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Colonial and State Records of North Carolina
Letter from Josiah Martin to the Lords of the Treasury of Great Britain
Martin, Josiah, 1737-1786
May 03, 1779
Volume 14, Pages 297-298

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GOV. JOSIAH MARTIN TO THE LORDS OF THE TREASURY.
[B. P. R. O. Am. & W. Ind. No. 593.]

New York, May 3d, 1779.

My Lords:

The humane and benevolent Attention so widely extended by your Lordships to His Majesty's faithfull and suffering subjects on this continent will, I flatter and persuade myself, plead my apology for most humbly offering to your notice a Gentleman whose modesty and generous reluctance to become a charge upon Government while he had a chance of supporting himself by the exertion of his own Talents and industry has hitherto withheld him from your Lordships' view.

The person I pray your Lordships' leave to bring forward to your notice is Mr. Jno Conden, late a Merchant of North Carolina, whose merits, besides the sacrifice of a very large joint property of his Uncles, and his own, to principles of loyalty which he has uniformly and steadily maintained, consist in the most spirited and disinterested efforts that he made to support the loyalists of that Country in the hour of danger, when they had resorted to Arms in Defence of his Majesty's Government, when nobody could espouse them but at the utmost hazard of his life, and when that of Mr Conden, together with his whole fortune, was entirely in the hands of the rebels—the former was at length providentially and critically delivered from peril while the latter was necessarily sacrificed and abandoned.

Mr Conden, my Lords, actuated by the same honorable principles which have hitherto governed his conduct, solicits not, your Lordships, immediate relief, well aware of the multitude who receive and want it more indispensably, and feeling most sensibly the unfitness of adding to the burthen of the State in this trying time of difficulty. His modest wish at present is only to have it made known to your Lordships that he is not without as fair Pretentions as other Candidates have to the favour of Government, in hopes that at the happy return of Peace arrangements may take place in this Country in which his faithfull services and attachment to his Majesty and his Government may come to your Lordships' remembrance.

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I have thought it, my Lords, on my part due to Mr Conden, as a witness of all his conduct, to lay before your Lordships this testimonial of his merits; and, from a very particular knowledge of this Gentleman and high esteem for him, I am called upon in justice to give your Lordships the fullest assurance that he is possessed of abilities to qualify him for any employment he can seek, and of honour and integrity to entitle him to the utmost trust and confidence, making a sum of Character that engages and, I flatter myself, will warrant me most humbly and most earnestly to recommend him to your Lordships, favour.

I have the honour to be,
With the greatest respect, My Lords,
Your Lordships, most obedient and most humble servant,
JO: MARTIN.
The Right Honble The Lords Commissioners of His Majesty's Treasury, &c., &c., &c.