Excuse me, I am in great haste,
Your friend,
THE COMMITTEE OF CORRESPONDENCE OF BOSTON TO THE COMMITTEE OF CORRESPONDENCE OF MARBLEHEAD.
[MS., Committee of Correspondence Papers, Lenox Library.]
BOSTON May 22 1774
DEAR SIR
We have just receivd your favor of this Date by the Hands of Mr Foster. We cannot too highly applaud your Sollicitude & Zeal in the Common Cause. The News you mention as having been receivd here from New York by the Post is without Foundation. We have receivd a Letter from New York dated the Day before the Post came out from that City, advising us that there was to be a meeting of the merchants there on the Tuesday following (last Tuesday)—that by a Vessel which had arrivd there from London the Citizens had receivd the barbarous Act with Indignation—that no Language could express their Abhorrence of this additional Act of Tyranny to all America—that they were fully perswaded that America was attackd & intended to be enslavd by their distressing & subduing Boston—that a Compliance with the provision of the Act will only be a temporary Reliefe from a particular Evil, which must end in a general Calamity—that many timid People in that City who have interrested themselves but very little in the Controversy with Great Britain express the greatest resentment at the Conduct of the Ministry to this Town and consider the Treatment as if done to them—and that this is the general Sense of the Inhabitants— that it was the general Talk that at the Meeting of the Merchants it would be agreed to suspend commercial Connection with Great Britain—also to stop the Exportation of Hoops Staves Heading & Lumber to the English Islands, & export no more of those Articles to foreign Islands than will be sufficient to bring home the Sugar Rum & Molasses for the Return of American Cargoes, and we are to be advisd of the Result of the meeting, which we expect very soon. The Express which we sent to New York had not arrivd when this left the City.
We have receivd Letters by the post from Portsmt in New Hampshire, from Hartford Newport Providence Westerly &c. all expressing the same Indignation and a Determination to joyn in like measures—restrictions on their Trade.
Hutchinsons minions are endeavoring to promote an address to him. The PROFESSD design is to desire his Friendship; but we take it rather to be a Design of his own, that when he arrives in England he may have THE SHADOW of Importance. It is carried on in a private Way—and is said to be signd by not fifty—Names of little Significance here may serve to make a Sound abroad.
We are sorry to hear that Mr Hooper is throwing his Weight &
Influence into the Scale against us. We can scarcely believe it.
If it be true we would desire to know of him whether he would
advise the Town of Boston to give up the rights of America.
We conclude in haste,