Extracts from a letter from Governor Josiah Martin to the Earl of Dartmouth, at Fort Johnson in North Carolina, 12 November 1775 regarding ‘difficulties with communications, land bought illegally from the Cherokees and land granted to new arrivals from Scotland ‘. Catalogue ref: CO 5/330 f.116-117.
Transcript
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I have heard that one of the principal and most guilty of the Rebels here has lately declared he never expected to see matters in this present state, that the Americans’ hopes of their opposition to the claims of Parliament proving successful were formed upon the belief that Britain would recede [retreat] from her pretensions [claims] on some expediency [necessity] arising out of the abridgement [lessening] of her Commerce [trade] the clamours of her Manufacturers her aversion to rigour towards the Colonies or from the discontents excited in her own bosom by the Partisans of America or the prevalence of opposition in Parliament.
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America after all their boasting
was in no condition to wage war against the Power of Britain and that he would gladly for his part sacrifice four fifths of his fortune to bring about an accommodation. This My Lord however was the language of a most unprincipled man of notorious and profound dissimulation [concealment] and falsehood and held before an Officer in the King’s service possibly only with design to beguile [win over] and deceive.
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no professions should be regarded or advances received other than unconditional submission and that any less certain presages [signs] of their desire of reconciliation should in no sort abate [ease] the vigor of Britain’s resolutions and preparations to assert Her supreme authority.
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- What do these extracts infer about the attitudes of colonial governors to the American Revolution?
- Why do you think the rebels underestimated how long the war would take?
- What can we learn about British terms for the end of the war?