Address of the Deacons of the Fourteen Incorporated Trades of Glasgow, to the King

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Address of the Deacon Conveener, Deacons of the Fourteen Incorporated Trades, and other Members at the Trades-House, of the City of Glasgow, presented to His Majesty by the Right Honourable Lord Frederick Campbell, their Representative in Parliament.

Most Gracious Sovereign:

We, your Majesty' s most dutiful and loyal subjects, the Deacon Conveener, Deacons of the Fourteen Incorporated Trades, and other Members of the Trades-House, of the City of Glasgow, at a general meeting assembled, impressed with the most unalterable sentiments of loyalty and affection to your Majesty' s person and Government, humbly beg leave, at this time, with unfeigned hearts, to express our abhorrence and detestation of that unprovoked and unnatural rebellion, now prevailing in some of your Majesty' s Colonies in America. To levy war against their Sovereign, acknowledged to be the best of Kings; against the Government which has always protected them, when in danger, and defended them from the attacks of foreign enemies; against the nation from which they sprang, and against their friends and fellow-subjects, all for the most frivolous causes that ever excited sedition; indicates, too strongly, their intention to shake off, and not be governed by, the laws of Great Britain, which, we firmly believe, they are bound to obey.

We, however, have the pleasure of informing your Majesty, that, notwithstanding this unnatural rebellion, our trade and manufactures, in general, are in a prosperous state; and, as we have hitherto enjoyed all the blessings and advantages which have flowed from your Majesty' s just, wise, and prudent administration, so, in duty, we, from the sincerity of our hearts, declare, that, with oar lives and fortunes, we will support and defend your Majesty' s person and Government, to the utmost of our power, in quelling the unnatural rebellion now subsisting in America, and in restoring the rebellious Colonies to a due submission to the laws and Government of Great Britain;

Signed in our presence, and by our appointment, by John Craig, Deacon Conveener of the Trades of the City of Glasgow, at Glasgow, the tenth day of January, one thousand seven hundred and seventy-six years.

JOHN CRAIG.