TO JOSEPH NYE.1
[Collections of Massachusetts Historical Society, 4th ser., vol. iv., pp. 206, 207.]
BOSTON, Feb. 21, 1775.2
SIR,
Your letter of the 17th of January, written in behalf of the Committee of Correspondence for the Town of Sandwich, came duly to hand. Capt. Tobey, the bearer, was kind enough to deliver to the Committee of this Town, appointed to receive Donations for the relief and employment of the sufferers by the Boston Port Bill, a charitable collection from the Congregational societies in Sandwich, amounting to nineteen pounds and three pence, for which he has our Treasurer's receipt. I am to desire you, in the name of our Committee, to return their sincere thanks to our worthy brethren, for the kindness they have shown to those sufferers by so generous a contribution for their support under the cruel hand of oppression. It affords us abundant satisfaction to have the testimony of such respectable bodies of men, that the inhabitants of this Town are not sufferers as evil doers, but for "their steady adherence to the cause of liberty," and we cannot but persuade ourselves that the Supreme Being approves our conduct, by whose all powerful influence the British American continent hath been united, and thus far successful, in disappointing the enemies of our common liberty, in their hopes, that by reducing the people to want and hunger, they should force them to yield to their unrighteous demands.
I am, Sir, in the name of the Committee, with sincere good wishes, your friend and countryman,
_________________________________________________________________ 1Member of the committee of correspondence of Sandwich, Massachusetts. 2The actual date of this letter would appear to have been February 25, from a prior manuscript copy in the library of the Massachusetts Historical Society. All letters here printed from the Collections, 4th ser., vol. iv., are contained in a volume of manuscript copies, from which apparently the texts in the Collections were edited. The text of the Collections has been followed in the present volume.