A NARRATIVE OF SUNDRY SERVICES PERFORMED, TOGETHER WITH AN ACCOUNT OF MONEY DISPOSED IN THE SERVICE OF GOVERNMENT DURING THE LATE REBELLION BY WALTER GROSSETT

To the Right Honourable Lord Commissioners of His Majesty’s Treasury, The MEMORIAL of WALTER GROSSETT, Esqr.

Humbly sheweth—

That as your Lordships have been pleased to appoint the Report of S^r Everard Fawkener and Mr. Sharpe,[587] relating to the account of your Memorialist Services to the Government during the late Rebellion, to be read to-morrow, he humbly begs leave to refer thereto and to observe:—

That the Account above mentioned is Certify’d by the Lord Justice Clerk and all the Generals who Commanded in Scotland; and as several of the Services therein set forth were performed, by verbal as well as by written Orders he had the honour to receive from His Royal Highness the Duke while in Scotland, it was by his Royal Highness’s Directions that the said Account was above three years ago laid before your Lordships by S^r Everard Fawkener, and that the Report relating thereto is now signed by him.

That your Memorialist has not in that or any other Account charged anything for his Trouble or Loss of Time for upwards of four years, he has been employed in the Service of the Government as aforesaid and finding out and collecting the Evidences for the Crown against the Rebells assisting in carrying on the Prosecutions against them at London, York, and Carlisle, attending the Tryal of Provost Stuart at Edinburgh, finding Bills in Scotland against those who were excepted out of the Act of Indemnity and other Services.

That before the Rebellion your Memorialist as an officer of the Revenue rendered greater service thereto than ever was done by any officer thereof in Scotland.

That your Memorialists share of the Profits arising from the Condemnation of prohibited and uncustomed Goods seized by him the three years immediately preceding the Rebellion amounted to above £4000 and the Crowns to above double that sum; that the remarkable Part reacted for the Service of the Government, from the first Breaking out of the Rebellion, made the Rebells lay hold upon everything that belonged to him and amongst other Things upon the greatest part of the Goods so condemned as aforesaid, and by which he was (exclusive of his other losses by the Rebellion) a most considerable sufferer.

That more Goods have been run in Scotland since the Rebellion than ever was done before in that Country in the same space of time.

That your Memorialist had several Informations relating thereto, but could not Profit thereby, by reason of the manner in which he has these four years past been employed, in the more Important Services to the Government before mentioned.

That few would have undertaken these services by reason of the apparent Hazard and other fatal Consequences, with which they were likely to be attended, and which he has in many Instances felt.

That your Memorialists wife who died of the Cruel usage she met with from the Rebells, certfy’d as above, has left him four Children to provide for.

That your Memorialists younger brother Captain Grosset who was barbarously murdered by the Rebells,[588] and whose remarkable services during the Rebellion are well known to all the Generals who commanded in Scotland, as well as to his Royal Highness the Duke, has left a widow and five children to whose support your Memorialist is obliged to contribute.

That the Insults and insufferable ill usage which they as well as his own Children daily met with in Scotland, has obliged him to bring them all to England, and who are thereby in effect banished their Country for their Father’s faithful Services to the Government.

That the Expenses your Memorialist has been and is thereby put to, and by false and scandalous Libells and groundless and vexatious Lawsuits, on account of the Services before mentioned, not only far exceeds the one half of the Profits of the Commission in which he is joined with Sir John Shaw[589] (and which is the only mark of favour he has met with for his services, losses, and sufferings as aforesaid) but of his estate which is considerably lessened thereby and his other Losses by the Rebellion.

Upon the whole if your Memorialist is turned out of the Employment above mentioned, before he is other wise suitably provided for, it will in place of rewarding the important services certified as above, be punishing him in the severest manner Especially as by the wording of the Warrant by which he is to be turned out of that Commission (if that Warrant is allowed to take place) your Memorialist must unjustly be recorded as one unworthy to be continued in that Employment, which is doing all that can be done to ruin him and his Family, and must be attended with worse consequences to them, than if the Rebells had succeeded in the many attempts they made to deprive him of his Life, as they did in taking away his Brothers; or if he had suffered along with the Rebell Peers and others, who could not have been condemned if it had not been for the Evidences he procured against them; Many of whose families and even those who were most active in the Rebellion, enjoy at this Time more of their Estates and Fortunes than he does of his, in proportion to the respective amounts thereof, before the Rebellion, and are themselves caressed and esteemed, whilst your Memorialist and his Family, and that of his unfortunate Brother, are daily harassed, affronted and cruelly persecuted by the Influence of that Party without being Protected, supported, or properly Countenanced by that Government to whom we rendered so many real services, and on which account we are so great sufferers.

All which is humbly submitted, etc., etc.

[Endorsed.—Mr. Grossetts Memorial relating to the Report of S^r Everard Fawkener and Mr. Sharpe upon the account of his Services to the Government.]

Note.—In the Record Office there are two documents, one entitled, ‘A NARRATIVE of Sundry Services performed by Walter Grossett, Esqr., during the course of the Rebellion, etc.’ which is countersigned as true by the Earl of Home and Generals Hawley, Handasyde, Guest, and Cope. The other is entitled ‘An ACCOUNT of Money,’ etc., and is certified by Andrew Fletcher, Lord Justice-Clerk. The Narrative’ is repeated in the ‘Account’ with only slight variations, so that there is no necessity to print both documents, and the ‘Account’ only is given here. Passages which appear in the ‘Narrative’ but have been omitted in the ‘Account’ are replaced here within square brackets.