CONTROVERSY RESPECTING THE NEW HAMPSHIRE GRANTS.

425

Green Mountains and Connecticut River , have been continually encouraged to extend their settle-ments under the Claim of New Hampshire and to believe that this Country would soon be annexedto that Government, which Encouragement by the universal Report among them, came from Timeto Time from Governor Wentworth, and which this Deponent believes to be true, and this Deponent is full} 7 sensible that had it not been for those Encouragements all opposition to the Government ofNew York would long since have been at an End.

P. And this Deponent further saith, that he hath always understood and believes, that the lateGovernor Wentworth granted all the Lands on the West side of Connecticut River , without theadvice of his Council for granting the respective Tracts ; that he hath understood that before hemade any Grants, he obtained a general advice of his Council for granting his Majesty’s Lands.And this Deponent saith that he was concerned in one of Mr. Wentworths Patents for Lands on theWest side of Connecticut River , and is very certain he had not the advice of his Council for issuingthat Patent further than the general advice above mentioned.

Q. That the nearest Part of this Country to Portsmouth in New Hampshire is one hundred andTw'enty miles as the Road goes, which this Deponent thinks cannot be shortened more than Tenmiles, and that the easiest, most convenient and cheapest way, to the City of New York , from allthat country is by Albany and so down Hudsons River, without passing out of the Province ofNew York .

Simon Stevens.

Sworn this Second Day of March 1771 Before me.

Dan : Horsmanden.

City of New York ss. Samuel Wells of Brattleborough in the County of Cumberland in theProvince of New York Esquire, one of the Judges of the Inferior Court of Common Pleas, and oneof his Majestys Justices of the Peace for said County being duly sworn maketh oath that he hasresided at Brattleborough aforesaid ever since the month of July 1762, having before that timepurchased some Lands under the Letters Patent of the late Governor Wentworth, for the said Tractcalled Brattleborough , and which purchase hath been since confirmed to him by a Grant from theGovernment of New York .

B. That very soon after Governor Coldens Proclamation asserting the Jurisdiction of the Provinceof New York in that Country, it was Public there being fixed up in Print in Divers Places, andthat soon after the issuing of the Proclamations by the Governments of New Hampshire and NewYork , notifying his Majesty’s Determination of the Boundary between these two Governments of the20‘h of July 1764 in Council, the same were Public in that Country being printed in the PublicNews Papers.

C. That at the time of the notification of his Majesty’s said order in Council, the Country in theProvince of New York to the Eastward of the Green Mountains had very few Inhabitants and thatthese were scattered among about a Dozen Towns on or near Connecticut River , and this Deponentbelieves that at that time, there were no Inhabitants in all that District up as far as the utmost extentof the former claim of New Hampshire Northward and Northwestward except the few straglingInhabitants above mentioned and that these few Inhabitants were as the Deponent hath always under-stood and believes in General Purchasers under some of the Letters Patent issued by the lateGovernor Wentworth for very small Considerations, and not Patentees. That at that Time the Stateof Cultivation in these Tracts that had any Inhabitants was very inconsiderable.

Vol. iv. 54