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L. H. J.
Liber No. 48
July 8
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Regard to Religion, your Address has given me the first Informa-
tion; but as the Gentlemen, who recommended him to me as a proper
Object of Mercy, are well known to be good Protestants, and have
shewn, on all Occasions, the firmest Attachment and Loyalty to his
Majesty, as you yourselves can Witness for Two of them, who were
some Years thought worthy to be Members of your House, I am
willing to hope their Recommendation was owing to a different
Motive from that which you have assigned; though as you speak
pretty positively with Respect to that Matter, I presume you want
not some extraordinary Evidence or Testimony, which I hope will
not be kept secret, that I may be better enabled to enquire into the
Affair, and that the Gentlemen reflected on may have an Opportunity,
should it happen to be false, of vindicating themselves, by disprov-
ing it.
The two other Instances of Partiality, as you are pleased to speak,
shewed to Popish Delinquents in Prince George's County, are, I
am told (for till now I was unacquainted within the Pale of what
Church they were numbered, my pardoning one Pye, a Youth, and
the Wife of one Bevan, each of them on the Application, and at the
earnest Request of many Protestant Gentlemen of their Neighbour-
hood, among whom were the Parties who had been injured......
I remember that many favourable Circumstances were urged in Be-
half of the first, and that one Inducement to me to yield to his
Friends Sollicitation, was, the Probability and Hopes of his being
a useful Witness against one Crawford, a noted Felon, then in
Custody in Charles County Goal, about to be tried at the Assizes,
where Pye was also recognized to appear as an Evidence against him.
Neither was the Woman represented as a less proper Object of
Mercy, and many Arguments were urged to move my compassion
to hear: If I recollect her Case, she was married to a very loose and
extravagant Man: her Husband had been brought up by and de-
pended upon an Uncle; the Wife went with a forged Letter of Credit,
signed with the Name of the Uncle, to Mr. Roundell's Store, and in
Virtue of that Deceit, obtained Credit for some Goods: This she
did, as there was Reason to suppose, with the P'rivity or by the
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p. 155
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Compulsion of a necessitous and base Husband; so had the Prosecu-
tion been carried on, the simple Wife might possibly have been
punished, while the more guilty Husband escaped with Impunity.
I might now proceed to mention the Constable in Charles County,
some Persons of Frederick, with more than twenty others, who have
been fortunate enough to be recommended to my Clemency, and
have by that Means escaped the Punishments, to which their Offences
or Misbehaviour had subjected them; but as they were known
Protestants, I need not, I suppose, enumerate them: However, I
hope you will no longer think, that the Mercy which has been shewn
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