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Colonial and State Records of North Carolina
Letter from Josiah Martin to Wills Hill, Marquis of Downshire
Martin, Josiah, 1737-1786
May 18, 1772
Volume 09, Page 292

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[B. P. R. O. Am. & W. Ind.: No. Carolina. Vol. 219.]
Governor Martin to Secry Hillsborough.

North Carolina New Bern,
May 18th 1772.

My Lord,

I have the honour to acknowledge the Receipt of Your Lordship's letters circular bearing date the 5th and 8th of February by which I learn with the deepest concern the afflicting losses of his Majesty's Royal Family in the death of her Royal Highness the Princess Dowager of Wales and the Landgravine of Hesse Cassel events that claim the condolence of all his Majesty's Subjects and in which I most sincerely and particularly participate with your Lordship fervently wishing that his Majesty's Royal mind may be long exempted from such natural incidents of affliction and every other ground of disquiet.

The Order of the Lord Chamberlain's and Earl Marshal's Offices that have been transmitted to me from your Lordship's Office in consequence of those melancholy events I have published in this Province and the mourning for his Majesty's Royal Mother commenced here by my appointment yesterday. I have also issued a Proclamation directing the alteration of the form of Prayer. His Majesty's Royal Instruction relative to Laws touching the attachment of effects of persons who have never resided in the Colony I shall not fail to pay the strictest attention to. It is most obviously founded upon those generous principles of equity that shine forth in every part of his Majesty's Government and every expedient to restrain the too prevalent disposition here to favour the Colonists at the expence of the Briton of which the Superior Court Law now existing here as far as it regards attachments is an irrefragable proof, and of which part it will become my duty to take care to have it recinded at the next Session of the General Assembly when it will expire and must of necessity be reenacted as it is the Foundation of distributive justice in this Country.

I have the honor to be &c
JO. MARTIN.