Instructions to the Earl of Bellomont, etc. etc., to inquire into the misdemeanors of Rhode Island. Instructions for our Right Trusty and well beloved Cousin, Richard, Earl of Bellomont, Captain Generall and Commander in Chief of our Provinces of the Massachusetts Bay, New York, and New Hampshire, and of the territories thereupon depending, in America. With these Instructions, you will receive our Commission, under our great Seal of England, authorizing, empowering, and requiring you to inquire into the disorders. and irregularities countenanced and practiced by the Governor and Company of our Collony of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations, in New England, in America, and thereupon to examine persons and witnesses, or to cause inquiries and examinations to be made upon the place or otherwise, in order to the procuring of full and legall evidences of the misdemeanors of the said Governor and Company, and to make report thereof unto us. In order to your proceeding therein, you shall therefore by the first convenient opportunity, according as the importance and circumstances of our service in any of our respective Plantations, in America, committed unto your charge, will permit, repair unto our foresaid Collony of Rhode Island, or if that cannot conveniently be done, you shall send and appoint fit persons to make inquiries, and take examinations there upon oath, concerning all things relating to the male administration of the respective Governors and Company of our said Collony, since our accession to the Crown of these kingdoms. And as occasion offers, you shall also make or cause to be made, the like inquiries, either in the place of your residence, when you receive our forementioned Commission, with these our Instructions, or elsewhere, as you find it may be necessary or useful to the end proposed. And for the better discovery of all the irregular and illegal practices of the said respective Governors and Company you shall in our name require from those at present in authority in our said Collony, authentic copies of all the acts of their Generall Assemblies, which are now in force amongst them; as also of the journals of their publick proceedings, as well in Councill as in Assembly, and of the commissions of war granted by any of them to commanders of ships. As also of other public records, registers, or entries, relating to the administration of that government, which may best tend to discover the disorders and irregularities countenanced or practiced in it. You shall carefully consider and weigh all the forementioned acts, journals, and other papers relating to the proceedings of the foresaid respective Governors and Company in the administration of the government of our said Collony, or cause the same to be so considered by capable and proper persons. In order to compare the methods and rules established by them or any of them (together with their proceedings thereupon), with the laws of this our kingdom of England; and more particularly with the Patent or Charter by which they are incorporated (of which Charter you are therefore likewise to require a copy from those that are at present there in authority), and to observe in what particulars either their practice or any of the methods, rules, or laws so established amongst them are repugnant to the laws of this kingdom; as also in what other things they have deviated from and gone con trary to the rules prescribed by their forementioned Charter, or have usurped and exercised any authority beyond the powers therein conferred upon them. And for the more effectual execution of our will and pleasure in this matter, you shall call to your assistance, or direct those that may be appointed by you for this service, to call to their assistance, Francis Brinley, Peleg Sanford, Nathaniel Coddington, Caleb Arnold, Josias Arnold, or any of them, or any such other persons as you or those appointed by you, shall find upon inquiry, and judge to be most capable and best disposed to give you or them such true and perfect informations as may enable you to form a scheme of inquiries proper for the service now required from you. The subjects upon which you are to make more particular inquiries, are the officers employed in any part of the administration of that government, and the legality of their qualifications for the execution of their respective offices. The acts of Assembly or laws of that Collony, the administration of justice and Courts estab lished amongst them for that purpose. The constitution of their militia, as well with relation to the election of officers as to the training of the inhabitants in martial affairs. The commissions of war which they have at any time granted to commanders of ships, and their conduct in relation to piracy, or to persons either known or who might reasonably have been suspected to be guilty thereof; and also in relation to illegal trade and traders. Upon all which things, and others that you may yourself find convenient, you are to observe as before directed; the agreements or disagreements of the methods established amongst them, with the Charter for their incorporation. Their practice and behaviour in the execution of their own laws or rules; their observation or breach of the acts of Parliament passed in this our kingdom of England, which have any relation to our Plantations in America; especially of the act passed in the sev enth and eighth years of our reign, entitled "An Act for preventing frauds, and regulating abuses in the Plantation trade," and more particularly of that clause in the said act, by which the respective Governors of our said Collony (as those in other Proprieties), are required before their entrance upon the government, to have our allowance and approbation, and to take the same oaths that are enjoyned to be taken by the Governor or Commanders in Chief in any other [of] our Collonies and Plantations. And accordingly you are to make inquiries or cause inquiries to be made, as aforesaid, upon oath, for the full and clear discovery of all the misdemeanors committed, practiced or countenanced in the administration of the government of our foresaid Collony. Further, besides the several inquiries which you shall find it necessary to make or cause to be made, in pursuance of these foregoing Instructions, our will and pleasure is, that you likewise take care that the persons hereunder named, be examined upon oath, to the following particular queries, viz. : Walter Clarke, Esq'r, late Governor of the foresaid Collony of Rhode Island, &c. Q. Did you grant any commissions during the late war, to any privateers? Q. Did you not grant a commission to Robert Colly, commander of the Pellican. Q. What security did you take of him? John Greene, Deputy Governor of the Collony of Rhode Island. Q. Did you grant any commissions during the late war, to any privateers? Q. To whom did you grant any such commissions? Q. What security did you take of Banks, Mayes, Tew and Lawrence? Q. By what authority did you, being Deputy Governor of the said Collony, grant any such commissions, when there was a Governor then in the government and in the execution of his office? John Easton, Esq'r, late Governor of the Collony of Rhode Island? Q. Did you grant any commissions to any privateers, during the late war? Q. Did you consent to John Greene, the Deputy Governor's granting any such commissions whilst you were Governor? Q. Dil you any ways declare against or forbid the said Greene to grant any such commissions? Walter Clarke, Esq'r, late Governor of the Collony of Rhode Island? Q. Did you not know or have you not seen during the time you were Governor of the Collony of Rhode Island, Downe in your government? Cornish and Q. Did you not hear that the said Cornish and Downe were not of the pirate Avery's company? Q. Was Cornish apprehended and committed to prison? Q. Was Downe apprehended and committed to prison? Q. Did either of them make his escape out of prison? Q. How did he make his escape? Q. Was the Sheriff prosecuted for suffering him to escape? Samuell Cranston, Esq'r, present Governor of the Collony of Rhode Island. Q. Did you not know or have you not seen during the time of your being Gov ernor of Rhode Island, &c., Cornish and Downe in your government? Q. Did you not hear that the said Cornish and Downe were of the pirate Avery's company? Q. Was Cornish apprehended and committed to prison ? Q. Was Downe apprehended and committed to prison ? Q. Did either of them make his escape out of prison ? Q. How did he make his escape? Q. Was the Sheriff prosecuted for suffering him to escape? Q. During the time you have been Governor of the Collony of Rhode Island, &c., did you not know or have you not seen Robert Munday and George Cutler in your government? Q. Did you not hear or suspect that the said Munday and Cutler had been a privateering, or committing piracy in the East Indies? Q. Were they apprehended and committed to prison? Q. By whom was the warrant for their commitment signed? Q. Were they admitted to bail after they were committed? Q. By whom were they admitted to bail? Q. Was any complaint made to you against them after they were admitted to bail? Q. Was not complaint made to you that they were seen armed with pistols, or did you not hear that they were seen armed with pistols ? Q. Was not complaint made to you that they affronted and abused his Majesty's subjects? Q. Were they not at bail upon their good behavior? Q. Did you cause their bonds to be prosecuted? Q. Were they not taken up a second time and committed without bail or mainprize? Q. Were they bailed after their second commitment? Q. Who admitted them to bail after their said second commitment? Q. If the Sheriff, did you cause the Sheriff to be prosecuted for so doing? Q. Did you not severall times within these three or four years last past, in the Collony of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations, sit Judge of a Court, which you called a Court of Admiralty; and as Judge of a Court of Admiralty hear, try, and determine severall causes? Q. By what authority did you hold the said Court? Q. Did not Peleg Sanford, Esq'r, in the year 1697, you being then Governor of said Collony, show you a commission to him, the said Sanford, appointing him Judge of the Court of Admiralty within the said Collony? Q. Did not the said Sanford demand of you to administer to him an oath in or der to qualify him to execute the said office? Q. Did you administer to him such an oath ? Q. Why did you not? Peleg Sanford, Esq'r. Q. Did you not in the year 1697, receive a commission, appointing you Judge of the Court of Admiralty, in the Collony of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations? Q. Did you not soon after you received the said commission, show the same to Walter Clarke, then Governor of the said Collony? Q. Did you not demand of the said Clarke to administer to you an oath in order to qualify you to execute the said office? Q. Did not the said Clarke refuse to administer to you such an oath ? Q. Did not the said Clarke detain from you the said commission? Q. Did you not severall times demand the said commission of him? Q. What answer did the said Clarke make upon your demanding of him the said commission? Samuell Cranston, Esq'r, present Governor of Rhode Island, &c. Q. Did you not in the year 1697 and 1698, you being then Governor of the Collony of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations, see a commission to Peleg Sanford, appointing the said Sanford Judge of the Court of Admiralty, in the foresaid Collony? Q. Had you not the said Sanford's commission in your custody? Q. Did not the said Sanford demand of you to administer to him an oath, in or der to qualify him to execute the said office? Q. Did you administer to him such an oath? Q. Why did you not? Peleg Sanford, Esq'r. Q. Had not Samuell Cranston, Esq'r, in the year 1698, he being then Governor of the Collony of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations, your aforesaid commission in his custody? Q. Did you not demand of him to administer to you an oath in order to qualify you to execute your said office of Judge of the Court of Admiralty? Q. Did not the said Cranston refuse to administer to you any such oath? Lastly. You shall transmit unto us by one of our Principal Secretaries of State, and to our Commissioners for Trade and Plantations, copies of all papers that shall have been laid before you or the persons appointed by you, relating to the administration of the government of our foresaid Collony, and of the severall informations and proofs that you or they shall have received, upon any matters or things in pursuance of these our foregoing Instructions, together with your Report, of your or their whole proceedings in the execution of what we have hereby and by our forementioned commission required from you. To the King's Most Excellent Majesty : May it please your Majesty :-Having lately in obedience to your Majesty's order in Councill, of the 5th of January last, laid before your Majesty, the draught of a commission for the Earl of Bellomont, to empower him to inquire into and examine witnesses for the discovery of the misdemeanors committed in the government of your Majesty's Collony of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations, in America. We herewith humbly lay before your Majesty a draught of such instructions, as we conceive may be also proper for that service.* Which, nevertheless, we most humbly submit. Whitehall, March the 9th, 1698-9. TANKERVILLE, Proceedings of the Generall Assembly held for the Collony of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations at Newport, the 3d of May, 1699. |