Proprietary of Maryland; they were so successfull in their applications, that I directed & empowered them to settle & improve the Lands under the Government of this Province, and which they have from that Time held and enjoyed subject to his Lordships Dominion & authority: But now they seem to think fitt, and resolve, by a most extraordinary kind of illegal Combination or Association, to disown their obedience to the Government from whom they received their possessions, and to transfer it to the Government of Pennsylvania.

"Whatever reasons I may have to be assured of this Proceeding taking its Rise and Accomplishment from the Encouragement & Prevalency of some Magistrates of your Government, & Others pretending to act under the Countenance & authority thereof; yet I must own my Unwillingness to believe those who have the honour of the Administration of the Government of Pensilvania, would permit or support a Behaviour so contrary to all good Order & Rule of the English Constitution; as must necessarily involve the Subjects of his Majesty in Struggles & Contentions, inconsistent with that Peace & Happiness his Majesty so gloriously endeavours to maintain & preserve amongst Others, as well as his Subjects.

"As I must frankly acknowledge, that I think it my indispensable Duty to take the most proper Measures to make such of these Violators of the Peace of this Government in particular, and the Good Rules and Orders of Society in General, who continue on the Possessions they received from this Government, sensible of the Injustice of this unwarantable attempt, so I rest assured of receiving from your Government all the Assistance necessary for that Purpose against such who may vainly imagine to shelter themselves under your Protection. I am,

“Sir,

"Your most Obedient humble Servant,
"SAM. OGLE.

"Annapolis, 31st August, 1736."

"To the President of the Council of Pensilvania, or Commanderin-Chief there, Philadelphia."

The Paper transmitted with the said Letter & referred to therein, is as follows:

Lancaster County, in Pensilvania.

"SIR :-The Oppression & ill Usage We have met with from the Government of Maryland, or at least from such Persons who have been impowered thereby and their Proceedings connived at, has been a treatment (as We are well informed) very different from that which the Tenants of you Government have generally met with, which, with many other cogent Reasons, give us good Cause to conclude the Governor & Magistrates of that Province do not themselves believe us to be settled within the reall bounds of his

Lordship's Dominions, but We have been seduced and made use of, first by fair promises & afterwards by threats and punishments, to answer purposes which are at present unjustifiable, and will if pursued tend to our Utter Ruin.

"We, therefore, the subscribers, with many Others, Our Neighbors, being become at last truely sensible of the wrong We have done the Proprietors of Pensilvania in settling on their Lands without paying Obedience to their Government, do resolve to return to Our Duty, and live under the Laws & Government of Pensilvania, in which Province We believe Ourselves seated.

"To this We unanimously resolve to adhere, 'till the Contrary shall be determined by a Legal Decision of the disputed Bounds, and our honest & just Intentions We desire may be communicated to the Governor of Maryland, or whom else it may concern.

"Signed with Our own hands this Eleventh day of August, Anno Dom., 1736."

Then was read the examination of one Francis Kipps, taken here on Saturday the fourth instant, before two of His Majesty's Justices, in these Words:

"Francis Kipps, of Maryland, Master of the Sloop Batchelor's Hall, now lying in Sasquehannah River, aged about thirty-eight years, being examined upon Oath before Clem't Plumsted & Charles Read, Esqrs., two of His Majesty's Justices, saith,

"That on thursday last, the second instant, in the evening, this Examinant, being on his private business in Baltimore County, he saw Colonel Hall, a Gentleman of that County, at the head of a considerable Number of Men (but how many this Examinant cannot say) on Horseback, armed with Guns, marching towards the upper part of the said County, that this Examt. passing near to Col. Hall, asked him familiarly if he was going to fight, to weh. Mr. Hall answered he was going on peaceable terms: That this Examt. crossing Sasquehannah near North East Iron works, came the same evening into Cecil County, where he understood by common Report, that the March of these Men under Col. Hall was to give Possession to one Cressap of a Plantation of one Wright, that if the same could not be done peaceably they were to use Force: That this Examt. heard the Militia of Cecil County was summoned to meet together. "Taken before Us at Philadia., Sept. 4th, 1736.

"Clemt. Plumsted,
"Charles Read."

FRA. KIPPS.

Upon all which the President desiring the advice of this Board, and the matter being duely considered, The Board are of Opinion, that a proper Answer cannot be given to the Lieut. Governor of Maryland until the Proceedings in Lancaster County are more fully and clearly known.

At a Council held at Philadia., September 8th, 1736.

PRESENT:

The Honble JAMES LOGAN, Esqr., President.

Clement Plumstead,

Thomas Laurence,

Ralph Assheton,

Samuel Hasell,
Thomas Griffitts, Esqrs.
Charles Read,

The meeting of the Board at this time being to consider of the Draught of an answer to Governor Ogle, and it having been the Opinion of most of the Members at the preceeding Council, that some accounts from Lancaster were necessary to be had before that Answer could be fully completed, the President laid before the Board a Letter he had but an hour since received, dated the seventh instant, & wrote by Direction of Mr. Blunston, who was so much engaged in attending the Affairs then transacting on the west side of Sasquehannah, as not to be able to write himself, which Letter gives the following Account:

That after the Sherif of Lancaster, and some People with him, who were gathered together on the Report that an armed force from Maryland was coming up into those parts, had waited some time and were dispersed, the Sherif of Baltimore County, with upwards of two hundred Men, under the Command of several military Officers, arrived on Saturday night last, the fourth of this Month, at Thomas Cressap's, and on Sunday, about noon, came in arms on Horseback, with Beat of Drum & Sound of Trumpet, to the Plantation of John Hendrick's; that the said Sherif of Baltimore, and several of those Officers, went that afternoon to the House of John Wright, Junr., where about thirty Inhabitants of Lancaster were assembled, & demanded the Dutch, of whom some were then in that House, that the Sherif of Lancaster had sent a written Message, desiring to know the Reason of their coming in that hostile manner, to threaten the Peace of the Province, to which they had returned answer, that they were not come to disturb the Peace of the Province of Pennsylvania, but to suppress Riots, & keep the Peace of Baltimore County; That Justice Guest, one of the Number from Maryland, appointed ten a'clock next day to speak with some of our People, but about five a'clock on Sunday evening, the Multitude from Maryland left Hendrick's with great Precipitation, & returned to Cressap's; That on Monday the Sherif of Lancaster sent another Message in writing, requiring them peaceably to depart, and offering, if any of them would meet the Magistrates of the County, with some Other Persons who were on this Occasion assembled with him, & endeavour amicably to settle the unhappy Differences at present subsisting, that they should be received civilly; to this Message the Sherif of Lancaster had returned a threatening and insolent answer; that soon after this, one John Wilkin, an Inhabitant of Lancaster County, who had gone down towards Cressap's, was taken Prisoner,

on pretence of his having been in a former Riot, and sent under a Guard to Maryland; that the Magistrates of Lancaster sent a letter to reclaim him, but they refused to receive the Letter; that it was reported the Governor of Maryland was waiting in Baltimore County, & was expected up in those parts on Susquehannah with considerably more Force; That the Sherif of Lancaster had gott about a hundred & fifty People together at John Wright's, Junr., where they have continued since Sunday evening, that no Hostilities had been yet committed, except in taking Wilkins, but that the Marylanders had sent Word to our People to take Care of their Buffs; that the Inhabitants, tho' unprovided with arms & Amunition, yet endeavoured to defend themselves & such of His Majesties Peaceable Subjects as fled from their Houses to them for Refuge.

With the Letter aforesaid was transmitted the following Petition, Signed by forty-eight Germans:

"To The Honourable James Logan, Esqr., President, and the Council of the Province of Pennsylvania,

"The Petition of Most of the Inhabitants on the west side of Susquehannah River, Opposite to Hempfield, in the County of Lancaster,

"That your Petitioners, two or three years past (Being many of us then newly arrived in America), & altogether Strangers to the Boundaries of the two Boundaries of Pennsylvania & Maryland, were, by many plausable pretences and fair promises, perswaded to settle under the Government of the Latter, Supposing from what we were then told that these Lands were within that Province, and that the River Sasquehannah was the Division; But, after we were Seated, finding the usage we received was very Different from that to the rest of the Government, and what small substance we had was made a prey to some Persons Impowered by them; And, tho' we Often made known our Cause of Complaint, could have no Redress, Nor the Promises which had been first made us, in the Least Regarded-Being also lately told by some in Power there, that we were worse than Negroes, for that we had no Master, nor were under the protection of any Laws, and since Informed by them that the River Sasquehannah Could not be the bounds, as we had at first been told, but that an East and West Line would Divide the Provinces; and also observing that the People on the East Side of the said River, Inhabitants of Pennsylvania, who live much more to the Southward than we do, Enjoy'd their Possessions peaceably, without any Disturbance or Claim from the Province of Maryland: Wee, from these Reasons, Concluded we had been Imposed upon, & Deluded to Answer some purposes of the Government of Maryland, which are not Justifiable, and might in the Eud tend to Our Ruin, and that we were not Settled within the true & Real Bounds of that Province, as we had been made to Believe; And from a

Sense thereof, and of the wrong we were doing to the Proprietors of Pennsylvania, in living on their Lands (as we now conceive we are) without paying the Acknowledgements due to them for the same, and in Denying Obedience to the Laws of your Government, Unanimously Resolved, to Return to our Duty. Your Humble Petitioners therefore pray you would Impute our Late Errours to Our want of Better Information, and would be pleased to receive us under the Protection of your Laws and Government, To which, for the future, we promise all ffaithful Obedience & Submission; And in Granting this Our Humble Petition, your Petitioners, as in Duty Bound, shall Ever pray for your Health & Prosperity. Signed with Our Own Hands, & Dated the thirteenth day of August, One Thousand Seven Hundred & thirty-six."

The Board taking the letter & Petition aforesaid into their serious consideration, the following Draught of a Letter to the Justices & High Sherif of the County of Lancaster was prepared and agreed

to:

"Gentlemen:

"The accounts we have this day received of the military & warlike Preparations of our Neighbours of Maryland, which are said to be intended against some of the Inhabitants of your County of Lancaster in this Province, cannot but very much surprize us, as such Proceedings must undoubtedly be construed a Levying of War against His Majesty's Subjects, & it being your indispensable Duty, by all proper means in your power, to prevent all Riots and Hostilities, & to preserve His Majesty's Peace in your County, you are to exert your utmost Endeavours for that End; but if you shall find the same like to prove ineffectual, we must observe to you that by the Laws of this Province, riotous & tumultuous Meetings being Subject to the same Punishments as in England, you are to cause the Proclamation, directed by the act of the 1st of the late King, to be made, in doing whereof, that you may proceed agreeably to the Directions of the said act, we send you herewith a Copy of the same; and if any Opposition should either be made to the reading of the Proclamation, or if they should think fitt to disregard it when read, you are to direct the Sherif to be ready with the Posse of the County to protect and defend His Majesty's Subjects, Inhabitants. of the same, from all Insults or Outrages, taking special Care at the same time that you do not by any precipitant Step or fruitless Opposition to a superior Force expose the Lives of any of the King's Subjects. It is likewise incumbent on you, & you are not to omitt taking the most exact Notice and making the best Observations you can of all Proceedings herein, that a distinct and full account may be given of them & the names of the Persons that are most active in promoting & carrying on such Disturbances, that a proper application may be made thereupon to His Majesty, from whose Justice VOL. IV.-5.