Chap. XXXIV.} 1768. June. |
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who had been impressed, was rescued; and when
Nathaniel Waterman went on board the Romney to liberate another by offering a substitute, Conner, the Captain, indulged in a storm of anger.
‘No man,’ said he, ‘shall go out of this vessel.
The town is a blackguard town, ruled by mobs; they have begun with me by rescuing a man whom I pressed this morning.
By the Eternal God, I will make their hearts ache before I leave it.’1 And he continued his impressments, in violation, as the lawyers and people of Boston believed, of an explicit statute.
The Commissioners had a rankling hatred against John Hancock, partly because he with his company of the Boston Cadets had refused to act as escort,2 on the day of the General Election, if they were in the procession; and partly because he openly denounced the revenue Acts.
His sloop, named ‘Liberty,’ had discharged her cargo and had taken in freight for a new voyage; when suddenly, on Friday the tenth of June, near sunset, and just as the laborers were returning home, the officers of the customs, obeying the written directions of the Commissioners,3 seized her for a false entry, which it was pretended had been made several weeks before.
The collector thought she might remain at Hancock's Wharf after she had received the broad arrow;4 but the Comptroller had concerted to moor her under the guns of the Romney, which lay a quarter of a mile
1 Affidavit of Nathaniel Waterman. Compare also Hutchinson to R. Jackson, 18 June, 1768.
2 A. Oliver to Thomas Whately, 11 May, 1768.
3 Harrison and Hallowell to Commissioners of the Customs, 11 June, 1768.
4 Hutchinson to R. Jackson, 16 June, 1768.
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