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L.H.J.
Liber No. 50
May 5
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County, and Mr. Isaac Baker, besides Five or Six young Men that
seemed fond of going with us from Frederick-Town, and whose
expences I bore; not that I suppose it would have been difficult for
me to get a greater Number, but I thought these were enough;
besides I was unwilling to take the People from their Harvest, or
to put the Country to any Expence that could possibly be avoided.
With Regard to the Behaviour of the Militia that were ordered
out on the present Occasion from Kent and Queen-Anne's Counties,
I can only repeat what I have been told by their Officers, that no
sooner had they received my Orders to march, than some who have
the Honour to sit in your House, exerted their utmost Endeavours to
dissuade and discourage them from marching; the Officers were first
practised with, and afterwards the Men. All the Reasons contained
in the Address, which you have now presented to me, were urged to
them, together with some which you have not in the Address taken
Notice of, particularly, that altho' I had a Right or Power to oblige
the whole Militia of a County to march, yet I had no Authority to
order the Officers of a Regiment to determine among themselves by
drawing Lots, which of them should take the Command of, and
March with, a Company or Detachment. I have been told likewise,
that many Artifices were used to hinder the Press-masters from
executing my Warrants; however, both they, and the Officers to
whom my Orders were sent, knew their Duty, and performed it. And
the Men, after the Impression that these fallacious Arguments had
at first made on them was effaced, obeyed their Officers Commands,
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p. 178
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excepting a few, whose Names I understand were returned by their
Captain to a Justice of the Peace, according to the Directions of the
Act of Assembly : Whether they have been all as yet carried before
him, and whether he admitted the Excuses of such as were, or to
what it is owing that none of them were bound over to the last Pro-
vincial Court, I have not been able to learn; but as the Clerk of the
Council was ordered several Days ago to write to Mr. Ringgold the
Justice, I expect that that Gentleman will soon send us a particular
Account of the Steps he has taken with respect to this Affair; and if
it shall appear that he hath been deficient in Point of Duty, as it is
supposed by some that he has, you may depend that proper Notice
shall be taken of his Offence or Neglect.
After what you have often said concerning the Ravages that have
been Committed since the French and their Indian Allies first made
a Descent on this and the two Neighbouring Provinces, I am sur-
prized, Gentlemen, to hear you speak of them as trifling Incursions,
and that you should take Occasion from a Message which Governor
Denny sent in March last to the Assembly of Pennsylvania, to pro-
pagate an Opinion that we have nothing more to fear from the
Indians to the Westward, when we have received Accounts of their
having since that Time attacked the Frontier Inhabitants of Pennsyl-
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