent to
lose their inheritance. The Earl declared he was exceedingly ill; but
as long as he could crawl down to that House, and had strength to raise
himself on his crutches, or to lift his hand, he would vote against
the giving up the dependency of America on the sovereignty of Great
Britain; and if no other lord was of opinion with him, he would singly
protest against the measure.
With regard to our power to carry on the war, or commence a new one
with France, there were, he said, means, though he knew not what;
if, however, he was called upon to give his advice, he would give it
honestly; and though, from his exceeding ill state of health, he feared
he had not abilities to insure to the execution of his measures the
wished-for success, he would make some amends by his sincerity.
KING GEORGE’S MESSAGE AND THE SPANISH MANIFESTO (1779).
=Source.=--_Gentleman’s Magazine._ Vol. xlix., pp. 324 _et seq._
Ld. Weymouth, principal secretary of state for the southern
departments, presented the following message from his Majesty to the H.
of Lords. At the same time Ld. North laid the same message before the
H. of C.
COPY OF THE KING’S MESSAGE.
“_George R._
“The ambassador of the King of Spain having delivered a paper to Lord
Viscount Weymouth, and signified that he has received orders from his
court immediately to withdraw from this country; his Majesty has judged
it necessary to direct a copy of that paper to be laid before the House
of Commons as a matter of the highest importance to the crown and
people; and his Majesty acquaints them, at the same time, that he has
found himself obliged, in consequence of this hostile declaration, to
recal his ambassador from Madrid.
“His Majesty declares, in the most solemn manner, that his desire to
preserve and to cultivate peace and friendly intercourse with the court
of Spain has been uniform and sincere; and that his conduct towards
that power has been guided by no other motives or principles than those
of good faith, honour, and justice; and his Majesty sees with the
greatest surprize the pretences on which this declaration is grounded,
as some of the grievances enumerated in that paper have _never_ come to
the knowledge of his Majesty, either by representation on the part of
the Catholic King, or by intelligence from any other quarter; and in
all those cases where applications have been received, the matter of
complaint has been treated with the _utmost attention_, and put into a
course of _enquiry_ and _redress_.
“His Majesty has the firmest confidence that his faithful Commons
will, with that zeal and public spirit which he has so often
experienced, support his Majesty in his resolution to exert all the
power and the resources of the Nation, to resist and repel any hostile
attempts of the court of Spain; and that, by the blessing of God on the
rectitude of his intentions, and the equity of his cause, his Majesty
will be able to withstand and defeat the _unjust_ and _dangerous_
enterprizes of his enemies, against the honour of his crown, and the
Commerce, the Rights, and the common interests, of all his subjects.”
* * * * *
The manifesto above alluded to, which the Spanish ambassador presented
to Ld. Weymouth, was as follows:
COPY OF THE SPANISH MANIFESTO.
“All the world has been witness to the noble impartiality of the King
in the midst of the disputes of the court of London with its American
Colonies and with France. Besides which his Majesty, having learned
that his powerful mediation was desired, generously made an offer of
it, which was accepted by the Belligerent Powers, and for this motive
only a ship of war was sent on the part of his Britannic Majesty to one
of the ports of Spain. The King has taken the most energetic steps,
and such as ought to have produced the most happy effect, to bring
those powers to an accommodation equally honourable to both parties;
proposing for this end wise expedients for smoothing difficulties,
and preventing the calamities of war. But although his Majesty’s
propositions, and particularly those of his _ultimatum_, have been
conformable to those which at other times the court of London itself
had appeared to judge proper for an accommodation, and which were also
quite as moderate, they have been rejected in a manner that fully
proves the little desire which the British cabinet has to restore
peace to Europe, and to preserve the King’s Friendship. In effect, the
conduct of that cabinet, with regard to his Majesty, during the whole
course of the negociation, has had for its object, to prolong it for
more than eight months, either by vain pretences, or by answers which
could not be more inconclusive; whilst, in this interval, the insults
on the Spanish flag, and the violation of the King’s Territories, were
carried on to an incredible excess; prizes have been made, ships have
been searched and plundered, and a great number of them have been fired
upon, which have been obliged to defend themselves; the registers have
been opened and torn in pieces, and even the packets of the court found
on board the King’s packet boats.
“The dominions of the crown in America have been threatened, and they
have gone to the dreadful extremity of raising the Indian nations
called the Chatcas, Cheroquies, and Chicachas, against the innocent
inhabitants of Louisiana, who would have been the victims of the
rage of these barbarians, if the Chatcas themselves had not repented
and revealed all that the seduction of the English had planned. The
sovereignty of his Majesty in the province of Darien, and on the coast
of St. Blas, has been usurped; the governor of Jamaica having granted
to a rebel Indian the commission of Captain-General of those Provinces.
“In short the territory of the Bay of Honduras has been recently
violated by exercising acts of hostility, and other excesses against
the Spaniards, who have been imprisoned and whose houses have been
invaded; besides which, the court of London has hitherto neglected to
accomplish what the 16th article of the last Treaty of Paris stipulated
relative to that Coast.
“Grievances so numerous, so weighty, and recent, have been at different
times the object of complaints made in the King’s name, and stated
in memorials which were delivered either to the British ministers at
London, or transmitted to them through the channel of the English
ambassador at Madrid; but although the answers which were received have
been friendly, his Majesty has hitherto obtained no other satisfaction
than to see the insults repeated, which lately have amounted to the
number of one hundred.
“The King, proceeding with the sincerity and candour which
characterize him, has formally declared to the court of London, from
the commencement of its disputes with France, that the court of England
should be the rule of that which Spain would hold.
“His Majesty likewise declared to that court, that at the time their
differences with that of Paris might be accommodated, it would be
absolutely necessary to regulate those which had arisen, or might still
arise, with Spain; and with the plan of mediation which was sent to
the underwritten ambassador the 28th of last September, and which was
by him delivered to the British ministry in the beginning of October,
a plan of which Lord Grantham was apprized, and of which he received
a copy, his Majesty declared in positive terms to the Belligerent
Powers, that in consideration of the insults which his subjects and
dominions had suffered, and likewise of the attempts levelled against
his rights, he should be under the necessity of taking his part, in
case the negociation, instead of being continued with sincerity, should
be broken off, or should produce no effect.
“The causes of complaint given by the court of London not having
ceased, and that court shewing no disposition to give reparation for
them, the King has resolved, and orders his ambassador to declare,
that the honour of his crown, the protection which he owes to his
subjects, and his own personal dignity, do not permit him to suffer
their insults to continue, and to neglect any longer the reparation
of those already received; and that in this view, notwithstanding the
pacific disposition of his Majesty, and even the particular inclination
he has always had and expressed for cultivating the friendship of his
Britannick Majesty, he finds himself under the disagreeable necessity
of making use of all the means which the Almighty has intrusted him
with to obtain that justice which he has solicited by so many ways
without being able to acquire: in confiding on the justice of his
cause, his Majesty hopes that the consequences of this resolution
will not be imputed to him before God or man; and that other nations
will form a suitable idea of this resolution, by comparing it to the
conduct which they themselves have experienced on the part of the
British ministry.
“Signed LE MARQUIS D’ALMODOVAR.
“LONDON, _16 June, 1779_.”
These important papers being read, Lord Weymouth moved, That an
humble address be presented to his Majesty (and Lord North moved the
same in the House of Commons), to assure his Majesty of support,
&c. This event, though not unexpected, occasioned warm debates in
both houses. All were for agreeing to the address; but the Lords and
gentlemen in opposition were for adding a condition, “provided his
Majesty would discard from his councils the present ministry.” After
much altercation, and many severe charges of maladministration, the
condition was rejected, and the addresses, as originally moved, passed
by a great majority in both houses.
SOCIETY AT BRIGHTHELMSTON (BRIGHTON) IN 1779.
=Source.=--Diarists quoted in _History of Brighthelmston_. John
Ackerson Erredge. Brighton, 1862.
(A.) THE LIBRARIES.
There is a sort of rivalry between the two Librarians on the Steyne,
as to their subscription books; which shall most justly deserve the
title of the book of Numbers.--There is a constant struggle between
them, which shall be most courteous; and the effects are those usually
consequent upon an opposition. Sir Christopher Caustic, this morning
was turning over the leaves, at Bowen’s, which contain the names of
the subscribers. Mr. Bowen bowed _a la Novarre_ or _Gallini_, and
with offered pen and ink, craved the honour of--an additional name:
this being his first season, and having been purposely misinformed
by some would-be-witty wag; “Sir,” said Mr. Bowen, displaying, all
the time, two irregular rows of remarkably white teeth, “yours will
stand immediately after that of the Honourable Charles James Fox,
Esq., and before that of Mrs. Franco, the rich Jew’s lady. Esquire
W----d’s was to have been on the medium line, but, poor gentleman,
he is unfortunately _detained_ near London, on _emergent_ business.”
To what a degree was the dealer in stationery let down, when he was
afterwards regularly rectified; when by explanatory notes, and critical
commentations, he came to be fully informed that the individual Mr.
Fox in question was not the celebrated senator of that name, but an
Irish _Jontleman_, who condescends in winter to keep a chop house at
the corner of the play-house passage, in Bow Street, Covent Garden;
and every autumnal season, has frequent opportunities of storming and
swearing at the ladies who may have the good fortune to belong to the
Brighthelmstone company of Comedians, he being sole manager thereof.
And such management!--_Scarrons Rancour_, who filled all the characters
in a play by himself, was a fool to him....
Mr. Thomas, the other librarian, must be noticed in turn. He hath been
years enough practising small talk with the ladies and gentlemen upon
the Steyne, and hath arrived at a surprising degree of precision in
pronouncing French-English. He is now reading the newspaper to some of
his subscribers, with an audible voice, and repeatedly calls a detached
body of troops a _corpse_; a _tour_ he improves into a _tower_; and
delivers his words in a _promiscas_ manner. It is near seven in the
evening, and the widow Fussic has just waddled into his shop, with
a parasol in her right, and a spying-glass in her left hand. Thomas
offers her a _General Advertiser_. “Lord bless me!” says she, “Mr.
Thomas, how damp this paper is, tho’ it has come so far, and must have
been printed so long since! What reason can you give for it?”--Mr.
Thomas observes, considers and explains, in a most explicit manner,
the cause and the effect, to the inquisitive lady, naturally speaking,
as a body may say; proving to a demonstration, according to Candide,
that there can be no effect without a cause; and that of course, damp
papers, closely compressed, will continue damp a considerable time.
In the interim, Miss Fanny Fussic stares and whispers to her brother
Bobby, while he is subscribing to a raffle, that Mr. Thomas must be a
most prodigious man monstrously intelligent, and withal, that he is
amazingly communicative: “He knows but every-thing,” says she, “and
tells but every-thing he knows.”
(B.) THE RAFFLES.
Every article of convenience, every trinket of luxury, is transferred
by this uncertain, quick mode of conveyance. Not a shop without its
rattle-trap,--rattle, rattle, rattle, morning and evening. Here may
be seen,--walk in and see,--an abridgement of the wisdom of this
world;--the pomps and vanities are at large, varying like yonder
evanescent clouds. Observe the fond parent initiating her forward
offspring in the use of the dice-box, and herself setting the example;
yet may she wonder, at some future day, and think her throw in life’s
raffle extremely severe, that a propensity to that and similar habits
should continue and increase.
THE GORDON NO-POPERY RIOTS (1780).
=Source.=--_Letters of Horace Walpole._
_To Rev. William Cole, Strawberry Hill, June 15, 1780._
You may like to know one is alive, dear sir, after a massacre and the
conflagration of a capital. I was in it, both on the Friday, and on the
Black Wednesday; the most horrible sight I ever beheld, and which, for
six hours together, I expected to end in half the town being reduced to
ashes. I can give you little account of the original of this shocking
affair; negligence was certainly its nurse, and religion only its
godmother. The ostensible author is in the Tower. Twelve or fourteen
thousand men have quelled all tumults; and as no bad account is come
from the country, except for a moment at Bath, and as eight days have
passed--nay, more, since the commencement--I flatter myself the whole
nation is shocked at the scene; and that, if plan there was, it was
laid only in and for the metropolis. The lowest and most villainous
people, and to no great amount, were almost the sole actors.
I hope your electioneering riotry has not, nor will mix in these
tumults. It would be most absurd; for lord Rockingham, the duke of
Richmond, Sir George Saville, and Mr. Burke, the patrons of toleration,
were devoted to destruction as much as the ministers. The rails torn
from Sir George’s house were the chief weapons and instruments of the
mob. For the honour of the nation I should be glad to have it proved
that the French were the engineers. You and I have lived too long for
comfort--shall we close our eyes in peace? I will not trouble you more
about the arms I sent you: I should like that they were those of the
family of Boleyn; and since I cannot be sure they were not, why should
not I fancy them so? I revert to the prayer for peace. You and I, that
can amuse ourselves with our books and papers, feel as much indignation
at the turbulent as they have scorn for us. It is hard at least that
they who disturb nobody can have no asylum in which to pursue their
innoxious indolence! Who is secure against Jack Straw and a whirlwind?
How I abominate Mr. Banks and Dr. Solander, who routed the poor
Otaheitans out of the centre of the ocean, and carried our abominable
passions amongst them! not even that poor little speck could escape
European restlessness. Well, I have seen many tempestuous scenes, and
outlived them! the present prospect is too thick to see through--it is
well hope never forsakes us. Adieu!
Yours most sincerely.
SURRENDER OF CORNWALLIS (1781).
=Source.=--_Gentleman’s Magazine._ Vol. li., p. 539.
_Whitehall._--By Sir H. Clinton’s letter to Lord G. Germaine, dated off
Chesapeak, October 29, and brought by the _Rattlesnake_ sloop, capt.
Melcombe, it appears that “the fleet and army, which sailed from the
Hook on the 19th, arrived off Cape Charles on the 24th, when they had
the mortification to hear that lord Cornwallis had proposed terms of
capitulation to the enemy on the 18th. This intelligence was brought by
the pilot of the _Charon_, and some other persons who came off from
the shore, and said they had made their escape from York on the 18th,
and had not heard any firing there since the day before. The _Nymph_
frigate also arriving from New-York, says the General, brought me a
letter from his lordship, dated the 15th, the desponding tenor of which
gives me the most alarming apprehensions of its truth.
Since then we have been plying off the Capes, with variable and hard
gales of wind, to the present hour, without being able to procure any
further information, except from two men taken in a Canoe, whose report
exactly corresponds with the former.
Comparing, therefore, the intelligence given by those people, and
several others since come in, with the purport of lord Cornwallis’s
letter, a copy of which I have the honour to inclose for your
lordship’s information; we cannot entertain the least doubt of his
lordship’s having capitulated, and that we are unfortunately too late
to relieve him; which being the only object of the expedition, the
admiral has determined upon returning with his fleet to Sandy Hook.
I beg leave to mention to your lordship, that the army is under the
greatest obligations to the admirals, the captains, and the officers
of the king’s ships, for the cheerfulness with which they submitted to
many and great inconveniences for our accommodation on this service.”
The Dispatches from admiral Graves were to the same effect as the above
from Sir H. Clinton.
The terms of capitulation have not yet officially been received.
PRELIMINARIES OF EUROPEAN PEACE (1783).
=Source.=--_Gentleman’s Magazine._ Vol. liii., p. 91.
SUBSTANCE OF THE PRELIMINARY ARTICLES OF PEACE BETWEEN GREAT BRITAIN
AND FRANCE, SPAIN, AND THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA.
_Between Great Britain and France._
Peace to take place in all parts of the world as soon as the
preliminaries are ratified. Newfoundland to remain to England as
before the war; and, to prevent disputes about boundaries, the French
fishery shall commence from Cape St. John on the eastern side, and,
going round by the north, shall have for its boundary Cape Ray on the
western side.
The islands of St. Pierre and Miquelon to be ceded to the French, with
liberty to fish in the Gulph of St. Laurence.
The French to have St. Lucia and Tobago.
The English to have Granada and the Grenadines, St. Vincent’s,
Dominica, St. Kitt’s, Nevis, and Montserrat; the subjects of the French
King that choose to leave these islands, to be allowed 18 months to
settle their affairs and dispose of their effects.
In Africa, the river Senegal and its forts to be ceded to France, and
the island of Goree to be restored.
Fort St. James and Gambia to remain to England. The gum trade to remain
as before the war.
All the establishments formerly belonging to the French in India, to be
put on the same footing as before the war, and the freedom of trade on
the coasts of Orixa, Coromandel, and Malabar, to be free to the French
either as private traders, or as a company.
Pondicherry, Kerical to be restored to the French with the districts
of Valanour and Bahour, and the four contiguous Magans, Mahé, and the
Comptoir at Surat, to the French.
The allies of France and England in India, to be invited to accede to
the present pacification, and four months allowed them to make their
decision. In case of refusal no assistance to be given the allies on
either side.
Great Britain renounces every claim whatsoever relative to Dunkirk.
Commissioners to be appointed to agree upon new arrangements of trade
on the footing of reciprocity and mutual convenience.
All conquests on either side not included in those articles to be
restored.
The rest of the treaty between France and England respects the time
when the cessions are to be made, the prisoners released, the captures
to cease, and the treaty ratified, which is fixed for one month or
sooner, if it may be.
_Between Great Britain and Spain._
Minorca to be ceded to Spain, and East and West Florida.
The English to have liberty to cut and carry away logwood, in a
district that shall be allotted them.
Spain to restore to Great Britain the islands of Providence, and the
Bahamas without exception.
All other conquests of what kind soever to be mutually restored;
and all other treaties not herein mentioned to be in full force as
heretofore.
The other part of the treaty exactly the same with France.
_Between Great Britain and the United States of America._
His Britannic Majesty acknowledges the United States to be free,
sovereign, and independent States, treats with them as such, and
relinquishes all claim whatever to the lands and territories included
within certain boundaries, which boundaries shall be described and
delineated in a future Magazine.
The people of the United States shall continue to enjoy their fishery,
in as ample a manner, as heretofore, on the coasts wherever British
fishermen use; but not to dry their fish where settlements are actually
made, or may hereafter be made, without previous agreement.
That creditors on either side shall meet with no lawful impediments, to
recover their debts heretofore contracted.
That Congress shall earnestly recommend to their respective
legislatures, to provide for the restitution of all estates, rights
and properties belonging to real British subjects, or such as were
resident in districts in the possession of his Majesty’s arms, and who
have not borne arms against the United States. And that persons of any
other description shall have free liberty to remain in any part of any
of the Thirteen United States for the term of twelve months unmolested
in their endeavours for the recovery of their estates, &c. And that
Congress shall recommend to the several States a revision of all acts
regarding the premises, and to render the said laws consistent, not
only with justice and equity, but with that spirit of reconciliation
which, on the return of the blessings of peace, should universally
prevail; so that the estates of persons of the above description may
have their said estates restored, they refunding for the same the bona
fide purchase money to the present possessors; nor shall persons having
any interest in such confiscated lands, either by debts, marriage
settlements, or otherwise, meet with any lawful impediment in the
prosecution for the same.
That there shall be no farther confiscations made, nor prosecutions
commenced against any persons for or on account of the part they may
have taken in the present war.
That there shall be a perpetual peace between the contracting parties,
and all hostilities both by sea and land shall forthwith cease; that
the troops of his Britannic Majesty shall be immediately withdrawn, and
that all American artillery shall remain in the forts and places that
shall be evacuated.
The navigation of the Mississippi, from its source to the Ocean, to be
free to the subjects of both States.
A VIOLENT ELECTION CONTEST (1784).
=Source.=--_Cowper’s Letters._ Thomas Wright. London: Hodder and
Stoughton. 1904. Vol. ii., pp. 194-197.
_To Rev. John Newton, April 26, 1784._
... The candidates for this county have set an example of economy,
which other candidates would do well to follow having come to an
agreement on both sides to defray the expenses of their voters, but to
open no houses for the entertainment of the rabble; a reform, however,
which the rabble did not at all approve of, and testified their dislike
of it by a riot. A stage was built, from which the orators had designed
to harangue the electors. This became the first victim of their fury.
Having very little curiosity to hear what gentlemen could say who
would give them nothing better than words, they broke it in pieces,
and threw the fragments upon the hustings. The sheriff, the members,
the lawyers, the voters, were instantly put to flight. They rallied,
but were again routed by a second assault, like the former. They then
proceeded to break the windows of the inn to which they had fled; and
a fear prevailing that at night they would fire the town, a proposal
was made by the freeholders to face about and endeavour to secure them.
At that instant a rioter, dressed in a merry-andrew’s jacket, stepped
forward, and challenged the best man among them. Olney sent the hero
to the field, who made him repent of his presumption. Mr. Ashburner
was he. Seizing him by the throat, he shook him,--he threw him to the
earth, he made the hollowness of his skull resound by the application
of his fists, and dragged him into custody without the least damage to
his person. Animated by this example, the other freeholders followed
it: and in five minutes twenty-eight out of thirty ragamuffins were
safely lodged in gaol....
THE COUNTRY POST (1785).
=Source.=--William Cowper, _The Task._ Book iv.
Hark! ’tis the twanging horn! O’er yonder bridge,
That with its wearisome but needful length
Bestrides the wintry flood, in which the moon
Sees her unwrinkled face reflected bright,
He comes, the herald of a noisy world,
With spattered boots, strapped waist, and frozen locks,
News from all nations lumbering at his back.
True to his charge, the close-packed load behind,
Yet careless what he brings, his one concern
Is to conduct it to the destined inn,
And having dropped the expected bag--pass on.
He whistles as he goes, light-hearted wretch,
Cold and yet cheerful: messenger of grief
Perhaps to thousands, and of joy to some,
To him indifferent whether grief or joy.
Houses in ashes, and the fall of stocks,
Births, deaths, and marriages, epistles wet
With tears that trickled down the writer’s cheeks
Fast as the periods from his fluent quill,
Or charged with amorous sighs of absent swains,
Or nymphs responsive, equally affect
His horse and him, unconscious of them all.
But oh the important budget! ushered in
With such heart-shaking music, who can say
What are its tidings? have our troops awaked?
Or do they still, as if with opium drugged,
Snore to the murmurs of the Atlantic wave?
Is India free? and does she wear her plumed
And jewelled turban with a smile of peace,
Or do we grind her still? The grand debate,
The popular harangue, the tart reply,
The logic, and the wisdom, and the wit,
And the loud laugh--I long to know them all;
I burn to set the imprisoned wranglers free,
And give them voice and utterance once again.
HIS MAJESTY’S SPEECH (1787).
=Source.=--_Annual Register._ Vol. xxix., pp. 268 _et seq._ of _State
Papers_.
HIS MAJESTY’S MOST GRACIOUS SPEECH TO BOTH HOUSES OF PARLIAMENT, ON
THE OPENING OF THE FOURTH SESSION OF THE SIXTEENTH PARLIAMENT OF GREAT
BRITAIN, ON TUESDAY THE 23D OF JANUARY, 1787.
MY LORDS AND GENTLEMEN,
“I have particular satisfaction in acquainting you, that since I
last met you in parliament, the tranquillity of Europe has remained
uninterrupted, and that all foreign powers continue to express their
friendly disposition to this country.
“I have concluded a treaty of navigation and commerce with the Most
Christian king, a copy of which shall be laid before you. I must
recommend it to you to take such measures as you shall judge proper for
carrying it into effect; and I trust you will find that the provisions
contained in it are calculated for the encouragement of industry and
the extension of lawful commerce in both countries, and by promoting a
beneficial intercourse between our respective subjects, appear likely
to give additional permanence to the blessings of peace. I shall keep
the same salutary objects in view in the commercial arrangements which
I am negociating with other powers.
“I have also given directions for laying before you a copy of a
convention agreed upon between me and the Catholic king, for carrying
into effect the sixth article of the last treaty of peace.
GENTLEMEN OF THE HOUSE OF COMMONS,
“I have ordered the estimates for the present year to be laid before
you; and I have the fullest reliance on your readiness to make due
provision for the several branches of the public service.
“The state of the revenue will, I am persuaded, continue to engage your
constant attention, as being essentially connected with the national
credit, and the prosperity and safety of my dominions.
MY LORDS AND GENTLEMEN,
“A plan has been formed, by my direction, for transporting a number of
convicts, in order to remove the inconvenience which arose from the
crowded state of the gaols in different parts of the kingdom; and you
will, I doubt not, take such further measures as may be necessary for
this purpose.
“I trust you will be able this session to carry into effect regulations
for the ease of the merchants, and for simplifying the public accounts
in the various branches of the revenue; and rely upon the uniform
continuance of your exertions in pursuit of such objects as may tend
still further to improve the national resources, and to promote and
confirm the welfare and happiness of my people.”
CHARACTERISTICS OF THE EAST INDIA COMPANY (1788).
=Source.=--_Speech in the Impeachment of Warren Hastings, Esq._ Edmund
Burke. Vol. vii. of his Collected Works. London: G. Bell and Sons. 1911.
I must however remark, before I go further, that there is something
in the representation of the East-India Company, in their oriental
territory, different from that, perhaps, of any other nation that has
ever transported any part of its power from one country to another. The
East-India Company, in India, is not properly a branch of the British
nation, it is only a deputation of individuals. When the Tartars
entered into China, when the Arabs and Tartars successively entered
into Hindostan, when the Goths and Vandals penetrated into Europe, when
the Normans forced their way into England, indeed in all conquests,
migrations, settlements, and colonizations, the new people came as the
offset of a nation. The Company in India does not exist as a national
colony. In effect and substance, nobody can go thither that does not
go in its service. The English in India are nothing but a seminary
for the succession of officers. They are a nation of placemen;--they
are a commonwealth without a people; they are a state made up wholly
of magistrates. There is nothing to be in propriety called people, to
watch, to inspect, to balance against the power of office. The power of
office, so far as the English nation is concerned, is the sole power
in the country. The consequence of which is, that being a kingdom of
magistrates, what is commonly called the _esprit du corps_ is strong
in it. This spirit of the body predominates equally in all parts; by
which the members must consider themselves as having a common interest,
and that common interest separated both from that of the country which
sent them out, and from that of the country in which they act. No
control upon them exists; none, I mean, in persons who understand their
language, who understood their manners, or can apply their conduct to
the laws. Therefore, in a body so constituted confederacy is easy, and
has been general. Your lordships are not to expect that that should
happen in such a body which never happened in any body or corporation,
that is, that they should in any instance be a proper check and control
upon themselves. It is not in the nature of things. The fundamental
principle of the whole of the East-India Company’s system is monopoly
in some sense or other. The same principle predominates in the service
abroad and the service at home; and both systems are united into one,
animated with the same spirit, that is, with the corporate spirit. The
whole, taken together, is such as has not been seen in the examples of
the Moors, the Portuguese, the Spaniards, the Romans; in no old, in no
recent examples. The Dutch may resemble it, but they have not an empire
properly so denominated. By means of this peculiar circumstance it has
not been difficult for Mr. Hastings to embody abuse, and to put himself
at the head of a regular system of corruption.
Another circumstance in that service is deserving of notice. Except
in the highest parts of all, the emoluments of office do not in
any degree correspond with the trust, nor the nature of the office
with its name. In other official systems the style, in general, is
above the function; here is it the reverse. Under the name of junior
merchant, senior merchant, writer, and other petty appellations of
the counting-house, you have magistrates of high dignity, you have
administrators of revenues truly royal;--you have judges civil, and in
some respects criminal, who pass judgment upon the greatest properties
of a great country. The legal public emoluments that belong to them are
very often so inadequate to the real dignity of the character, that
it is impossible, almost absolutely impossible, for the subordinate
parts of it, which though subordinate are stations of power, to exist
as Englishmen who look at a fortune to be enjoyed at home as their
ultimate object, and to exist in a state of perfect incorruption in
that service.
In some parts of Europe it is true that the greatest situations are
often attended with but little emolument; yet still they are filled.
Why? Because reputation, glory, fame, the esteem, the love, the tears
of joy which flow from happy sensibility, the honest applauses of a
grateful country, sometimes pay the cares, anxieties, and toils which
wait on great situations in the commonwealth: and in these, they pay in
money what cannot be paid in fame and reputation. It is the reverse in
the service of the India Company. Glory is not the lot of subordinated
merit; and all the subordinate parts of the gradation are officers
who, in comparison with the offices and duties intrusted with them,
are miserably provided for; whereas the chief of each great presidency
has emoluments securing him against every mode of temptation. But if
this has not secured the head, we may easily judge how the members
are to be coerced. Mr. Hastings at the head of the service, with high
legal emoluments, has fouled his hands and sullied his government with
bribes. He has substituted oppression and tyranny in the place of
legal government. With all that unbounded, licentious power which he
has assumed over the public revenues, instead of endeavouring to find
a series of gradual, progressive, honourable, and adequate rewards
for the persons who serve the public in the subordinate but powerful
situations, he has left them to prey upon the people without the
smallest degree of control. In default of honest emolument, there is
the unbounded license of power; and (as one of the honestest and ablest
servants of the Company said to me in conversation) the civil service
of the Company resembled the military service of the Mahrattas--little
pay, but unbounded license to plunder. I do not say that some of
the salaries given in India would not sound well here; but when you
consider the nature of the trusts, the dignity of the situation,
whatever the name of them may be, the powers that are granted, the
hopes that every man has of establishing himself at home,--I repeat, it
is a source of infinite grievance--of infinite abuse: of which source
of corrupt power we charge Mr. Hastings with having availed himself in
filling up the void of direct pay, by finding out and countenancing
every kind of oblique and unjust emolument; though it must be confessed
that he is far from being solely guilty of this offence.
Another circumstance which distinguishes the East-India Company is the
youth of the persons who are employed in the system of that service.
The servants have almost universally been sent out to begin their
progress and career in active occupation, and in the exercise of
high authority, at that period of life which in all other places has
been employed in the course of a rigid education. To put the matter
in a few words, they are transferred from slippery youth to perilous
independence, from perilous independence to inordinate expectations,
from inordinate expectations to boundless power. School-boys without
tutors, minors without guardians, the world is let loose upon them,
with all its temptations; and they are let loose upon the world, with
all the powers that despotism involves.
CORN IMPORTS AND EXPORTS (1789).
=Source.=--_Annual Register, 1789_, pp. 279 _et seq._
AN ACCOUNT OF THE QUANTITIES OF ALL CORN AND GRAIN EXPORTED FROM, AND
IMPORTED INTO, ENGLAND AND SCOTLAND, WITH THE BOUNTIES AND DRAWBACKS
PAID, AND THE DUTIES RECEIVED, THEREON, FOR ONE YEAR, ENDED THE 5TH OF
JANUARY, 1790.
EXPORTED.
+-------------------+-------------+-------------+--------------------------+
| | British | Foreign | Bounties and Drawbacks |
| | (Quarters). | (Quarters). | paid. |
|-------------------+-------------+-------------+--------------------------+
| England, 1789: | | | £ s. d. |
| Wheat | 66,820 | 6,983 | } |
| Wheat Flour | 185,770 | 3,310 | } |
| Rye | 37,089 | 2,718 | } |
| Barley | 190,197 | 360 | } 76,551 16 1¼ Bo. |
| Malt | 125,019 | -- | } |
| Oats | 23,997 | 1,434 | } Nil. Dr. |
| Oatmeal | 537 | 194 | } |
| Beans | 14,374 | 4,126 | } |
| Pease | 8,931 | 238 | } |
| Scotland, 1789: | | | |
| Wheat | 3,289 | -- | } |
| Wheat Flour | 2,346 | -- | } |
| Rye | 139 | -- | } |
| Barley | 19,127 | -- | } |
| Barley, hulled | 100 | -- | } |
| Bear or Big | 10,972 | -- | } |
| Bearmeal | 61 | -- | } 5,999 5 0 Bo. |
| Malt | 9,799 | -- | } |
| Oats | 1,402 | -- | } |
| Oatmeal | 5,118 | -- | } |
| Pease and beans | 222 | -- | } |
| Groats | 12 | -- | } |
+-------------------+-------------+-------------+--------------------------+
IMPORTED.
+-------------------+-----------+------------------+
| | | |
| | Quarters. | Duties received. |
| | | |
+-------------------+-----------+------------------+
| England, 1789: | | £ s. d. |
| Wheat | 72,379 |} |
| Wheat Flour | 16,172 |} |
| Rye | 14,844 |} |
| Barley | 8,749 |} |
| Oats | 359,754 |} 4,814 3 7¾ |
| Oatmeal | 6,213 |} |
| Beans | 162 |} |
| Pease | 99 |} |
| Indian corn | 54 |} |
| Scotland, 1789: | | |
| Wheat | 19,722 |} |
| Wheat Flour | 2,228 |} |
| Barley | 2,378 |} 1,334 1 9 |
| Oats | 63,754 |} |
| Pease and beans | 130 |} |
+-------------------+-----------+------------------+
The following is an account of the average prices of corn in England
and Wales, by the standard Winchester bushel, for the year 1789:
Wheat. Rye. Barley. Oats. Beans.
s. d. s. d. s. d. s. d. s. d.
6 4¾ 3 8¾ 2 10¼ 2 0 3 4¾
N.B.--The prices of the finest and coarsest sorts of grain generally
exceed and reduce the average price as follows, viz.:
Wheat. Rye. Barley. Oats. Beans.
Per bushel 6d. 3d. 3d. 3d. 6d.
THE SPOLIATION OF THE CLERGY IN FRANCE (1790).
=Source.=--_Reflections on the Revolution in France._ Edmund Burke.
Vol. ii. of his Collected Works. LONDON: G. Bell and Sons. 1910.
Perhaps persons unacquainted with the state of France, on hearing the
clergy and the noblesse were privileged in point of taxation, may
be led to imagine, that, previous to the Revolution, these bodies
had contributed nothing to the state. This is a great mistake. They
certainly did not contribute equally with each other, nor either of
them equally with the commons. They both, however, contributed largely.
Neither nobility nor clergy enjoyed any exemption from the excise on
consumable commodities, from duties of custom, or from any of the other
numerous _indirect_ impositions, which in France, as well as here, make
so very large a proportion of all payments to the public. The noblesse
paid the capitation. They paid also a land-tax, called the twentieth
penny, to the height sometimes of three, sometimes of four, shillings
in the pound; both of them _direct_ impositions of no light nature, and
no trivial produce. The clergy of the provinces annexed by conquest to
France, (which in extent make about an eighth part of the whole, but
in wealth a much larger proportion,) paid likewise to the capitation
and the twentieth penny, at the rate paid by the nobility. The clergy
in the old provinces did not pay the capitation; but they had redeemed
themselves at the expense of about 24 millions, or a little more than a
million sterling. They were exempted from the twentieths: but then they
made free gifts; they contracted debts for the state; and they were
subject to some other charges, the whole computed at about a thirteenth
part of their clear income. They ought to have paid annually about
forty thousand pounds more, to put them on a par with the contribution
of the nobility.
When the terrors of this tremendous proscription hung over the clergy,
they made an offer of a contribution, through the archbishop of Aix,
which, for its extravagance, ought not to have been accepted. But it
was evidently and obviously more advantageous to the public creditor,
than anything which could rationally be promised by the confiscation.
Why was it not accepted? The reason is plain--There was no desire
that the church should be brought to serve the state. The service of
the state was made a pretext to destroy the church. In their way to
the destruction of the church they would not scruple to destroy their
country: and they have destroyed it. One great end in the project would
have been defeated, if the plan of extortion had been adopted in lieu
of the scheme of confiscation. The new landed interest connected with
the new republic, and connected with it for its very being, could not
have been created. This was among the reasons why that extravagant
ransom was not accepted.
The madness of the project of confiscation, on the plan that was first
pretended, soon became apparent. To bring this unwieldy mass of landed
property, enlarged by the confiscation of all the vast landed domain
of the crown, at once into market, was obviously to defeat the profits
proposed by the confiscation, by depreciating the value of those
lands, and indeed of all the landed estates throughout France. Such
a sudden diversion of all its circulating money from trade to land,
must be an additional mischief. What step was taken? Did the Assembly,
on becoming sensible of the inevitable ill effects of their projected
sale, revert to the offers of the clergy? No distress could oblige them
to travel in a course which was disgraced by any appearance of justice.
Giving over all hopes from a general immediate sale, another project
seems to have succeeded. They proposed to take stock in exchange
for the church lands. In that project great difficulties arose in
equalizing the objects to be exchanged. Other obstacles also presented
themselves, which threw them back again upon some project of sale. The
municipalities had taken an alarm. They would not hear of transferring
the whole plunder of the kingdom to the stock-holders in Paris. Many
of those municipalities had been (upon system) reduced to the most
deplorable indigence. Money was nowhere to be seen. They were therefore
led to the point that was so ardently desired. They panted for a
currency of any kind which might revive their perishing industry. The
municipalities were then to be admitted to a share in the spoil, which
evidently rendered the first scheme (if ever it had been seriously
entertained) altogether impracticable. Public exigencies pressed upon
all sides. The minister of finance reiterated his call for supply with
a most urgent, anxious, and boding voice. Thus pressed on all sides,
instead of the first plan of converting their bankers into bishops and
abbots, instead of paying the old debt, they contracted a new debt,
at 3 per cent., creating a new paper currency, founded on an eventual
sale of the church lands. They issued this paper currency to satisfy in
the first instance chiefly the demands made upon them by the _bank of
discount_, the great machine, or paper-mill, of their fictitious wealth.
The spoil of the church was now become the only resource of all their
operations in finance, the vital principle of all their politics, the
sole security for the existence of their power. It was necessary by
all, even the most violent means, to put every individual on the same
bottom, and to bind the nation in one guilty interest to uphold this
act, and the authority of those by whom it was done. In order to force
the most reluctant into a participation of their pillage, they rendered
their paper circulation compulsory in all payments. Those who consider
the general tendency of their schemes to this one object as a centre,
and a centre from which afterwards all their measures radiate, will not
think that I dwell too long upon this part of the proceedings of the
National Assembly.
To cut off all appearance of connexion between the crown and public
justice, and to bring the whole under implicit obedience to the
dictators in Paris, the old independent judicature of the parliaments,
with all its merits, and all its faults, was wholly abolished. Whilst
the parliaments existed, it was evident that the people might some
time or other come to resort to them, and rally under the standard
of their ancient laws. It became, however, a matter of consideration
that the magistrates and officers, in the courts now abolished, _had
purchased their places_ at a very high rate, for which, as well as
for the duty they performed, they received but a very low return of
interest. Simple confiscation is a boon only for the clergy;--to the
lawyers some appearances of equity are to be observed; and they are to
receive compensation to an immense amount. Their compensation becomes
part of the national debt, for the liquidation of which there is the
one exhaustless fund. The lawyers are to obtain their compensation
in the new church paper, which is to march with the new principles
of judicature and legislature. The dismissed magistrates are to take
their share of martyrdom with the ecclesiastics, or to receive their
own property from such a fund, and in such a manner, as all those, who
have been seasoned with the ancient principles of jurisprudence, and
had been the sworn guardians of property, must look upon with horror.
Even the clergy are to receive their miserable allowance out of the
depreciated paper, which is stamped with the indelible character of
sacrilege, and with the symbols of their own ruin, or they must starve.
So violent an outrage upon credit, property, and liberty, as this
compulsory paper currency, has seldom been exhibited by the alliance of
bankruptcy and tyranny, at any time, or in any nation.
In the course of all these operations, at length comes out the grand
_arcanum_;--that in reality, and in a fair sense, the lands of
the church (so far as anything certain can be gathered from their
proceedings) are not to be sold at all. By the late resolutions of
the National Assembly, they are indeed to be delivered to the highest
bidder. But it is to be observed, that _a certain portion only of
the purchase money is to be laid down_. A period of twelve years is
to be given for the payment of the rest. The philosophic purchasers
are therefore, on payment of a sort of fine, to be put instantly into
possession of the estate. It becomes in some respects a sort of gift to
them; to be held on the feudal tenure of zeal to the new establishment.
This project is evidently to let in a body of purchasers without money.
The consequence will be, that these purchasers, or rather grantees,
will pay, not only from the rents as they accrue, which might as
well be received by the state, but from the spoil of the materials
of buildings, from waste in woods, and from whatever money, by hands
habituated to the gripings of usury, they can wring from the miserable
peasant. He is to be delivered over to the mercenary and arbitrary
discretion of men, who will be stimulated to every species of extortion
by the growing demands on the growing profits of an estate held under
the precarious settlement of a new political system.
SUSSEX ELECTION PETITIONS (1792).
=Source.=--_Oldfield’s Representative History of Great Britain._
London, 1816.
(A) HORSHAM ELECTION PETITION.
Lord William Gordon and James Baillie, esq., and certain electors
in their interest, petitioned in 1790 against the return of Timothy
Shelley and Wilson Bradyl, esqrs. The petition was renewed the second
session. A committee to try this case met Feb. 16, 1792. The petitions
were the same in substance, stating, that the election for Horsham
was held June 19, 1790; that Drew Mitchell and John Rawlinson, the
baliffs, acted with gross injustice and partiality in favour of the
sitting members: that on a poll being demanded, they appointed the Duke
of Norfolk’s steward, Thomas Charles Medwin, and James Robertson, the
steward’s clerk, to be the poll-clerks, who rejected legal votes in
favour of the petitioners, and received illegal votes for the sitting
members, by which means they procured a colourable majority.
The final numbers on the poll were--
T. Shelley, esq. 25
W. Bradyl, esq. 24
Lord W. Gordon 20
J. Baillie, esq. 9
On the 8th of March, 1792, the chairman of the committee reported to
the House, that the petitioners were duly elected, and ought to have
been returned, and that the sitting members were not duly elected, and
ought not to have been returned.
That neither the petitions nor the opposition to them appeared to
be frivolous or vexatious. The committee also came to a resolution,
which was not reported to the House, that Drew Mitchell and John
Rawlinson, the baliffs and returning officers were reprehensible for
their conduct. The numbers, according to the votes allowed legal by the
committee, were--
Lord W. Gordon 15
J. Baillie, esq. 14
T. Shelley, esq. 10
W. Bradyl, esq. 9
(B) STEYNING.
_Political Character._
This borough, together with that of Bramber, consists of one street,
not more than two-thirds as large as Fetter-lane in London; but
constituting _two boroughs_, with a right of sending _four members to
Parliament_!!! They formerly elected in conjunction, and intermitted
till 31 Henry VI. One part of Bramber is in the centre of the borough
of Steyning, and a part of Steyning intersects Bramber in like manner.
Inveloped in the dark cloud of legal quibble and intricacy, they
present us, like all the rotten boroughs, with a finished picture of
political deformity; irregular in their districts, unintelligible
in their constitutions, indefinite in their rights, corrupt in the
exercise of their functions, contradictory in their respective
organizations, and adverse to the ancient established principles of the
constitution, and the rights of men.
The right of election has been the subject of litigation in this place
for near a century, and has but lately received a final decision from a
committee constituted under the authority of 28 Geo. III., to determine
the same, upon an appeal from a contrary determination the preceding
year.
In 1701, the right was determined to be in the inhabitants paying scot
and lot, and not receiving alms.
In 1710, to be in the constables and house-holders (inhabitants) paying
scot and lot.
On 16th June, 1715, to be in all such persons as have an estate of
inheritance or for life, in burgage-houses or burgage-lands, lying
within the said borough.
In 1791, to be in the inhabitants of ancient houses, and houses built
on the sites of ancient houses, within the borough of Steyning, being
householders, paying scot and lot, and not receiving alms.
In 1792, the select committee appointed to try and determine the merits
of the petition of James Martin Lloyd, esq., and others.
Resolved: “That no persons have a right to vote at an election for
members to serve in Parliament for the borough of Steyning in respect
of any houses within the borough of Bramber, the tithing of Bidlington,
or the manors of Charlton or King’s Barnes.”
The said select committee at the same time also determined,
“That the right of election of members to serve in Parliament for the
borough of Steyning, in the county of Sussex, is in the constable and
householders, inhabitants within the said borough, paying scot and lot,
and not receiving alms.”
The houses built on ancient foundations were all the property of the
late Sir John Honeywood; the rest belonged to the Duke of Norfolk: and
as those of a general description are more numerous, the resolution of
1792, repealing that of 1791, changed the patron, and transferred that
influence to the Duke of Norfolk, which the former gave to Sir John
Honeywood.
The resolution of 1791 ousted Henry Howard, esq., the present member
for Gloster, who had a majority of the householders paying scot and
lot, and declared John Curtis, esq., who had only the votes of those
persons who inhabited houses built on ancient foundations, duly elected.
The resolution of 1792 established the election of James Martin
Lloyd, esq., who polled the identical votes which were deemed illegal
the preceding year; and the petitioner _lost_ his seat by the same
pretensions that Mr. Curtis had obtained one.
These contradictory resolutions have been productive of the same
parliamentary inconsistency which distinguished the borough of
Saltash, in the Parliament of 1785. Mr. Ambler obtained his seat for
that place by the decision of a committee in that year, against the
petition of Lord Strathaven, and the same Mr. Curtis, who now succeeded
at Steyning, on the right of the corporation to elect the members for
Saltash. In 1787, Mr. Lemon, the petitioner, by the determination of
a second committee, appointed to try the same question, succeeded on
the votes of the burgage-holders, and ousted the Earl of Mornington,
sitting member, who had been elected by the corporation.
“Thus two members were sitting in the House of Commons at the
same time, and for the same borough, upon the right of different
descriptions of electors who had each of them been deemed ineligible in
the same Parliament.”
This was exactly the case with the representatives of this borough. The
inhabitants of houses built on ancient foundations, and the inhabitants
in general, have each been declared to possess the right of election;
and a member, chosen by each description of voters, has been seated and
ousted in the same Parliament.
Since the above decision on the right of election, the Duke of Norfolk
has effectually prevented all further contest, by purchasing the whole
of Sir John Honeywood’s property in Steyning, as he did that of the
Marquis of Hertford, at Horsham, and thereby became sole proprietor of
both boroughs.
THE RIGHT OF THE FRENCH NATION TO SELF-GOVERNMENT (1792).
=Source.=--_Cowper’s Letters._ Thomas Wright. London: Hodder and
Stoughton. 1904. Vol. iv., pp. 332-335.
_To Lady Hesketh, Dec. 1, 1792._
The French are a vain and childish people, and conduct themselves on
this grand occasion with a levity and extravagance nearly akin to
madness; but it would have been better for Austria and Prussia to
let them alone. All nations have a right to choose their own mode
of government, and the sovereignty of the people is a doctrine
that evinces itself; for whenever the people choose to be masters
they always are so, and none can hinder them. God grant that we may
have no revolution here, but unless we have a reform, we certainly
shall. Depend upon it, my dear, the hour is come when power founded
in patronage and corrupt majorities must govern this land no longer.
Concessions too must be made to dissenters of every denomination. They
have a right to them, a right to all the privileges of Englishmen, and
sooner or later, by fair means or by force, they will have them.
PERORATION IN THE IMPEACHMENT OF WARREN HASTINGS (1794).
=Source.=--_Speech in the Impeachment of Warren Hastings, Esq._ Edmund
Burke. Vol. viii. of his Collected Works. London: G. Bell and Sons.
1908.
My lords, I have done; the part of the Commons is concluded. With a
trembling solicitude we consign this product of our long, long labours
to your charge. Take it!--take it! It is a sacred trust. Never before
was a cause of such magnitude submitted to any human tribunal.
My lords, at this awful close, in the name of the Commons, and
surrounded by them, I attest the retiring, I attest the advancing
generations, between which, as a link in the great chain of eternal
order, we stand.--We call this nation, we call the world to witness,
that the Commons have shrunk from no labour; that we have been guilty
of no prevarication; that we have made no compromise with crime; that
we have not feared any odium whatsoever, in the long warfare which we
have carried on with the crimes--with the vices--with the exorbitant
wealth--with the enormous and overpowering influence of Eastern
corruption. This war, my lords, we have waged for twenty-two years,
and the conflict has been fought at your lordships’ bar for the last
seven years. My lords, twenty-two years is a great space in the scale
of the life of man; it is no inconsiderable space in the history of a
great nation. A business which has so long occupied the councils and
the tribunals of Great Britain, cannot possibly be huddled over in
the course of vulgar, trite, and transitory events. Nothing but some
of those great revolutions that break the traditionary chain of human
memory, and alter the very face of nature itself, can possibly obscure
it. My lords, we are all elevated to a degree of importance by it; the
meanest of us will, by means of it, more or less become the concern of
posterity, if we are yet to hope for such a thing in the present state
of the world as a recording, retrospective, civilized posterity; but
this is in the hands of the great Disposer of events; it is not ours
to settle how it shall be. My lords, your House yet stands; it stands
as a great edifice; but let me say, that it stands in the midst of
ruins; in the midst of the ruins that have been made by the greatest
moral earthquake that ever convulsed and shattered this globe of ours.
My lords, it has pleased Providence to place us in such a state, that
we appear every moment to be upon the verge of some great mutations.
There is one thing, and one thing only, which defies all mutation;
that which existed before the world, and will survive the fabric of
the world itself; I mean justice; that justice, which, emanating from
the Divinity, has a place in the breast of every one of us, given us
for our guide with regard to ourselves, and with regard to others, and
which will stand after this globe is burned to ashes, our advocate or
our accuser before the great Judge, when He comes to call upon us for
the tenor of a well-spent life.
My lords, the Commons will share in every fate with your lordships;
there is nothing sinister which can happen to you, in which we shall
not be involved; and if it should so happen that we shall be subjected
to some of those frightful changes which we have seen--if it should
happen that your lordships, stripped of all the decorous distinctions
of human society, should, by hands at once base and cruel, be led to
those scaffolds and machines of murder, upon which great kings and
glorious queens have shed their blood, amidst the prelates, amidst the
nobles, amidst the magistrates who supported their thrones, may you in
those moments feel that consolation which I am persuaded they felt in
the critical moments of their dreadful agony!
My lords, there is a consolation, and a great consolation it is, which
often happens to oppressed virtue and fallen dignity; it often happens
that the very oppressors and persecutors themselves are forced to bear
testimony in its favour. I do not like to go for instances a great way
back into antiquity. I know very well that length of time operates
so as to give an air of the fabulous to remote events, which lessens
the interest and weakens the application of examples. I wish to come
nearer to the present time. Your lordships know and have heard, for
which of us has not known and heard, of the parliament of Paris? The
parliament of Paris had an origin very, very similar to that of the
great court before which I stand; the parliament of Paris continued to
have a great resemblance to it in its constitution, even to its fall;
the parliament of Paris, my lords, WAS; it is gone! It has passed away;
it has vanished like a dream! It fell, pierced by the sword of the
Compte de Mirabeau. And yet I will say, that that man, at the time of
his inflicting the death wound of that parliament, produced at once
the shortest and the grandest funeral oration that ever was or could
be made upon the departure of a great court of magistracy. Though
he had himself smarted under its lash, as every one knows who knows
his history (and he was elevated to dreadful notoriety in history),
yet when he pronounced the death sentence upon that parliament, and
inflicted the mortal wound, he declared that his motives for doing it
were merely political, and that their hands were as pure as those of
justice itself, which they administered--a great and glorious exit, my
lords, of a great and glorious body! And never was a eulogy pronounced
upon a body more deserved. They were persons in nobility of rank, in
amplitude of fortune, in weight of authority, in depth of learning,
inferior to few of those that hear me. My lords, it was but the other
day that they submitted their necks to the axe; but their honour was
unwounded. Their enemies, the persons who sentenced them to death,
were lawyers, full of subtlety; they were enemies, full of malice; yet
lawyers full of subtlety, and enemies full of malice, as they were,
they did not dare to reproach them with having supported the wealthy,
the great, and powerful, and of having oppressed the weak and feeble,
in any of their judgments, or of having perverted justice in any one
instance whatever, through favour, through interest, or cabal.
My lords, if you must fall, may you so fall! But if you stand, and
stand I trust you will, together with the fortune of this ancient
monarchy--together with the ancient laws and liberties of this great
and illustrious kingdom, may you stand as unimpeached in honour as in
power; may you stand not as a substitute for virtue, but as an ornament
of virtue, as a security for virtue; may you stand long, and long stand
the terror of tyrants; may you stand the refuge of afflicted nations;
may you stand a sacred temple, for the perpetual residence of an
inviolable justice.
GEORGE III. ASSAULTED BY THE MOB (1795).
=Source.=--_Letters of Princess Elizabeth of England._ Edited by Philip
Yorke. London: Fisher Unwin. 1898.
_To Lady Harcourt, Wednesday, 5th July, 1795._
I am sure you will be anxious to know how we all are, my dear Ly. H.,
after yesterday’s horrors. It is impossible to paint to you in any
degree what we have gone through since we arrived in Town; but I trust
in that all-merciful Providence, who has saved our dear King in so
wonderful a manner, that the great Crisis is now over.
In going to the House, a bullet was shot through the Kg. coach; which
undoubtedly was intended to penetrate elsewhere. This is a most
Shocking thought; however, thank God, it went harmlessly through the
glass opposite, and shot out a round piece the size of a small bullet.
Some of the Servants saw it fall. That not answering their wicked ends,
they threw stones several times at him; but he came home well, and
perfectly composed. The mob followed the Coach in an insolent manner,
moaning and screaming “peace, no War,” “give us Bread,” “Down with
Pitt,” “off with your Guards” (which he was attended with to the house,
I mean home).
Everybody is well to-day, though much agitated with the thoughts of the
Play; but I trust great care will be taken. More you shall hear from me
when my mind is easier. God bless you; and believe me,
Yrs. affly.,
E.
THE MUTINY AT THE NORE (1797).
=Source.=--_Annual Register._ Vol. xxxix., pp. 214 _et seq._ of
_History of Europe._
The suppression of the disturbances among the seamen at Portsmouth,
without recurring to violent measures, and by granting their petitions,
occasioned universal satisfaction, and it was hoped that the causes of
their discontent being thus effectually removed, no further complaints
would arise to spread alarm throughout the nation. But these reasonable
expectations were in a short time wholly disappointed by a fresh mutiny
that broke out in the fleet at the Nore, on the twenty-second of May.
The crews on that day took possession of their respective ships,
elected delegates to preside over them, and to draw up a statement of
their demands, and transmit them to the lords of the admiralty. These
demands went much farther than those of the seamen at Portsmouth and
Plymouth, and from their exorbitancy did not appear entitled to the
same indulgence. On the sixth of June, in the morning, the fleet at the
Nore was joined by the _Agamemnon_, _Leopard_, _Ardent_, and _Isis_
men of war, together with the _Ranger_ sloop, which ships had deserted
from the fleet under admiral Duncan. When the admiral found himself
deserted by part of his fleet, he called his own ship’s crew together,
and addressed them in the following speech:
“MY LADS,
“I once more call you together with a sorrowful heart, from what I have
lately seen, the disaffection of the fleets: I call it disaffection,
for the crews have no grievances. To be deserted by my fleet, in
the face of an enemy, is a disgrace which, I believe, never before
happened to a British admiral; nor could I have supposed it possible.
My greatest comfort under God is that I have been supported by the
officers, seamen, and mariners of this ship: for which, with a heart
overflowing with gratitude, I request you to accept my sincere thanks.
I flatter myself much good may result from your example, by bringing
those deluded people to a sense of their duty, which they owe, not only
to their king and country, but to themselves.
“The British navy has ever been the support of that liberty which
has been handed down to us by our ancestors, and which I trust we
shall maintain to the latest posterity; and that can only be done by
unanimity and obedience. The ship’s company, and others, who have
distinguished themselves by their loyalty and good order, deserve to
be, and doubtless will be, the favourites of a grateful country. They
will also have, from their inward feelings, a comfort which will be
lasting, and not like the floating and false confidence of those who
have swerved from their duty.
“It has often been my pride, with you to look into the Texel, and see
a foe which dreaded coming out to meet us: my pride is now humbled
indeed! my feelings are not easily to be expressed! our cup has
overflowed and made us wanton. The all-wise Providence has given us
this check, as a warning, and I hope we shall improve by it. On Him
then let us trust, where our only security can be found. I find there
are many good men among us; for my own part, I have had full confidence
of all in this ship; and once more beg to express my approbation of
your conduct.
“May God, who has thus far conducted you, continue to do so; and may
the British navy, the glory and support of our country, be restored to
its wonted splendour, and be not only the bulwark of Britain, but the
terror of the world.
“But this can only be effected by a strict adherence to our duty and
obedience; and let us pray that the almighty God may keep us in the
right way of thinking.
“God bless you all.”
* * * * *
At an address so unassuming, modest, and pious, and so well calculated,
from its simplicity and truth, to touch the human heart, the whole
ship’s crew were dissolved in tears. They declared, by every expression
they could devise, their resolution to abide by the admiral in life
or death. Their example was followed by all the other ships, besides
those already mentioned. And the admiral, notwithstanding the defection
of so considerable a part of his squadron, repaired to his station,
off the coast of Holland, to watch the motions of the Dutch fleet; and
resolved, still, not to decline, should it offer him battle.
The principal person at the head of this mutiny was one Richard Parker,
a man of good natural parts, and some education, and of a remarkably
bold and resolute character. Admiral Buckner, the commanding officer
at the Nore, was directed by the lords of the admiralty to inform
the seamen, that their demands were totally inconsistent with the
good order and regulations necessary to be observed in the navy, and
could not for that reason be complied with; but that on returning to
their duty, they would receive the king’s pardon for their breach of
obedience. To this offer Parker replied by a declaration, that the
seamen had unanimously determined to keep possession of the fleet,
until the lords of the admiralty had repaired to the Nore, and
redressed the grievances which had been laid before them.
In order to put an end with all possible expedition to a mutiny
that appeared so dangerous, lord Spencer, lord Arden, and admiral
Young, hastened immediately to Sheerness, and held a board, at which
Parker and the other delegates attended; but their behaviour was so
audacious, that the lords of the admiralty returned to town without
the least success. The principal article of complaint, on the part of
the mutineers, was the unequal distribution of prize-money, for the
omission of which they much blamed their fellow seamen at Portsmouth.
On the return of the lords of the admiralty from Sheerness, a
proclamation was issued, offering his majesty’s pardon to all such of
the mutineers as should immediately return to their duty: intimating,
at the same time, that admiral Buckner was the proper person to be
applied to on such an occasion. All the buoys, by order of government,
were removed from the mouth of the Thames, and the neighbouring coast;
from which precaution, any ships, that should attempt to get away,
would be in danger of running a-ground. Great preparations, also, were
made, at Sheerness, against an attack from the mutinous ships, which
had manifested some strong indications of an intention to bombard that
place; and furnaces and hot balls were kept ready.
Emboldened by the strength of men and shipping in their hands,
and resolved to persevere in their demands till they had extorted
a compliance, the mutineers proceeded to secure a sufficiency of
provisions for that purpose, by seizing two vessels laden with stores,
and sent notice ashore that they intended to block up the Thames; and
cut off all communication between London and the sea, in order to
force government to a speedy accession to their terms. They began the
execution of this menace by mooring four of their vessels across the
mouth of the river, and stopping several ships that were coming from
the metropolis.
They now altered the system of their delegation, and to prevent too
much power from being lodged in the hands of any man, the office of
president was entrusted to no one longer than a day. This they did
to secure themselves from the attempts to betray them, which might
result from the offers held out to those in whom they were obliged to
place confidence and authority, were those to possess such a trust for
any time. They also compelled those ships, the crews of which they
suspected of wavering in the cause, to take their station in the midst
of the others. But, notwithstanding these precautions, two vessels
eluded their vigilance, and made their escape.
These transactions, while they excited the greatest alarm in the
nation, were violently reprobated by the seamen belonging to the two
divisions of the fleet lying at Portsmouth and at Plymouth. Each of
them addressed an admonition to their fellow-seamen at the Nore, warmly
condemning their proceedings as a scandal to the name of British
seamen, and exhorting them to be content with the indulgence already
granted by government, and to return to their duty without insisting on
more concessions than had been demanded by the rest of the navy.
But these warnings proved ineffectual. The reinforcement of the four
ships lately arrived, and the expectation of being joined by others,
induced them to persist in their demands. The committee of delegates,
on board the _Sandwich_, came to a determination to commission lord
Northesk, whom they had kept in confinement in the _Montague_, of which
he was the commander, to repair to the king in the name of the fleet,
and to acquaint him with the conditions on which they were willing to
deliver up the ships. The petition, which he was charged to lay before
the king, was highly respectful and loyal to him, but very severe on
his ministers, and they required an entire compliance with every one of
their demands, threatening, on the refusal of any, to put immediately
to sea. Lord Northesk readily undertook to be the bearer of their
petition, but told them, that, from the unreasonableness of their
demands, he could not flatter them with the hope of success. Confiding
in him, they said, as the seamen’s friend, they had entrusted him
with this mission, on pledging his honour to return, with a clear and
positive answer, within fifty-four hours.
Lord Northesk departed accordingly for London, and was introduced, by
lord Spencer, to the king. But no answer being returned to the message,
and information being brought to the fleet, that the nation at large
highly disapproved of their proceedings, great divisions took place
among the delegates, and several of the ships deserted the others, not,
however, without much contest and bloodshed. The mutineers, despairing,
now, of accomplishing their designs, struck the red flag, which they
had hoisted as the signal of mutiny, and restored a free passage to the
trade of the metropolis. Every ship was now left at its own command,
and they all gradually returned to obedience, though, on board of some,
violent struggles happened between the mutineers and the loyal parties.
The principal conductor of the mutiny, Richard Parker, was seized
and imprisoned, and after a solemn trial, that lasted three days, on
board of the _Neptune_, he was sentenced to death. He suffered with
great coolness and intrepidity, acknowledging the justice of his
sentence, and expressing his hope, that mercy might be extended to his
associates. But it was judged necessary to make public examples of the
principal and most guilty, who were accordingly tried, and, after full
proof of their criminality, condemned and executed. Others were ordered
to be whipped; but a considerable number remained under sentence of
death till after the great victory obtained, over the Dutch fleet, by
admiral Duncan: when his majesty sent a general pardon to those unhappy
men; who were, at that period, confined on board a prison ship in the
river Thames.
ENGLAND AND THE DIRECTORY (1797).
=Source.=--_Correspondence of the First Earl of Malmesbury_, London,
1844. Vol. iii., pp. 577 _et seq._
_Letter from Lord Malmesbury to Mr. Pitt, Calais. Sept. 18th. 1797._
MY DEAR SIR,--
Although I shall in a very few hours have the pleasure of seeing you,
I cannot delay till then thanking you most sincerely for your two last
very comfortable private letters. No consolation could ever come at a
moment when it is more wanted. I almost feel guilty of ingratitude
in making so ill a return to it, as that of leaving Lisle so rapidly,
notwithstanding, God knows, my will by no means consented to this act.
I trust this will appear in everything I have said and done, and that
nothing has been omitted on my part to obtain what I know to be _your
first wish_, and which I can safely say was also _mine_. The having
failed in it hurts me still the more, as we infallibly should have
succeeded had not the _political earthquake_ of the 4th of September
taken place. But success being impossible, the next best comfort is,
the having failed without discredit to myself; and if, when I have the
pleasure to meet you, I should be assured of it, I shall feel comfort
fully equal to that in which I began this letter, by thanking you.
I am, &c.
(Signed) MALMESBURY.
_Letter from Lord Malmesbury to Mr. Canning, Calais, Monday, 9 p.m.,
Sept. 18th, 1797._
MY DEAR CANNING,--
If the date of the place from whence this letter is written surprises
you, let me refer you to my public despatch for all the wholesale
reasons, and desire you to wait for the more detailed one till
to-morrow evening, or probably Wednesday morning, when I hope we
shall meet. Your private letter to me by Herslet, although on an
uncomfortable subject, afforded me very great consolation; since I
not only perceive you are prepared for my return, but prepared for it
in a way which totally disperses the few apprehensions I had, lest my
conduct, under the present circumstances, might not in every respect
have met every approbation.
From what you say, I am now certain it will; and it gives me the more
pleasure, from a consciousness that I never in my life acted more
rightly.
I am too fatigued to go on to-night with the messengers, but we sail
to-morrow at nine a.m.; and on the whole, I had rather you should read
my story than hear it told by me. I have much to say to you, and to
some others, but I should not like to hold forth before a Cabinet.
I am infinitely obliged to you (in the strict sense of the word) for
your very friendly and attentive goodness in endeavouring to replace
all that I lost by the cruel accident which has happened to poor
Brooks. Your principal does not partake of this sort of feeling; and he
has as few of this species of human _imperfections_ as any being called
_human_ can pretend to.
Let us hear from you on our arrival. I shall drive at once to my own
house, and if possible, before twelve o’clock on Wednesday.
I am, &c.
(Signed) MALMESBURY.
_Extract of a Despatch from Lord Malmesbury to Lord Grenville, Calais,
19th Sept., 1797._
There can be little doubt, from the language and manner of the French
Plenipotentiaries, that there is a fixed determination on the part of
the French Government to continue war with England; and that if in
any part of their behaviour or conversation with me there appeared a
contrary intention, it was solely with a view to avoid, if possible,
that the odium of breaking off the Negotiation should be imputed
entirely to them. They, however, have managed this with so very little
ability--what they have done has been so positive, and what they have
said so vague--that it is difficult even for the most prejudiced minds
to entertain a doubt on this subject.
The whole of my official Correspondence since the event of the 4th of
September will, I trust, have so far prepared your Lordship for what
has now happened, that, although it may very justly cause concern,
it will not create surprise. Disposed as I was to pay attention to
whatever I heard from the late members of the French Legation, as
well from their knowledge of their own country, as from my having, on
every important point, always found their information correct, I could
never allow my opinion to go with them on this particular point;
and although the satisfaction of having judged rightly cannot, on an
occasion like this, be very great, yet the not having misled your
Lordship diminishes, to a certain degree, the regret I feel on having
failed in the great end of my Mission.
It would be vain to search for any rational motive for such a conduct
as the Directory have thought proper to adopt, or to endeavour to
explain on what grounds they can prefer a hazardous and unpromising
continuation of a war, become extremely unpopular, to an advantageous
and honourable peace, and one which, I am confident, would have had the
approbation of the whole French nation. The solution of this difficulty
cannot be found either in the internal situation of France, or in its
present relative position to other powers, but must be sought for in
the daring and inconsiderate character of the two governing members of
the Directory, Barras and Rewbell. The success which has attended their
late very bold undertaking appears to have given them the most implicit
confidence in their own abilities, and in the strength of their party;
and they never at any time appeared to have any fixed system, or to
look forward beyond the circumstances of the moment.
THE BATTLE OF THE NILE (OR ABOUKIR BAY) (1798).
=Source.=--_Annual Register._ Vol. xl., pp. 142 _et seq._ of _History
of Europe_.
It was the first of August before the Pharos of Alexandria was got
sight of by the squadron, who were then steering direct for it towards
the S.S.E. and as they approached discovered a wood of masts in the
harbour. The advanced ships (the _Alexander_ and _Leander_ about two
leagues a head) made signal for having discovered ships of war to
eastward. The admiral, who, with the bulk of the squadron, was in close
order of sailing, being thus directed to a view of the long sought-for
fight, immediately altered his course accordingly, and made signal to
recal those on the look-out. The _Culloden_ was then about two leagues
to the eastward of the admiral, and, after some time and signals
exchanged, obtained leave to cast off the vessel towed from off Coron.
The _Alexander_ and _Leander_, who had run in nearer Alexandria, were
thereby obliged to hawl more to the wind than between N.N.W. and N.W.
in order to round the point off Aboukir; which threw them considerably
later than the main body; who sailing with a free wind reached about,
or soon after five o’clock, the point; which having rounded and got the
bay fairly open, the admiral hawled up on the lar-board tack, under an
easy sail, probably for the purpose of viewing the situation of the
enemy, or more likely for giving time for those of his own squadron
to close; the _Culloden_ being still about two leagues distant in the
N.W. quarter. While the _Alexander_ and _Leander_ were still farther
distant in the W.S.W. the squadron of the enemy, which shewed 13 sail
of the line of battle, were but a few miles off, bearing from S.W.
to south, and anchored in a line extending nearly N.W. and S.E. with
their admiral’s flag on board a three deck ship in the centre, and four
frigates, with several gun-vessels, dispersed inside towards the van
and rear.
The squadron did not remain long with their heads from the enemy. The
admiral speedily determined on what plan of attack was to be adopted.
He gave orders, by signal, to prepare to anchor by the stern, and wore
with the whole squadron together by signal. That manœuvre at once
changed the situation of the squadron, by giving the lead to those, who
were, while their heads were to the offing, dropping a-stern to join
their situation in the rear, in the order of sailing: or, as some have
alleged, loitered a-stern from an unwillingness to be drawn off even a
few hundred yards from the enemy. If such were the sentiments of any,
they were now indulged by the admiral bearing up toward the van of the
enemy, and making the signal to form the line of battle a-head, or most
convenient: that is, for each ship to fall in as their situation at the
time best suited, without regard to the established order of battle.
On that occasion, there were such displays of emulation by each ship to
gain an advanced post in the attack, as must have tended to inspire
each other with an invincible confidence. But so alert were the whole,
that no one ship could gain the point of getting a-head of another, who
had the advantage of laying their heads towards the enemy. The admiral,
as they were drawing into a form of battle, made the signal to attack
the enemy’s van and centre: and soon after, added the signal for a
close engagement, which was kept flying.
The wind, which was between N.W. and N.N.W., had been a fresh top
gallant sail breeze, and, though moderated as the day drew towards a
close, still swelled out the lighter sails. Before the _Goliah_ (the
leading ship) had approached within a mile of the enemy’s van ships,
they commenced a brisk cannonade with their starboard guns, as did the
batteries at the castle of Becquires and the gun-vessels, which galled
the British squadron much as they closed. But the situation of the
enemy’s anchorage, and the shallowness of the water around, rendered
it impossible to evade that annoyance. It was therefore borne with
a firmness worthy of their character. The period was but short when
it became theirs to return the annoyance. The gallant leader[10] in
the _Goliah_, on that occasion displayed a conduct which shewed him
worthy of the post he had taken. Keeping his ship under all convenient
working sail, he kept as near to the edge of the bank as the depth of
water would permit, and passing a-head of the enemy’s van ship, _Le
Guerrier_, poured into her a most destructive fire; and bearing round
up shortened sail,[11] and anchored by the stern inside of the second
of the enemy’s line, _Le Conquerant_.
The _Zealous_ followed in the track of the _Goliah_, but not so far,
having dropped her stern anchor, so as to preserve a situation on
the inside bow of _Le Guerrier_, whom she handled in the severest
manner without being exposed to annoyance in return. The _Orion_ next
followed, and passing to windward of the _Zealous_, and round her,
plying her larboard guns on _Le Guerrier_, while they bore, continued
on a S.E. course, and passed the inside of the _Goliah_: when, being
annoyed by a frigate’s fire, she yawed as much as was necessary to
bring her starboard guns to bear, and gave her so complete a dose as
to silence her for ever. Then hawling round towards the enemy’s line,
she dropped the starboard bower anchor inside between the third and
fourth ships from their van, and with some exertions, by spreading all
her after-sail, (probably to force her keel over the ground, which it
most likely touched) got her swung round abreast of _L’Aquilon_, who
had, without annoyance, suffered the _Orion_ to place herself in this
situation. The _Theseus_, who followed the _Orion_, passed between the
_Zealous_ and _Le Guerrier_, so close to the latter, (whose foremast
was by this time over the side) only preserving sufficient distance to
avoid entangling her rigging with the jib-boom of the enemy’s ship, and
when abreast of her bow, poured in a broadside, until then reserved,
the effect of which on the enemy was instantaneous. The main and
mizen-masts were also brought down. Thus, in less than fifteen minutes
was the van ship of this line reduced to a mere hulk, incumbered with
the wreck of her own masts and yards, and doubtless the crew much
mutilated. That destructive broadside was given just as the sun dipped
in the horizon; after which the _Theseus_ passed on the outside of
the _Goliah_, and dropped her stern-anchor a-head of her; and thus
was placed inside of the third ship of the enemy, _La Spartiate_, and
had commenced the cannonade about the time or before her leader, the
_Orion_, was got completely placed, from the little interruptions
before-mentioned.
The _Audacious_ followed next, and passing between _Le Guerrier_ and
_Conquerant_, increased the misfortunes of those ill-fated ships,
by a destructive fire, and afterwards dropped her stern-anchor, so
as to preserve her station inside bow of the latter, over whom the
_Goliah_ had already got a decided superiority, by the comparative fire
maintained. The breeze by this time (as above observed) had lessened
as the day closed: most probably too it had been lulled the more by
the effect of the cannonade, which had for some time been maintained:
hence the ships which were in the rear of the British squadron were not
enabled to close with the celerity suitable to their ardour on that
occasion.
The _Vanguard_ was the follower of the _Audacious_; but did not, like
the five who had preceded her, pass the enemy’s line: the rank of the
admiral (whose flag this ship bore) gave him a privilege of deviating
from the example of his leaders, whose manœuvres were to be guided
by his direction: she was anchored by the stern on the outside, and
close to the third ship from the van, _Le Spartiate_. Her followers
respectively passed on a-head of their leader, anchoring by the stern
as they came up on the outside as the admiral had done. Thus the
_Minotaur_, _Defence_, and _Swiftsure_, took position a-breast of the
fourth, fifth, and sixth ships from the van; by which arrangement it
was left for the _Bellerophon_ to attack the French admiral’s ship,
_L’Orient_, of three decks:[12] nor was the undertaking shrunk from,
because of the apparent inequality of the contest: the _Bellerophon’s_
stern-anchor was dropped on the outside bow of _L’Orient_, whose
collection of heavy batteries was reserved for the closing. The effect
of these will be best judged of by the reference to the list of killed
and wounded of the hardy assailants, in which stands enrolled the names
of almost every officer of that ship. By that time the day was so much
closed, as to obscure from general view the conduct of each ship;
particularly towards the centre, which was covered with the clouds
of smoke blown thither from the van, by the light breeze which yet
continued. Under these circumstances, the _Majestic_, who followed the
_Bellerophon_, had to grope for an antagonist; in doing which, it is
said, she found her jib-boom had entered the main rigging of one of the
enemy’s ships a-stern of their admiral; by whom, she was most severely
treated while thus entangled: but, after some time, she swung clear,
and avenged herself completely on another of the enemy farther astern.
Having thus got all the ships into action, that had formed the body
of the squadron, the _Culloden_, who had been detained by the towing
of the wine-vessel, may now be looked after; also the _Alexander_ and
_Leander_, who had been thrown out a-stern, by their having been on the
look-out towards Alexandria.
It was with extreme mortification observed, before the day had closed,
that the former had run a-ground on a shoal, which was found to extend
N.E. from the point on which the castle stood. It may be better
imagined than described what were the feelings of the gallant commander
and crew of that ship, to be so arrested in their passage to the
participation of the fatigues and glory of the combat then depending.
The loss of the assistance of such a ship, on so important occasion
too, must have excited emotions of deep regret among those engaged,
many of whom had witnessed, on an important and splendid occasion in
the preceding year, how eminently that ship, under the command of the
same officer, and with the same crew, had been distinguished.--Great as
the loss of this ship’s assistance was, it yielded some consolation to
conclude, that her running a-ground served as a beacon to induce the
two ships (_Alexander_ and _Leander_, then to the westward of her) to
hawl more out to the offing than they might otherwise have done, from
an anxiety to be as soon as possible up to the assistance of their
companions; in which case the assistance of two ships would have been
lost instead of the _Culloden_. The _Mutine_ brig made towards her, and
remained to render her assistance in getting off the ground; and the
_Leander_, in passing, had communication to know if she could render
her effectual aid: that being judged impracticable, she followed her
companion, the _Alexander_, who, having rounded the end of the shoal,
was then steering for the centre of the enemy, under all sail: nor
did she shorten any, until closed with the French admiral’s ship, whom
she passed and anchored in a most judicious position inside of that
tremendous ship, whom she attacked with a briskness, and maintained
with such vivacity, as indicated the impatience of the crew in having
been thrown out so long from entering into the action.
Without pretending to minute accuracy with regard to time, this may
be stated to have taken place about, or soon after eight o’clock.
Soon after, the _Leander_ ran in under the stern of the fifth ship;
and, anchoring there, took a position whereby she could, without
annoyance, fire her guns of one side in the stern of _Le Peuple
Souverain_, and those of the other side into the bows of _La Franklin_.
It is unnecessary to remark on what must have been the effect of so
destructive a raking fire, even from a ship of the _Leander’s_ small
force.
Thus did each of the British ships enter into action. The result
shews the manner in which each performed its duty. By the time the
last-mentioned ships got placed in their respective positions, those
which formed the van of the enemy were silenced, and some had struck.
Their submission had extended as far as the fourth ship, about nine
o’clock. And, soon after, _L’Orient_, in their centre, was discovered
to be on fire, which spread with such rapidity that she was soon
in a general blaze, and precluded even a shadow of hope for her
preservation. The cannonade was, in the meantime, maintained with
equal briskness by the British ships, whose opponents had not yet
surrendered, while some of them, very much sickened, were barely able
to maintain resistance.
While the flames were consuming _L’Orient_, great were the exertions
made by the _Alexander_ to remove to such distance as her captain
judged necessary to save her from danger of being covered with the
wreck of her unfortunate antagonist. About ten o’clock, the fire
had reached _L’Orient’s_ magazine, when she blew up with a most
tremendous explosion, by which fragments of her wreck were thrown to a
considerable distance on every side; and those ships who were nearest
to the place of the explosion, were for some time completely obscured,
by the thick column of smoke which spread around. The cannonade at
that moment ceased, and a silence ensued, strongly expressive of the
awe with which the minds of the combatants were impressed by that
dreadful event.
That impression appeared to be effaced, by the recollection that
there was still duty left to be performed; for, in about ten minutes
after, the cannonade was renewed around the spot where _L’Orient_
had exploded, and in a few minutes was maintained with vivacity, and
continued with little abatement until after midnight, when it became
slacker, with some intermissions, indicating the exhausted state of the
combatants, by the fatigue already undergone;[13] but the firing did
not entirely cease until three o’clock.
_Thursday morning, the second of August._--When the day opened, how
different was the prospect from that which the preceding evening
had closed! The greatest part of the ships, which formed the van of
the French line, dismasted, and all struck! Not a vestige of their
admiral’s ship to be seen! The frigate (_La Sêrieuse_), whom the
_Orion_ had silenced the preceding evening, now sunk! The _Bellerophon_
was observed several miles to the eastward along shore, at anchor,
dismasted. Some of the British ships, which had attacked and defeated
the van, now shifted more towards the rear, and others moving thither,
to complete the conquest of the enemy’s ships. In that part, this led
to a recommencement of the cannonade, in the outset of which, a frigate
(_L’Artémise_), in the centre, displayed a conduct mean and unworthy
of the squadron to which it was attached. After firing a broad-side,
she struck; but, before she was sent to, by any of the British ships,
was observed to be on fire, and the crew making for the shore in their
boats, where they were so ill received by the natives, that a remnant
of them were fain to return, and trust to the generosity of their
enemy, whom they had so recently offended by a flagrant breach of the
laws of war.
Without entering into any further detail of the whole, after the
cannonade had been long maintained, with some intermissions, it
was closed with the surrender of _L’Heureux_ and _Mercure_, and
dismasting of _Le Tonnant_. The two rear ships, _Le Guillaume Tell_ and
_Genereux_, observing all their companions either surrendered, or in
a disabled state, prepared to get under sail, which they did, without
interruption, before two o’clock, and were accompanied by _La Dianne_
and _Justice_ frigates, neither of whom had been annoyed. _Le Timoleon_
made an attempt to follow, but, casting with her head into the bay, and
not being alertly managed (probably, not in a manageable state), her
head was not got out to the offing, but ran ashore at a little distance
from whence she had laid, in the south-east part of the bay, where they
set her on fire. The _Zealous_, who was under sail when the rear ships
of the enemy left the bay, stood after them; but, as there was not any
other then under sail, to accompany and support her, she was called in
by the admiral.
There yet remained to be taken possession of, _Le Tonnant_, entirely
dismasted, but who had not struck, and had shifted a considerable
distance to leeward from her original position. In that state,
incapable of moving or helping herself, a message was sent, to demand
her surrender, which the captain refused, without the condition of
vessels being furnished to carry him and his crew (which he stated to
be then 1,500) to France. This requisition was communicated to admiral
Nelson, who desired him to be informed, that the surrender must be
unconditional, else force would be employed, against which resistance
would not avail. These communications were not exchanged till late in
the evening of the second, owing to the distance.
Friday morning, the third of August, the French flag was observed to be
still displayed on the stump of _Le Tonnant’s_ main-mast. The admiral
made signals to the _Theseus_ and _Leander_ to attack her. It appeared
they had, in some measure, recovered from their late fatigues, by
the alertness of their movements. They were soon under the necessary
sail; and, on the _Theseus_ approaching her rear, the flag of truce
was hoisted. An officer was then sent from the _Theseus_ to desire the
colours to be struck unconditionally, which was complied with. Thus was
the close put to that distinguished battle.
Whether a retrospect is had to the unremitting perseverance in
continuing the search after the enemy, to the promptness of decision
in attacking them when found, or to the skill and intrepidity with
which the attack was executed, it is difficult to decide which has the
highest claim to admiration. The renown of this action has reached to
every part of the globe, and been re-echoed back with the high praises
so justly merited.
SUPPLIES GRANTED BY PARLIAMENT FOR NAVY AND ARMY (1800).
=Source.=--_Annual Register._ Vol. xlii., pp. 160 _et seq._ of
_Appendix to Chronicle_.
NAVY.
_October 1, 1799._
£ _s._ _d._
That 120,000 seamen be employed for two
lunar months commencing 1st January,
1800, including 22,696 marines:
For wages for ditto 444,000 0 0
For victuals for ditto 456,000 0 0
For wear and tear of ships in which they are
to serve 720,000 0 0
For ordnance sea service on board such ships 60,000 0 0
_October 3._
For the ordinary establishment of the navy,
for two lunar months, commencing
1st January, 1800 121,510 0 0
For the extraordinary establishment of
ditto 115,625 0 0
_February 10, 1800._
That 110,000 seamen be employed for eleven
lunar months, commencing 26th February,
1800, including 22,696 marines:
For wages for ditto 2,238,500 0 0
For victuals for ditto 2,229,000 0 0
For wear and tear of ships in which they are
to serve 3,630,000 0 0
For ordnance sea service on board such ships 302,500 0 0
_February 13._
For the ordinary of the navy, including half
pay to sea and marine officers, for eleven
lunar months, commencing 26th February,
1800 685,429 13 11
For buildings and repairs of ships, and
other extra works 656,515 0 0
For the probable expense of transport service,
for one year, commencing 1st January,
1800 1,300,000 0 0
For the maintenance of prisoners of war in
health 500,000 0 0
For the care and maintenance of sick
prisoners of war 90,000 0 0
---------------------
£13,619,079 13 11
=====================
ARMY.
_October 3, 1799._
£ _s._ _d._
That 90,047 men be employed for land service,
including 5,766 invalids, from 25th
December, 1799, to 24th February, 1800:
For guards, garrisons, and other land-forces
in Great Britain, Jersey, Guernsey, and
Alderney, and in Holland 510,596 0 0
For forces in the plantations, including
Gibraltar, Minorca, the Cape of Good
Hope, and New South Wales 166,480 0 0
For the increased rates of subsistence to be
paid to innkeepers and others, on quartering
soldiers 40,000 0 0
For expenses expected to be incurred in the
barrack-master general’s department 120,000 0 0
_February 13, 1800._
That 80,275 men be employed for land-service,
including 5,792 invalids, from
25th February, 1800:
For guards, garrisons, and other land-forces
in Great Britain, Jersey, Guernsey, and
Alderney 2,337,159 8 8
For forces in the plantations, including
Gibraltar, Portugal, Minorca, and other
stations in the Mediterranean, the Cape of
Good Hope, and New South Wales 1,004,480 13 6
For difference between the British and Irish
pay of six regiments of foot for service
abroad 42,901 19 0
For four troops of dragoons, and sixteen
companies of foot stationed in Great
Britain for recruiting regiments serving
in East India 24,558 3 8
For recruiting and contingencies for land-forces,
and extra feed for the cavalry 530,000 0 0
For general and staff-officers, and officers of
hospitals 105,054 7 11
For full pay to supernumerary officers 26,230 14 6
For allowance to the paymaster-general of
the forces, commissary-general of the
musters, &c. &c. 105,747 2 6
For the increased rates of subsistence to be
paid to inn-keepers and others, on quartering
soldiers 140,000 0 0
For allowance to the non-commissioned
officers and private men of the land
forces, in lieu of small beer 120,000 0 0
For reduced officers of land-forces and
marines 138,979 7 1
For allowances to reduced horse-guards 20 12 11
On account of officers late in the service of
the states-general 1,000 0 0
Ditto, of reduced officers of British-American
forces 52,500 0 0
For allowances to several reduced officers
of ditto 7,500 0 0
For the in and out-pensioners of Chelsea
hospital, and the expenses of the hospital 143,310 7 3
For pensions to widows of officers of land
forces 20,231 12 0
For expenses incurred, and expected to be
incurred in the barrack-master general’s
department 359,334 0 0
For foreign corps in the service of Great
Britain 471,128 12 3
_February 24._
To defray the extraordinary services of the
army for 1800 2,500,000 0 0
_May 27._
For the troops of the elector of Bavaria, in
the pay of Great Britain, pursuant to
treaty 566,688 10 0
_July 16._
For the expense of a royal military asylum
for the reception of the children of
soldiers 25,000 0 0
--------------------
£9,558,951 12 3
====================
HIS MAJESTY’S SPEECH TO THE FIRST UNION PARLIAMENT (1801).
=Source.=--_Annual Register._ Vol. xliii., pp. 207 _et seq._ of _State
Papers_.
_His Majesty’s Speech to both Houses, on opening the Imperial
Parliament, 2d February, 1801._
MY LORDS AND GENTLEMEN,
At a crisis so important to the interests of my people, I derive great
satisfaction from being enabled, for the first time, to avail myself
of the advice and assistance of the parliament of my united kingdom of
Great Britain and Ireland.
This memorable era, distinguished by the accomplishment of a measure
calculated to augment and consolidate the strength and resources of the
empire, and to cement more closely the interests and affections of my
subjects, will, I trust, be equally marked by that vigour, energy, and
firmness, which the circumstances of our present situation peculiarly
require.
The unfortunate course of events on the continent, and the consequences
which must be expected to result from it, cannot fail to be matter of
anxiety and concern, to all who have a just feeling for the security
and independence of Europe.
Your astonishment, as well as your regret, must be excited by the
conduct of those powers, whose attention, at such a period, appears to
be more engaged in endeavours to weaken the naval force of the British
empire, which has hitherto opposed so powerful an obstacle to the
inordinate ambition of France, than in concerting the means of mutual
defence against their common and increasing danger.
The representations which I directed to be made to the court of
Petersburgh, in consequence of the outrages committed against the
ships, property, and persons of my subjects, have been treated with the
utmost disrespect: and the proceedings of which I complained have been
aggravated by subsequent acts of injustice and violence. Under these
circumstances, a convention has been concluded by that court, with
those of Copenhagen and Stockholm; the object of which, as avowed by
one of the contracting parties, is to renew their former engagements
for establishing by force a new code of maritime law, inconsistent with
the rights, and hostile to the interests of this country.
In this situation I could not hesitate as to the conduct which it
became me to pursue.
I have taken the earliest measures to repel the aggressions of this
hostile confederacy, and to support those principles which are
essential to the maintenance of our naval strength, and which are
grounded on the system of public law so long established and recognised
in Europe. I have, at the same time, given such assurances as manifest
my disposition to renew my ancient relations with those powers,
whenever it can be done consistently with the honour of my crown, and
with a just regard to the safety of my subjects.
You will, I am persuaded, omit nothing on your part that can afford me
the most vigorous and effectual support, in my firm determination to
maintain, to the utmost, against every attack, the naval rights and the
interests of my empire.
GENTLEMEN OF THE HOUSE OF COMMONS,
I have directed the estimates for the several branches of the public
service to be laid before you. Deeply as I lament the continued
necessity of adding to the burdens of my people, I am persuaded you
will feel with me the importance of providing effectual means for those
exertions which are indispensably requisite for the honour and security
of the country.
MY LORDS AND GENTLEMEN,
I am confident that your deliberations will be uniformly directed to
the great object of improving the benefits of that happy union, which,
by the blessing of Providence, has now been effected; and of promoting
to the utmost the prosperity of every part of my dominions.
* * * * *
BILLING AND SONS, LTD. PRINTERS GUILDFORD.
FOOTNOTES:
[1] Mr. Burke, who wrote the historical portion of the _Annual
Register_ for the year 1761, says, that “when Mr. Pitt resigned the
seals, the great person to whom they were re-delivered received them
with ease and firmness, without requesting that he should resume his
office. His Majesty expressed his concern for the loss of so able
a servant; and to show the favourable sense he entertained of his
services, he made him a most gracious and unlimited offer of any
rewards in the power of the Crown to bestow. His Majesty at the same
time expressed himself not only satisfied with the opinion of the
majority of his council, but declared he would have found himself under
the greatest difficulty how to have acted, had that council concurred
as fully in supporting the measure proposed by Mr. Pitt as they had
done in rejecting it. Mr. Pitt was sensibly touched with the grandeur
and condescension of the proceeding. ‘I confess, sir, I had but too
much reason to expect your Majesty’s displeasure: I did not come
prepared for this exceeding goodness: pardon me, Sir,--it overpowers,
it oppresses me.’ He burst into tears. We are far from an attempt
to add any colouring to so exquisitely affecting a picture; we are,
indeed, far from being able to do justice to perhaps one of the most
pathetic and elevated scenes which could possibly be displayed,--the
parting of such a prince, and such a minister.”
[2] On the evening of this day Bubb Doddington (now Lord Melcombe)
wrote thus to Lord Bute: “I sincerely wish your lordship joy of being
delivered of a most impracticable colleague, his Majesty of a most
imperious servant, and the country of a most dangerous minister. I am
told that the people are sullen about it. Be that as it may, I think it
my duty to my gracious Sovereign and my generous friend to say, that,
if I can be of any service to either in anything that is most dangerous
and difficult, I am most ready to undertake it.” In his answer of the
following day, Lord Bute says: “Whatever private motives of uneasiness
I might have in the late administration, I am far from thinking the
dissolution of it favourable, in the present minute, to the King’s
affairs. I shall not fail to acquaint the King with the very frank and
generous declaration you made. Indeed, my good lord, my situation, at
all times perilous, is become much more so; for I am no stranger to the
language held in this great city: ‘Our darling’s resignation is owing
to Lord Bute, and he must answer for all the consequences;’--which
is, in other words, for the miscarriages of another system, that Pitt
himself would not have prevented. All this keeps up my attention, and
strengthens my mind, without alarming it; not only whispers caution,
but steadiness and resolution; wherein my noble friend’s assistance
will prove a real comfort to me.”
[3] It is impossible to read this letter without being forcibly
reminded of the following splendid passages in Mr. Burke’s celebrated
speech, in 1774, on American taxation:
“If ever Lord Chatham fell into a fit of the gout, or if any other
cause withdrew him from public cares, principles directly the contrary
of his own were sure to predominate. When his face was hid but for a
moment, his whole system was on a wide sea, without chart or compass.
The gentlemen, his particular friends, who, with the names of various
departments of ministry, were admitted to seem as if they acted a part
under him, with a modesty that becomes all men, and with a confidence
in him, which was justified even in its extravagance by his superior
abilities, had never, in any instance, presumed upon any opinion of
their own. Deprived of his guiding influence, they were whirled about,
the sport of every gust, and easily driven into any port; and as those
who joined with them in manning the vessel were the most directly
opposite to his opinions, measures, and character, and far the most
artful and most powerful of the set, they easily prevailed so as to
seize upon the vacant, unoccupied, and derelict minds of his friends;
and instantly they turned the vessel wholly out of the course of his
policy. As if it were to insult as well as to betray him, even long
before the close of the first session of his administration, when
everything was publicly transacted, and with great parade, in his name,
they made an act declaring it highly just and expedient to raise a
revenue in America. For even then, Sir, even before this splendid orb
was entirely set, and while the western horizon was in a blaze with
his descending glory, on the opposite quarter of the heavens arose
another luminary, and, for his hour, became lord of the ascendant. You
understand, to be sure, that I speak of Charles Townshend, officially
the reproducer of this fatal scheme....”
“He had voted, and in the year 1765, had been an advocate for the
stamp act. Things, and the disposition of men’s minds, were changed.
In short, the stamp act began to be no favourite in this House. He,
therefore, attended at the private meeting, in which the resolutions
moved by a right honourable gentleman were settled; resolutions leading
to the repeal. The next day, he voted for that repeal; and he would
have spoken for it, too, if an illness (not, as was then given out,
a political), but, to my knowledge, a very real illness, had not
prevented it. The very next session, as the fashion of this world
passeth away, the repeal began to be in as bad an odour in this House
as the stamp act had been in the session before. To conform to the
temper which began to prevail, and to prevail mostly amongst those most
in power, he declared, very early in the winter, that a revenue must be
had out of America. Instantly he was tied down to his engagements by
some who had no objection to such experiments at the cost of persons
for whom they had no particular regard. The whole body of courtiers
drove him onwards. They always talked as if the King stood in a sort
of humiliated state, until something of the kind should be done. Here
this extraordinary man, then Chancellor of the Exchequer, found himself
in great straits. To please universally was the object of his life;
but to tax and to please, no more than to love and to be wise, is not
given to men. However, he attempted it. To render a tax palatable to
the partisans of American revenue, he made a preamble, stating the
necessity of such a revenue. To close with the American distinction,
this revenue was _external_, or port duty; but again, to soften it to
the other party, it was a duty of _supply_.
“To gratify the _colonists_, it was laid on British manufactures; to
satisfy the _merchants of Britain_, the duty was trivial, and (except
that on tea, which touched only the devoted East India Company) on
none of the grand objects of commerce. To counterwork the American
contraband, the duty on tea was reduced from a shilling to threepence.
But to secure the favour of those who would tax America, the scene
of collection was changed, and, with the rest, it was levied in the
colonies. What need I say more? This fine-spun scheme had the usual
fate of all exquisite policy. But the original plan of the duties, and
the mode of executing that plan, both arose singly and solely from a
love of our applause. He was truly the child of the House. He never
thought, did, or said anything, but with a view to you. He every day
adapted himself to your disposition; and adjusted himself before it as
at a looking-glass. Hence arose this unfortunate act.”
[4] On the subject of triennial parliaments, Lord Chatham appears
subsequently to have changed his opinion, as will be seen by reference
to his speech in the Lords, April 30, 1771, in which he declares
himself “a convert to triennial parliaments.”
[5] This suggestion was adopted by the cities of London, Bristol, and
Edinburgh, and the towns of Montrose, Aberdeen, Campbeltown, and Lynn.
[6] On the Burton Pynsent estate, which was disputed by the relatives
of the deceased with the Earl of Chatham.
[7] The Solicitor-General informed Mr. B. when the resolutions were
separately moved, that the grievance of the judges partaking of the
profits of the seizure had been redressed by office; accordingly the
resolution was amended.
[8] The Provincial account of this action differs materially.
[9] On the “morrow” Lord Chatham appeared in the House of Lords _for
the last time_.
[10] The passing around the bow of the enemy’s van and inside of their
line appears to have originated with the leader, Captain Foley, as
no signal was made to direct such a manœuvre, and the suggestion, so
apropos, was highly worthy of a seaman having ready and clear ideas
of what appertained to his profession. The example was followed by
four others of those who composed the van, and the advantage which was
derived from that manœuvre may be best calculated by a reference to the
result. This kind of initiative may well have been learnt from Nelson’s
notable manœuvre in the Battle of St. Vincent in 1797.
[11] The wind had become so moderate that it was not necessary to furl
the sails, that the anchor might hold; they were only hauled as close
up as was possible, which circumstance allowed the men to remain at
their quarters on the principal batteries.
[12] The difference of force between _L’Orient_ and _Bellerophon_, or
any other of the squadron, by estimating the weight of ball fired from
one broadside of each, was above seven to three, and the weight of
ball from _L’Orient’s_ lower deck alone exceeded that from the whole
broadside of the _Bellerophon_.
[13] As an instance of the fatigue, it may here be noted, that one of
the ships, which were inside of the van, and had finished her duty
there, did in the morning, some hours before daylight, weigh her stern
anchor for the purpose of going towards the rear, to attack the enemy
there; and, as the men unshipped the capstan-bars, many of them lay
down among them, being so much overcome with fatigue as to fall asleep,
notwithstanding that they must have known the anchor was got up, and
the ship then moving toward the enemy, to begin a fresh cannonade.
[Transcriber's Note:
Chapter headings regularized.
Inconsistent spelling and hyphenation are as in the original.]
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