Report on Letter from Hardwick

v1:1004

Saturday, December 10,1774, A˙ M.

The Committee to take into consideration the Letter and Papers enclosed received from the Committee of Correspondence of the Town of Hardwick, reported; which was read and accepted, and ordered to be published in the publick Papers, and also the Papers on which the said Report is founded. The Report is as followeth, viz:

Whereas, it appears to this Congress that one or more members of the lately appointed unconstitutional Council in this Province, now residing in Boston, has sent to the Town of Hardwick a paper purporting to be an Association to be entered into by those persons who falsely assume the name of friends to Government; calculated to counteract the salutary designs of the Continental and Provincial Congresses, to deceive the people into agreements contrary to the welfare of this country, and tending in its consequences to hinder an amicable accommodation with our mother country, — the sole end of those Congresses and the ardent wish of every friend to America. It is therefore recommended by this Congress to the several Committees of Correspondence in this Colony, that they give notice to the Provincial Congress, that shall meet in this Province on the first day of February next, and the earliest notice to the publick, of all such combinations, and of the persons signing the same, if any should be enticed thereto, that their names may be published to the world, their persons treated with that neglect, and their memories transmitted to posterity with that ignominy which such unnatural conduct must deserve.