I am extremely sensible of your Lordp'* favour and it shall be my constant endeavour to demonstrate by every thing in my power with how much gratitude I am, My Lord, Your most obedient & faithful serv CADWALLADer Colden Governor Moore to the Earl of Hillsborongh. [New-York Papers (8. P. 0.) CLXI. ] My Lord, New York. 20 January 1769. The Acts passed during the late Session of Assembly are now preparing to be transmitted to your Lord with all possible expedition. On my informing the house of His Majesty's instruction relative to the insertion of the Words "in the West Indies" in the Act for granting the several duties and impositions on goods ettc imported into this Provce, it was readily complyed with and the alteration made. But my suspicions in regard to the Militia Bill were soon confirmed, and the Bill entirely drop'd after having been once read. The division of the County of Albany did not take place, neither can I very well ascertain the reasons which prevented it. No objection was made to the Bill in the form pointed out in your Lordp'* letter to me, and it was brought into the house, without any mention being made of the right of chusing Members, which priviledge was entirely left with the Crown. The contested Elections at the beginning of the session took up much time, which might have been better employed, and a sudden period was put to all business then before the house, by the dissolution which took place soon after the resolves were entered on their Journals; had this not been the case in a probability the Bill might have passed, but it would at the same time have laid me under a new difficulty, as the Tract of Country now in question is of so great extent, that it was proposed by the Bill to divide it into three separate and distinct Counties, and the Bill would have passed in that form. The permission, which His Maj" had given by Your Lord's letter of issuing a writ of Election being confined only to one additional County, I could not take upon me to do any thing till further orders, as an equal distribution of favour would be expected from the Crown in granting the same priviledges to both the New Counties, whereas his Maju'* Commands had been only signified in regard to one. Our Elections are now carrying on with great warmth, and as I apprehend that I shall be under a necessity of calling the new Assembly together, sooner than the usual time of their meeting, on account of some additional provision to be made for the Troops, I hope I shall have the honor of receiving some further Instructions in regard to what I have here mentioned concerning the division of the County of Albany. I have the honor, ettc. My Lord, Governor Moore to the Earl of Hillsborough. [New-Tork Papera (8. P. O.) CLXI.] New York. 21. January 1769. Immediately upon receipt of His Majesty's orders for the admission of Mr Hugh Wallace and Mr James de Lancey into the Council of this Province, in the room of Mr Walton and Mr Alexander, the members of the Council were convened, and Mr Wallace took the oaths and his seat at the Board, but Mr de Lancey declined the honour that His Maj" had intended him, & after declaring before the Council, that he could not accept of the appointment, withdrew without any further ceremony, nor was there any reason given either by himself or his friends for such a proceeding. I have the honor of returning to your Lord here inclosed, the Royal mandamus in favour of Mr de Lancey, and must leave to that Gentleman the explanation of so singular a conduct, as I should be extremely embarassed to determine what extraordinary engagements he could possibly have entered into, which could be either incompatible with his duty to his Majv, or inconsistent with his attendance on the service of his Country at the Council Board; I hope that I shall have your Lord's pardon for what I am now going to say in favour of my former recommendation, and that the anxiety of mind I am under, lest I should be supposed to have recommended an improper person, may plead my excuse, for troubling your Lord with any thing further on this head. My connections in point of acquaintance and private friendship with Mr Rob' Livingston, in whose favour I had wrote, are by no means so strong as with many Gentlemen in this Province, whose names I have never mentioned to your Lord, and the following are the true reasons of the preference given to him on this occasion. He is a branch of the most considerable family in this Provce; his father (who is very far advanced in years) possessed of a very great landed Estate, which will come to him. undivided, as he is an only son. He is married to the richest Heiress in this Country whose Father is likewise very old and infirm; so, that in all human probability he must very shortly be the greatest Landholder without any exception, in this province; the very large Estate which must center in him, cannot fail of giving him great weight here, and puts it very much in his power to support Govern', which all my letters to His Majty's Ministers have shewed to be very weak and to stand much in need of every assistance which can be obtained. Mr Livingston is a Member of the Church of England as by Law established, & very well affected to His Maju' person and Govern'. He is at this time one of tho Judges of the Supreme Court, and has there given frequent proofs of his abilities to serve his Country. He has likewise been for several years a Member of the House of Assembly, where I must acknowledge myself indebted to him, for his readiness and assistance in some difficulties I laboured under during the troubles I was engaged in, on my first arrival here, and from the whole tenor of his conduct I thought he deserved recommendation I had given him, being at this time fully perswaded that if he had been a Member of the Council during the last Session of Assembly I shd have been better supported than I was by that Board, when the resolves of the late Assembly were laid before them, which brought on the dissolution. Thus much My Lord, I thought myself bound to say, from the apprehensions I was under that Mr Livingston's character had been misrepresented, & that I had fallen under the censure that of having wrote in favour of a person undeserving His Maj's notice, but I hope that I shall never be thought to have merited such an accusation, but that on the contrary it will appear, that my zeal for His Maj' service, has directed and influenced every article of my conduct, since I have been honor'd with the Chief command here. Upon Mr De Lancey's refusal of a seat at the Council Board, Mr Henry White1 made another application to me, but I have already given my opinion concerning him so fully, that I shall not trespass any further on your Lordp's time. I have the honor to be with the greatest respect, Several Inhabitants of this Province being desirous of making settlements on the lands ceded by the Indians in the late Treaty, have made application for them in the manner directed by His Maju' Instruction, but a difficulty we are at present under has prevented their requests being granted. Out of the vast Tract of Land ceded by the Indians to the Crown of Great Brittain, a very inconsiderable portion of it has fallen to the share of this province, as the partition line has not been carried farther to the Northward than the Mohawk River, and at that place not above three or four miles to the Westward of a grant of Land made so long ago as in 1708, as a considerable sum of money has been paid by the Crown to the Indians at the late Congress, it is humbly requested that His Majesty's pleasure may be made known in regard to the conditions, on which the Lands are to be granted. If the Grantees are to be called on by the Govern' for a reimbursement of the sums expended for the settling of this line, in the same proportion they would have paid in case the lands had been purchased by them of the Indians, the share they would pay, would be so inconsiderable and bear so little proportion to the whole, that it would not be worth attending to; on the other hand settlement made on the Frontiers and so distant from the capital are attended with so many difficulties, that any increase of the necessary and common expences, will effectually discourage those who are willing to engage in them from all farther proceeding and drive them to another part of the Country. The inclosed sketch was sent to me by Sir William Johnson, in order to be laid before the house of 1HENRY WHITE was a commissary in the British service and a prominent merchant in New-York, and was one of the consignees of the Tea sent to that city. He was sworn of the Council on the 8th March, 1769, and continued a member of that body until 1783, when he returned to England. His estate was confiscated in 1779. In 1755 Mr. W. married Eve, daughter of Frederick and grand-daughter of Jacobus Van Cortlandt. Frederick C., one of the sons, was appointed in 1781, an ensign in the 64th regiment of Foot, then serving in America, and ultimately rose to be a general in the army. John, another son, was a rear-admiral in the Royal Navy. Mrs. White died in New-York in 1836, at the advanced age of 99. Her daughter Ann married Sir John Hays, and Margaret married Peter J. Munro, a distinguished member of the New-York bar, and one of the framers of the late Constitution of this State. Sabine's Am. Loyalists; De Peyster's Genealogy. — ED. Assembly and only shews so much of the line as relates to this Province. Pennsylvania is now bounded on the North by the East and West line drawn from Owegy to the Delaware, but the lands to the Northward of that line do not fall into this Province, as was expected, but we are still confined to our old boundary the Delaware for many miles, and the line is continued up the course of that River to the Northward till it comes to that spot which is due south from the Mouth of the Tienaderha1 Creek, which falls into the Susquehanna; a due North line is then drawn to the Mouth of that Creek, and continued up its course to the head of it, and from thence by a straight course to the Mouth of Canada Creek, where it terminates. Your Lordp will see on inspecting this draught, that in this Province we are rather sufferers than gainers by this settlement, as we shall now be confined by a line fixed in so solemn a manner, at no great distance from our Lands already patented, and to have it our power to extend farther to the Westward; whereas the necessities of the Indians were constantly obliging them to make sale of their Lands for their support, which of course, would extend our Frontier and drive them back further into the Country. I have the honor to be with the greatest respect Since my last of Decbr 23d N° 6. I have had the honour to receive your Lordship's letter N° 6 in answer to mine N° 2. containing His Majesty's commands that I should make out some certain Estimate of what I thought the Department might require in order to the determining whether any greater sum should be allowed than that recommended by the Board of Trade. And that in the mean time the annual expence should not exceed that sum. The first is already done as I long since transmitted a short estimate for that purpose to General Gage, who informs me that the same is now before His Majesty. The second is in part and will verry soon be entirely complied with by the total removal of the Commissaries & all other Officers of the Department at the out posts & frontiers, but as on the first receipt of the plan for the reform it was judged most adviseable by the General and myself that the Provinces should have some little time to consider in what manner they should carry that part relating to Trade into execution, as the withdrawing those Officers abruptly without any to supply their places, would beyond all doubt have proved of verry ill consequences; It was not till the receipt of your Lordships letter of the 12th of October that we could withdraw them, and some must of necessity remain until the Lakes & Rivers are open.—I am extremely happy to find that those remarks which I humbly offered on the subject of the Reform have been honoured with 'See note 2, supra, p. 123. - ED. His Majesty's attention, it would much exceed the bounds of a letter to enter minutely into so multifarious a subject, or to point out the various arguments that might be brought in proof of the weight of any remarks, whatever I have presumed to offer in that way was perfectly disinterested & arose from a conviction of their necessity. The arrangements pointed out in your Lordships letter of April last were in my opinion judiciously calculated to answer their object which to me appeared to be the releiving the Kingdom from a large expence by transferring the management of Trade to the several Colonies on a supposition that these Colonies would do everry thing necessary therein, but if my experience in these matters here joined to my opertunitys of knowing the state of Indian Affairs at this time gave me reason to apprehend that the wise measures of Government were liable to be frustrated, or would not be carried on, so as to answer their good Intentions, or the Publick Security, I thought it my Duty to offer my thoughts to avoid a charge of remissness in a matter of so much moment. My Lord I would willingly avoid any reflection on the people here especially those amongst them whose errors may be imputed to ignorance of the consequence & importance of a subject laid before them, But when your Lordship considers the Character, Disposition & Practice of those who grant money for public service in America, it will not appear new or extraordinary to suppose that they will not see the necessity of being at any expence adequate to the importance of the subject, I could have recourse to undoubted authorities to prove their extreme parsimony and backwardness on the most alarming occasions, when their all was at stake, but I persuade myself that enough of this is known to justify my apprehensions concerning their conduct in matters which appear of less consequence, on the subject of which, they are in general totally ignorant, and will of course judge the necessary (or perhaps any) expence as needless, it is my duty to represent this, as it may in its consequences affect the Crown. I gave Sir Harry Moore a sketch of my regulations for the Trade, & the last Instructions to my Officers on that head, who laid it before his Assembly, And they have as I am since informed done nothing therein farther than to recommend the consideration thereof to the Albany Representatives. I likewise conversed on the subject with the Governours of New Jersey & Pensilvania. And from all that I can hear, there is litttle prospect that the Assemblys will do what may have been expected from them on this subject. Thus my Lord, it stands at present. Whatever resolutions they may take I shall do all in my power to second & promote them, but I found that the Dutys expected from the Colonies are so complicated with many others, & the execution of them, so uncertain, that I fully persuade myself your Lordship will pardon me for the liberty I have taken in declaring my thoughts as to the Event. If the Duty of Commissaries could be dispensed with until the Provinces make some provision for Officers of that kind, The smiths & interpreters appear always wanting, & the interests of the Crown require that the latter in particular should be under the direction of its own Officers. Any apology for the liberty I have taken in these matters will be needless, as I rely entirely on your Lordship's Indulgence to the motives of duty & fidelity which have produced them. As to the Boundary & Purchase from the Indians, as I lost no time in calling together the several Nations necessary after the receipt of my orders It was not in my power to act otherwise than I did, as from all the Intelligence I could procure, It was deemed the intention of the Crown to purchase the soil in all the Royal Govern", had it been otherwise I beleive it would have appeared, that the adjustment of the Quotas of the respective Colonies with their |