to the extreem and dr[awn] all its weight [of] rage upon them, and after they have with various success deludged the Country in Blood the Issue will be that the Americans will be a free independant people. this may be the result of a Struggle of many years. Thus I have Stated what appears to me to be the natural course of the present contest, and in its course the different Towns will have at different times to incounter all the miserys of War, Sword, famin, and perhaps pestalence, as that is generally an attendant on War and so is famin I now would ask our Dear Mother by you, weither a month's Voyage is by any means an evil to be compaired to the evils above menshoned? if not, why she will hisitate one moment. I am surprized she did not come with Your Sister. by your Letter you seemed determined, but I write this lest my Dear Mother should still deliberate. you are to consider if things should come to that extremity that would fix her determination, it may be out of her power than to leave the place. I shall be very glad to find you have imbarked, but if it should be otherways, I think you must prevail with our Mother to come; but when this reaches you it will be late, perhaps Octr., whereas the latter end of May or the begining of June is the time to have short and smooth passages. at the same time, however, it may be that even a January passage would be more eligiable than to stay in Boston. this you will Judge best of yourself, you can have no Idea of my Anxiety for you while you remain in that place. I therefore request you will bring Our hond. Mother, and beleive me Yours Affect'y

J. S. COPLEY.

Give my Affectionate love and Duty to all friends, perticularly My Dear Mother and let me expect to see her in England as soon as possable.

SIR,

Johnson to Henry Pelham

[1775?]

I have seen Mr. Robertson the Engeneer, who Consents to show you his draughts of ours and the enemys Works. If you'll be so good to perfect the draught you are makeing of this town and the enverons and insert these in it, before the Admiral Sails, youl oblige me by letting me have the draught.

If you call at Capt Robertson's tomorrow morning early youl find him at home. he lives in the Street where Mr. Hallowell the Commissioner dwells,1 ten or twelve houses nearer Concert hall 2 on the other side of the Street. I am, Sir, your obt. Servt.

JAMES[?] JOHNSON.

[Addressed:] To Mr. Pelham New Boston.

Henry Pelham to Copley

MY DEAR BROTHER,

BOSTON, August 19, 1774 [1775].

It was my intention to have wrote you a long Letter to have accompanyed a plan which I have almost this moment finished, proposing to have exhibited to the Publick as perfect an Idea as was possable upon Paper of the late most important and glorious action, which I was an anxious Spectator of, and to which under God I attribute my present capacity for writing, and I hope will be our future security.

1

Benjamin Hallowell occupied land on Hanover Street which was sold under the confiscation act and later became the property of the Hanover Street Church.

2 Concert Hall was at the corner of Hanover and Queen (Court) Street.

I was disapointed in my expectations. this morning upon waiting on Gen❜l Gage, he acquainted me that it would not be altogether proper to publish a plan of Charlestown in its present state, as it would furnish those without with a knowledge of the fortification[s] erected there and in a polite manner desired I would postpone the sending it at present. Mrs. Copley desired we would write word when we met with fresh Meat. You will form some Idea of our present disagreable Situation when I tell you that last Monday, I eat at Gen'l Howe's Table at Charlestown Camp, the only bit of fresh Meat I have tasted for very near four Months past. And then not with a good Conscience, considering the many Persons who in sickness are wanting that and most of the Convenency[s] of Life. The usual pleas now made by those who beg a little Bacon or Saltfish is that its for a sick person.

Mr. Clarke says he has inclosed you Copies of some late intercepted Letters. by them you will find what those who stile themselves patriots are after, and where there Schems will drive us. [Independency [is] what alone will content those who have insinuated themselves into the good Opinion of (generally speaking) a well meaning but credulous people. Upon the supposition that this Country was totally independent on the Parent State, in the Name of Common Sence what one advantage could accrue? Should we be free from Taxes? We know we could not support a goverment for ten times the expence. Should we be Safer from forreign insults? Reason tells us that we should be exposed to every Inconven[ien]ce that a defenceless and impoverish'd People ever experienced. Would our internal Peace and Happyness be greater? Here alass! We may look back to those Days of Felicity and Peace which we enjoyed under the fostering Care and indulgent Protection of Britain,

and contemplate ourselves as having once been the happiest people in the Empire; and on this View I am sure every unprejudiced Person will execrate those distructive Schems, and that unbounded Ambition whi[c]h from the pinacle of Ease has plunged us into the depths of Distress and Ruin Judge Sewall,1 who kindly takes the Care of this, just setting out on his Voyage obliges me to conclude abruptly acquaint❜g you that we are all as Well as the times will permitt. with wishing My dear Sister and family ever[y] possable felicity, I am, my dearest Brother, your

[Unsigned.]

P. S. I write this in your house in the Common where the Company unite with me in good Wishes. Our hon'd Mam[ma] desires her kind Love to you all. I must beg when you write me, to be carefull what you say, as all letter[s] that come into the[i]r hands are prise. I beleive there is one or more of your Letters at Cambridge. I almost hope ther[e] is, as I should be grieved to find you had not wrote to me. when you write send your letters [di]rectly to this Place.

Copley to Henry Pelham

MY DEAR BROTHER,

PARMA, Augst 22d., 1775.

I take this oppertunity to write to you, although I dont know weither you are still in America or on your Voyage to England. if you are in Boston I am sensable you must want every consolation that can be affoard'd you in so unhappy a situation. this induces me to address you at this time, that you may have the small comfort my letters can affoard you, which is all that is 1 1 Jonathan Sewall, Attorney-General of Massachusetts.

in my power while you remain in that unhappy place. I really hope to hear of your safe arrival in England with our Dear Mother. I cannot but be very thankfull to that beneficient being for all his mercy to me through life, but in a very perticular maner for the course of my affairs (which has removed me from that place of distress just at the time it did), being so overuled as to have preserved me from much distress anxiety and dificulty; and I trust that, although I may by this unhappy struggle be reduced to a state of poverty, I shall have my health and meet with that incouragement in England which will enable me to provide for my family, and in a decent manner bring these Dear Children up which God has blessed me with. I am just now on the point of finishing my Tour, which I should have found it very dificult to have taken if I had stayd in America longer than I did, and if I had left it sooner, it would have been doing more violence boath to myself and Dear Wife to have fix'd in England. but now there is no choice left; and my business is so near accomplish'd that my family could not have done better than to have come to England when they did. how short a way do we penetrate into the secrets of Futurity! did you think when I left Boston such a sceene would have taken Place? that I was leaving so much distress? and that my choice was so undoubtedly the most eligiable? and what ere long I should have been obliged to have adopted? and than it would have been to a much greater disadvantage. I now have the hope that my happiness will be made still more compleat by meeting you and my dear mother in England. I shall (if it pleases God to spare my life) be there in Octr., as I am near done in this place, and shall make the best of my way there as soon as I have finished my Copy of the Corregio, which I am about at this time.