[447] Dr. Peter Oliver wrote (Nov. 27) from Boston: "The pirates, or, as the rebels term them, the privateers, have taken a Cork vessel, Captain Robbins, of this town, with provisions, and carried her into Marblehead; and a number of wood vessels from the eastward are carried into the worthless town of Plymouth." P. O. Hutchinson, i. p. 571. Again, Dec. 7, he writes: "We have eight or ten pirate vessels out between the capes; and yet our men-of-war are chiefly in the harbor." Ibid., p. 581. Admiral Graves was as inactive as Gage, and, on Dec. 30, Admiral Shuldham arrived with orders to relieve him. Percy, writing from Boston of the new admiral, says: "We wanted a more active man than the last, for really the service suffered materially during his stay." (Percy Letters, in Boston Pub. Library.) Curwen records how matters at this time were regarded in London: "Their [the rebels'] activity and success is astonishing."
[448] She reached Cambridge Dec. 11.
[449] Adams's Works, ix. 270, 369. Burgoyne was soon too distant for the implied blow. He sailed for England Dec. 5.
[450] See the rolls in the State House in Boston, and N. H. Rev. Rolls, i. 240. Cf. N. H. Prov. Papers, vii. 675-681.
[451] There is in a volume of Misc. MSS., 1632-1795, in the Mass. Hist. Soc. library, an agreement to release Andrew Richman, who had joined the regiment after the suppression of the rebellion,—signed by John Small, major of brigade.
[452] Mem. Hist. Boston, iii. 77.
[453] It will be recollected that independence had not yet been declared.
[454] Percy wrote from Boston, January 7, 1776: "I take it for granted that the next campaign will be so active and, I hope, so decisive a one, that the rebels will be glad to sue for mercy. All, however, will depend on our having a sufficient force sent us out very early in the spring.... Brig. Gen. Grant directs our commander-in-chief and all his operations. Mr. Howe is, I think, the only one here in his army who does not perceive it. I wish from my soul that we may not feel the consequences." (Percy Letters.) Hutchinson was writing in January, 1776, from London: "I count the days, and absurd as it is so near the close of life, I can hardly help wishing to sleep away the time between this and spring, that I may escape the succession of unfortunate events which I am always in fear of." (P. O. Hutchinson, vol. ii.)
[455] Sparks's Washington, iii. 223.
[456] Moore's Diary of the Rev., i. 193, 199.