538

CONTROVERSY RESPECTING THE NEW HAMPSHIRE GRANTS.

Mob, who by a series of the most daring outrages, have so long disturbed the Peace and abusedthe Magistrates and Inhabitants of the County of Charlotte, and the North eastern District of theCounty of Albany with Impunity .

That your petitioner in vain flattered himself, that the provision made by the Legislature at thelast Session, for preventing disorders, so disgraceful to Government, would have checked theirInsolence, and contributed to the Redress aud security of the peaceable Inhabitants : But such isthe Temper of those violent men hardened by a Repetition of the most enormous offences, that,instead of being awed into submission or forbearance, they are actually proceeding in the accom-plishment of the iniquitous Resolutions which they long since formed of laying violent Hands onall who will not involve themselves in their Crimes, plundering them of their property andexpelling them from the Country.

That in pursuance of this ruinous project they on the twenty sixth day of January last, with anarmed Power seized and bound your Petitioner ; violently forced him from his residence, kept himinclose confinement for several days - ; tryed him before a mock Tribunal ; condemned him toreceive two hundred stripes on his naked Back ; carried that ignominious sentence into the severestexecution ; and then banished him from the Country on pain of receiving five hundred Lashesin case he should be found within what they assume as their Jurisdiction,

That although they had thus satiated their vengeance upon your petitioner and seen himbleeding and fainting under his wounds ; and tho’ they had dragged him suddenly from his housewithout giving him Time to provide himself for a journey or to settle his affairs, they would not sufferhim to return to his Family for a day ; but insisted that he should go forward towards this City of NewYork, or Albany ; and to add to their arrogance publickly gave him a Certificate; that he hadreceived full punishment for the crime with which they had charged him ; to which Ethan Allenand Seth Warner, two of their principal Leaders, did not hesitate to Subscribe their Names.

That the mock Court , before which your Petitioner was thus abused consisted of the followingpersons to wit, Ethan Allen, Seth Warner, Robert Cochran , Peleg Sunderland, James Mead, GideonWarren, and Jesse Sawyer, who acted in the double office of Accusers and Judges ; That no less thantour other persons were appointed to execute their sentence, to wit Winthrop Hoyt of Bennington,Abel Benedict of Arlington John Sawer, & another with whose Name your petitioner is unacquainted;and that each of them alternatly whipped your petitioner till the full Number of two hundred stripeswere inflicted.

That the only provocation which they pretended for this barbarous treatment was that yourpetitioner had complained to Government of their former Misconduct towards the Magistrates andInhabitants of the said Counties ; that he had discouraged people from joining them in theirunwarrantable proceedings; and that he had accepted and exercised the office of a magistrate forthe said county of Charlotte contrary to their Injunctions.

That the said Rioters have publickly proclaimed their intention to treat every other Inhabitantwho will not unite with them in their flagitious practices with the same severity.

That tiie intolerable Grievances wliich your petitioner and others have sustained and the Dangerstiiey are daily exposed to, from the said Rioters, are more fully set forth in the several Deposi-tions of your petitioners Daniel Walker and Sandy Trueby which are herewith presented to yourHonour, and to which to avoid prolixity he begs leave to refer.

That your Petitioner is fully perswaded that unless some protection is provided for the saidsuffering inhabitants, they will soon be cruelly insulted and abused in their persons ; plundered oftheir property ; and driven from their Habitations in the utmost wretchedness and distress.

Your Petitioner therefore in behalf of himself and those much injured and unhappy people once