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Colonial and State Records of North Carolina
Letter from Josiah Martin to Henry Frederick Carteret
Martin, Josiah, 1737-1786
October 04, 1780
Volume 15, Page 96

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GOV. JOSIAH MARTIN TO RT. HON. H. F. CARTERET.
[B. P. R. O., Am. & W. Ind., No. 593.]

Head Quarters at Charlotte Town,
in North Carolina, Oct. 4th, 1780.

Sir:

By a letter I gave myself the honor of writing to you in August by my friend Captain Ross, Lord Cornwallis's Aid de Camp, I informed you that I conceived it would be proper, so soon as you should find us in good hold of North Carolina, to employ your interest to obtain Government's immediate approbation of the Draft of a Bill which I transmitted for consideration in the year 1775, for the better collection of the King's and the Proprietors' Revenue of Quit Rents in North Carolina, which was thought well calculated to answer those purposes by the then Secretary of State, and by him, as a matter appertaining to the Crown Revenue, referred to the Treasury Board, where I think it probably still is. This Bill, if it met with approbation, was to have been returned with a recommendation to the Provincial Legislature to pass it into a Law. I apprehended at that time it was not in the intention of Government to take that regulation under the consideration of Parliament; and I should doubt whether it will be now thought a business to enter upon them. If it is not, I should beg leave to recommend it to you to obtain the necessary approbation and recommendation of it to send to me, together with a Copy of the Draft of the Bill, & of the detached additional clauses which I transmitted in the year 1775 to the Secretary of State, whenever I shall advise you that they may be put in train, as it is doubtfull whether I may find in this Country the original Draft that by some oversight was left with other Papers which it is probable the Rebels seized with my effects.

I have the honour to be,
With great respect, Sir, &c.,
JO. MARTIN.
Right Honble.
H. F. Carteret, &c., &c., &c.