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man who was the object of them. Mr. Henry, who had been on the point of setting out for congress at the time when he had been called off by the intelligence from Williamsburgh, now resumed his journey, and was escorted in triumph by a large party of gentlemen, as far as Hooe's ferry, on the Potomac. Messengers were sent after him from all directions, bearing the thanks and the applauses of his assembled countrymen, for his recent enterprise; and in such throngs did these addresses come, that the necessity of halting to read and answer them converted a journey of one day into a triumph of many. Thus the same man, whose genius had in the year seventeen hundred and sixty-five given the first political impulse to the revolution, had now the additional honour of heading the first military movement in Virginia, in support of the same cause.

CHAPTER VI.

Second Session of the Delegates to Congress-Attachment of the People of Virginia to Lady Dunmore-Barbarous Proceeding of Lord DunmoreTakes his Residence on board the Fowey-His Correspondence with the Committee-Mr. Henry is appointed Colonel of one of the Regiments raised by the Colonial Convention-Tender of the British sloop Otter is burnt by the People-Correspondence with Capt. Squire in relation to that EventLord Dunmore heads a Body of Recruits-Col. Woodford is sent to oppose his Progress-Circumstances leading to Mr. Henry's resignation-He is elected a Delegate to the Convention-Declaration of Rights-Mr. Henry elected Governor of Virginia-Addresses connected with that Event.

I CANNOT learn that Mr. Henry distinguished himself peculiarly at this session of congress. The spirit of resistance was sufficiently excited; and nothing remained but to organize that resistance, and to plan and execute the details which were to give it effect. In business of this nature, Mr. Henry as we have seen, was not efficient. It has been already stated that he was unsuccessful in composition, of which much was done, and eminently done, at this session; and the lax habits of his early life had implanted in him an insuperable aversion to the drudgery of details. He could not endure confinement of any sort, nor the labour of close and solitary thinking.

His habits were all social, and his mind delighted in unlimited range. His conclusions were never reached by an elaborate deduction of thought; he gained them as it were per saltem; yet with a certainty not less infallible than that of the driest and severest logician. It is not wonderful, therefore, that he

felt himself lost amid the operations in which congress was now engaged, and that he enjoyed the relief which was afforded him, by a military appointment from his native state. It will be proper, however, to explain particularly the proceed. ings which led to this incident in the life of Mr. Henry.

Shortly after the affair of the gunpowder, Lord North's conciliatory proposition, popularly called the Olive Branch, arrived in America. Hereupon the governor of Virginia called a meeting of the house of burgesses; and as if the quarrel were now completely over, Lady Dunmore and her family returned from the Fowey to the palace.

If an estimate may be formed from the newspapers of the day, into which the people seem to have poured their feelings without reserve, that lady was eminently a favourite in this colony. Her residence here had been short; yet the exalted virtues which marked her character, and those domestic graces and attractions which shone with the more lustre by contrast with his lordship, had already endeared her to the people; and would have consecrated her person, and those of her children, . amid the wildest tumult to which this colony could possibly be excited. The people had been extremely wounded by her late departure for the Fowey: they considered it as a measure of his lordship, and as an unjust reflection both upon the judg ment and generosity of the people of this country.

They had told him intelligibly enough, that they had formed a much more correct estimate of her worth than he himself appeared to have done; and that so far from her being insecure in the bosom of a people who thus admired, respected, and loved her, his lordship would have acted much more wisely to have kept her near his person, and covered himself under the sacred shield which sanctified her in the eyes of Virginians. In proportion to their regret and mortification at her depar ture, was the ardour of delight with which they hailed her return. A paragraph in Purdie's paper assured her, that "her arrival at the palace was to the great joy of the citizens of Williamsburgh, and of the people of the whole country, who had the most unfeigned regard and affection for her ladyship, and wished her long to live among them."

On Thursday, the first of June, the general assembly according to the proclamation of Lord Dunmore, met at the capitol in the city of Williamsburgh. He addressed them with great earnestness on the alarming state of the colony; and exhibited the conciliatory proposition of the British ministry, as an advance on the part of the mother-country, which it was the duty of the colonists to meet with gratitude and devotion. The Council answered him in a manner perfectly satisfactory; but

before he could receive the answer of the house of burgesses, an incident occurred, which drove his lordship precipitately from his palace, and terminated for ever all friendly relations between himself and the people of Virginia.

It seems, that during the late ferment, produced by the removal of the powder, and while Mr. Henry was on his march toward Williamsburgh, some of the inhabitants of the town, to the great offence of the graver citizens, had possessed themselves of a few of the guns which still remained in the magazine. This step gave great displeasure as well as alarm to the governor; and although the mayor and council, as well as all the more respectable inhabitants of the town, condemned it in terms as strong as his own, and sincerely united in the means which were used to recover the arms, yet his lordship continued to brood over it in secret, until, with the aid of the minions of the palace, he hatched a scheme of low and cruel revenge, sufficient of itself to cover him with immortal infamy.

It was on Monday night, the fifth of June, that this scheme discovered itself. "Last Monday night," says Purdie, "an unfortunate accident happened to two persons of this city, who, with a number of others, had assembled at the magazine, to furnish themselves with arms. Upon their entering the door, one of the guns, which had a spring to it, and was charged eight fingers deep with swan-shot, went off, and lodged two balls in one of their shoulders, another entered at his wrist, and is not yet extracted: the other person had one of his fingers shot off, and the next to it so much shattered as to render it useless, by which sad misfortune he is deprived of the means of procuring a livelihood by his business. Spring-guns, it seems, were placed at other parts of the magazine, of which the public were totally ignorant; and certainly had any person lost his life, the perpetrator or perpetrators of this diabolical Invention might have been justly branded with the opprobrious title of murderers. O tempora! O mores!"

The indignation naturally excited by this piece of deliberate and barbarous treachery, which was at once traced to Lord Dunmore, was farther aggravated by a discovery that several barrels of powder had been buried in the magazine, with the purpose, it was reasonably conjectured, of being used as a mine, and thus producing still more fatal destruction, when the occasion should offer. Early on the next morning, Lord Dunmore with his family, including Captain Foy, fled from the palace to return to it no more, and took shelter on board the Fowey, from the vengeance which he knew he so justly deserved. No commotion, however, had ensued to justify his retreat.

The people, indeed, were highly indignant, but they were

silent and quiet. The suggestions of his lordship's conscience had alone produced his flight. He left behind him a message to the speaker and house of burgesses, in which he ascribed this movement to apprehensions for his personal safety; stated that he should fix his residence on board the Fowey; that no interruption should be given to the sitting of the assembly; that he should make the access to him easy and safe; and thought it would be more agreeable to the house to send to him, from time to time, one or more of their members, as occasion might require, than to put the whole body to the trouble of moving to be near him.

On receiving this message, the house immediately resolved itself into a committee of the whole, and prepared an answer, in which they expressed their deep concern at the step which he had taken-assuring him that his apprehensions of personal danger were entirely unfounded; regretting that he had not expressed them to the house previous to his departure, since, from their zeal and attachment to the preservation of order and good government, they should have judged it their indispensable duty to have endeavoured to remove any cause of disquietude. They express the anxiety with which they contemplate the very disagreeable situation of his most amiable lady and her family, and assure him, that they should think themselves happy in being able to restore their perfect tranquillity, by removing all their fears.

They regret his departure and the manner of it, as tending to keep up the great uneasiness which had of late so unhappily prevailed in this country; and declared that they will cheerfully concur in any measure that may be proposed, proper for the security of himself and his family; they remind him how impracticable it will be to carry on the business of the session with any tolerable degree of propriety, or with that despatch which the advanced season of the year required, while his lordship was so far removed from them, and so inconveniently situated; and conclude with entreating him, that he would be pleased to return with his lady and family to the palace, which they say, they are persuaded will give the greatest satisfaction, and be the most likely means of quieting the minds of the people.

This communication was carried down to him by a deputation of two members of the council, and four of the house of burgesses; and in reply to language so respectful, and assurances so friendly and conciliatory, his lordship returned an answer in which he charged them with having slighted his offers of respect and civility, with giving countenance to the violent and disorderly proceeding of the people, and with a usurpation

of the executive power in ordering and appointing guards to mount in the city of Williamsburgh, with the view, as was pretended, to protect the magazine, but which might well be doubted, as there then remained nothing therein which required being guarded; he exhorts them to return within the pale of their constitutional power; to redress the many grievances which existed; to open the courts of justice; to disarm the independent companies, and what was not less essential by their own example, and every means in their power, to abolish the spirit of persecution which pursued, with menaces and acts of oppression, all his majesty's loyal and orderly subjects.

For the accomplishment of which ends, he invited them to adjourn to the town of York, opposite to which the Fowey lay, where he promised to meet and remain with them till their business should be finished. But with respect to their entreaty that he would return to the palace, he represents to them that unless they closed in with the conciliatory proposition now offered to them by the British parliament, his return to Williamsburgh would be as fruitless to the people, as possibly it might be dangerous to himself. So that he places the event of his returning, on their acceptance of Lord North's offer of conciliation.

The house of burgesses now took up that proposition; and having examined it in every light, with the utmost attention, they conclude with a firm and dignified rejection of it, and an appeal "to the even-handed justice of that Being who doth no wrong; earnestly beseeching him to illuminate the councils, and prosper the endeavours, of those to whom America had confided her hopes, that, through their wise direction, we may again see reunited the blessings of liberty and prosperity, and the most permanent harmony with Great Britain."

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A correspondence on another topic was now opened between the council and burgesses, and the governor, Dunmore.

The former addressed him with a request, that he would order a large parcel of arms which he had left in the palace to be removed to the public magazine, a place of greater safety. This he peremptorily refused; and ordered that those arms, belonging to the king, should not be touched without his express permission. In their reply, they say, that the arms may ⚫ in some sort be considered as belonging to the king, as the supreme head of the government, and that they were properly under his lordship's direction; yet they humbly conceived, that they were originally provided and had been preserved for the use of the country in cases of emergency.

*This vigorous and eloquent production is from the same pen which drew the Declaration of American Independence.

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