Governor's Message.

[Copied from MS. “Govrs Messages," in Secretary's office, Vol. I, p. 341.)

Gentlemen of the Assembly

Your Message of this day is not the first instance wherein you have trifled with the prerogative & Royal orders laid before you, treated the King's Governor in terms unworthy to be repeated from the Chair, and in language unbecoming an address to an Inferior.

Indignitys of this nature can never reach me, but must centre on their Authors. But it gives me the greatest concern that the Council office must bear the Records of your conduct herein, which must appear before nicer Judges than I pretend to be.

I endeavor to persuade myself that these Messages may be calculated by some, but can't be the genuine sentiments of the whole House, who I flatter myself would have been disposed to treat the King's Governor with more decency and greater Respect, had they been fully apprised of the diction and Maturely deliberated on the Materials they were built with.

I have with great Industry attended yesterday & to day for a resolve of your House on his Majesty's orders in Council of the 6th of Sept. respecting Fort Dummer, which if you finish the men of war being in Port I shall have the pleasure to transmit to his Majesty.

You have now time to save the most valuable part of this Province, which if lost by your neglect, in refusing now to obey his Majesty's Commands, I am clear of this charge and the blame must be wholly with you.

Council chamber

in Portsmo 3d April, 1745.

B. WENTWORTH.

Mr. Secretary came & adjourned y° Gen' Assembly to Monday 10 o'clock, by order of his Exc".

Monday, April ye 8th 1745. Met according to adjournment. The Comtee appointed to prepare an answer to his Exc message of ye 3d currt bring an answer prepared into the House, weh is read in the House-as on file.

Voted, That it be sent up & a copy kept on file or entered on ye Journal.

Answer of the House, &c.

[Copied from MS. "Gov's Messages," in Secretary's office, p. 343.] Province of N. Hamp

In the House of Representatives, April 8th, 1745. Voted, That the following Message be sent up In answer to his Excellencys Message of ye 3d currt.

May it Please your Excellency,

Your Excellency's last message to us of ye 3d Inst. containing very severe tho' groundless Reflections on this House, we trust your Excellency will not take amiss that we vindicate ourselves therefrom. Having found by our own experience, in the little time we have been concern'd with the Publick affairs, the Inconvenience of hurrying over things of Importance, & this of Fort Dummer being far from a trifling affair, we thought it highly proper to Defer for some time coming to a Resolve upon it. How the Prerogative is concerned

in this affair, we don't so throughly understand. But as to the Royal orders Directed (not to us) to your Excellency, forthwith to move the Assembly, &c. We were so far from trifling with them, as your Excellency is pleased to term it, that we took the only possible method we could think of to pay them a proper Respect; for, that supporting Fort Dummer would be attended with a very great charge, was obvious at the first view. But we could not so easily discern the advantages that would arise therefrom, nor how a Fort so situated would be of any, the least service to our Frontiers; Had we therefore Determined while things appeared in this Light, must it not necessarily have been in the Negative? But because we know not but that there might sufficient reasons appear hereafter, to Determine us another way, & because we tho't it would be shewing a greater Regard to what came Recommended from his Majesty, therefore we determined to defer coming to a final Resolution for some farther time. This being the conduct of the House in this affair, & the Royal orders having been so long in your Excellencys hands, notwithstanding you are therein directed forthwith to move the Assembly &c. & notwithstanding there were so many opportunitys for it in the whole month of March; we are very free to Leave it to those nicer Judges your Excellency referrs to, to Determine to whom the Reflection of trifling properly belongs. Under this head we only farther add, that altho' your Excellency is pleased to say that this is not the first instance &c. Yet as your Excellency has mentioned no other & we know of none at all, we confine our answer to this.

The next thing your Excellency thinks proper to animadvert upon is the Terms & Language made use of in our last Message, & very indecent they must have been to deserve the gross Reflections your Excellency has cast upon them: But inasmuch as your Excellency has not tho't proper to descend to particulars, we can only say that on a review of our said message, we have not as yet been able to find out what it is your Excellency refers to, possibly the subject matter of said message may be desagreeable to your Excellency, & by that means the terms Language or Diction (as your Excellency Pleases to call it) may appear so. Upon this supposition we take leave to observe to your Excellency, that it always has been the professed & (as far.as we could Judge ye) real Determination of the whole House, to treat your Excellency with all proper Decency & Respect. But this notwithstanding, we think ourselves at Liberty fully & Freely to Remonstrate agst any part of your Excellency's publick conduct, which we apprehend affects the Privileges of the House or the People we represent: In doing of which we shall not think ourselves obliged to use the Language of Slaves to an arbitrary Lord, But that of Freemen, & the Representatives of Free men, to one of the King's Governors, who however much he may be exalted above us by the Honour he receives from his Majesty's Commission, is yet liable to mistakes & Errors in his conduct & may do wrong tho' his Royal master cannot.

In another part of your Excellency's message you intimate that the messages sent up to your Excellency are not the genuine sentiments of the House-a Reflection very severe & ungrounded. But inasmuch as we fully join with your Excellency in that part of your message wherein you signify to us that any Indecency in Language or Behavior centers on its author, we shall say no more on this head, but that we are so fully persuaded of our Innocency, The Unjustness of your Excellency's Reflections on us & the reason we have to complain of your Excellency's behaviour to us, that we are willing to be at the Expence of printing the whole Transactions of this House or that part only which relates to Fort Dummer, if your Excellency should choose it, & if not we are content to omit publishing any thing, unless it should hereafter become necessary for our own vindication, in which case we hope to be Excused tho' it should be contrary to your Excellency's Inclinaation.

Your Excellency towards the latter part of your last message, Informs us that you have with great Industry attended yesterday & to day for a Resolve &c. The plain English of which is, (for in our own vindication we must speak it) that we have had about 5 or 6 hours to determine on so weighty an affair, & in the mean time three of your Messages urging our coming to a

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Resolution upon it, that your Excellency might send the same by the Fleet, part of which was under sail, and the man of Warr Expecting them, Ready to Leave the Coast at the very time some of the messages were sent. This is one among other Instances we might mention, wherein your Excellency's conduct towards us is matter of just complaint, & the rather, inasmuch as it is plain to us, that our most Gracious Sovereign, always tender of the privileges of his subjects, ever designed to allow us sufficient time to consider of this matter, as appears by his Directing your Excellency forthwith to propose it to our consideration, and his Excellency Governor Shirley, to move the Assembly of that Province to provide for the said Fort, till the Assembly of this had Resolved what to do.

In the last Paragraph of your Excellency's message there seems to be an intimation that your Excellency is acquainted with the meaning of the words (proper District) in the Royal Orders of September ye 6th past. If so we should be glad your Excellency would be pleased to inform us, & by that means, what is meant by the most valuable part of this Province, & if your Excellency would also please to let us know what advantage the supporting that Fort would be to our Frontiers, or give any light Relating to the affair before us, & attend with a little patience, if we can't see things so quick as some others; we should hereby be the better Enabled to pass a right Judgment in an affair of such Importance. But in the mean time must say, that if any part of the Province should be lost for want of a Resolve of this House, to go by the Fleet now in Port waiting for a wind, the Blame must not lay on this House but must wholly lay where his Majesty's Royal Order in Council Lay at the month of March.

N. Rogers, Speaker.

Voted, Mr. Meshech Wear & Eleazer Russell Esq. be a Com to joyn with Mr. Henry Sherburne jun. to print & publish the whole or any part of the Journals of this House which they think proper. The House adjourn'd till tomorrow half past nine.

Letter of Andrew Wiggin, Esq. to the Assembly, April 8th 1745. [Copied from MS. Corr. in Secretary's office, Vol I, p. 233.]

To the Honble Assembly of this Province of New Hampshire now convened. Worthy Gentlemen,

I have bin informed that the Massachusets has complained to the King against this Province for that we don't take care of Fort Dummer, to defend it against the French, and the King has sent to the Government of this Prov ince speedily to take said Fort under their protection or he will give it to the Massachusetts with a considerable quantity of Land with it; and I am also inform'd that you are Inclin'd to give it up becaus of the great distance it is from here, and the great charge it will be to keep it. Now Gentilmen, I pray you to consider the consequences of giving it up as well as the charge of keeping it.

In the furst place it will be very Dishonorable to the Province and a slite of the King's favour aftar ten yeares hard strugel with the Expence of nere Eight thousand pounds, and nere five hundred pounds more for running the Lines. And again, call to mind that the charge above said is laid on that part that was recovered from them as well as the other part of the Province, and they pay'd nere a thousand pounds last year, and now the Line is settled and all that peopel conform to the Government of this Province and have takened of the Loane money which may be dificult recovering if the Line be altar'd: And again, thirdly, you have past a bill for the Emitting fifty two

thousand pounds (1) old currence to be paid in again sum time hence, which that part that you will Loose if you give up Fort Dummer would have pay'd twelve thousand pounds of it for I am Intiarly of that mind and it neaturely follows, that if you refuse that forte and the King returns that forte to them again that the Masechusetts will plead to have that returned to them again that the Line toock from them to support the charge of the Fort with which you have in your power to convert the same way if you don't give it out of your hands- and now the Governars Salary is seteled, and if you give away half the Province he nor any that shall com aftar wont abeat (2) one mit but will return on you that it is your own act-now pray Gentilmen, Consider what you Do in that affair, for what you Dou in giving it up will be binding forever, and it will be out of the power of the rising Generation to helpe themselves-for I am fully of the mind that that part of the Province you will Luse if you give up that fort, if it be peace in twenty years will be biger than all the province besides is now. Gentilmen, it is Daingers refusing the Kings offer, for we Cant make a bargain with him and say we will take this and refus that but he can say if you will not take it as I offer, you shall to your old bounds and it will be in vain for us or ours to try to helpe ourselves here aftar. I am of the mind that what we have recovered from them if it be all converted to that use will very neere pay the charge of that forte, and we are in hopes the war will be over in a little time and then the charge Sese Pray pardon the boldnes of your most Humble Sarvant.

Apl ye 8th 1745.

Andr Wiggin.

Tuesday, April the 9th 1745. The House met according to adjournm' and the above voted message [Answer to the Gov's message] sent up to his Exc by Mr. Frost & Mr. Lock.

Voted, That Mr. Gideons go to the Secretary for a copy of the vote or act whereby James Clarkson Esq. &c. were appointed a Comtee to Repair Fort Wm & Mary agreeable to ye act for Emitting £25000.

[P. 162.] Voted That the following Muster Roll of Capt. Jeremiah Clough (3) be allowed and paid out of the money in the Treasury for that end, viz.

6 men 3 months, from 26th 7br to ye 18th Dec' 1744,

wages

ye victuals

Also another acct for dyets 7 other men since June last.

£24: 0: 0

18: 18: 0

5: 12: 6

Mr. Secretary came down & his Exc sent to know if the House had any thing ready to come up this forenoon. Mr. Wear sent up to inform his Exc that the House had nothing ready to send up this forenoon.

The House adjourn'd till three of the clock in the afternoon.

P. M. Met according to adjournment. Inasmuch as the Report of the Comtee of Muster Rolls has not been sent into this House by the Honble Council,

(1) £52,000 old Tenor is equal to £13,000, new Tenor.-ED.

(2) Abate?

(3) See Potter's Mil. Hist. N. H., Adj. Gen. Report, 1866, Vol. II, p. 56.-ED.

Voted, That Coll. Gilman & Mr. Wear Examine into the Grants of men in yo year past & compare them with the Muster Rolls & make Report to this House to morrow morning, how far they

agree.

Whereas it appears to this House that James Clarkson, Esq. and Mr. Jotham Odiorn had the Inspection and management of the Repairing his Majtys Fort William & Mary & whereas George Jeffrey, Theod. Atkinson, James Clarkson, Esqs. & Mr. Jotham Odiorn were appointed a Comtee to Inspect & manage the further Repairs of s Fort according to a clause in the act of £25000 loan, Voted that the s James Clarkson Esq. & Mr. Jotham Odiorn & the sd Comtee be desired to make Report unto the Gen' Assembly as soon as may be of what they have done towards the Repairing of s Fort & lay their accts before this House. Sent up for concurrence, Wednesday morning, Ap. ye 10th by Mr. Gilman & Mr. Levit. Adjourned till to morrow nine o'clock.

Wednesday April ye 10th 1745, Met according to adjournm'. Coll. Gilman & Mr. Wear who were appointed last night to inquire into the grants of men & Report, as on file:

[P. 163.] That the Muster Rolls (exclusive of what men have been kept at Fort Wm. & Mary) exceed the grants 625 days, & that there has been kept out on ye Western side of Merrimack River men to y am° of 2050 days more than they could find grants for.

Voted That the sd Report be Received & accepted.

Samuel Palmer Esq. brings an acct into the House for 12 1-2 bb. powder supply'd y Prov: & dd Coll. Wingat, am° to 1: 17: 6 Voted, That the sd acct be allowed & paid out of the money in ye Treasury for defraying the charge of the Government. Sent up ye 12th by Mr. Fabyan & Lock.

The Secretary came into the House & said his Exc & the Council sent him to inform the House that the acc' for Repairing of the Fort should be laid before the House in the afternoon.

Voted That Mr. Speaker Rogers, Mr. Wear, Mr. Sherburne, Mr. Gideons & Mr. Frost be a Comtee to draw up a Resolution of this House on his Exc's message of ye 2d currant wch was accompanied with a copy of his Maju order Relating to Fort Dummer & his Exc Gov Shirley's letter of the 25th February & also to draw up & make a proper Representation thereof & address his Maj thereon.

The Question being put in the House by yeas & nays whether this House will at present Receive & support Fort Dummer there were but two yeas, two in doubt, & Eleven nays.

The House adjourned for two hours.