Mr. Printer.
Please to insert the following, and you will oblige the Public.
On the 3d day of February last, on our passage from Boston, in the sloop Dispatch, Nathaniel Thayer, Master, bound for Baltimore, we were taken by his majesty's ship Brune, Capt. Ferguson, between Cape Henry and Cape Charles, and were plundered of many things that belonged to us, among which were some of our cloathing; the remainder we were allowed to keep; they gave us nothing to eat for near two days, and then put us on short allowance, viz. three pounds of meat, and three pounds of bread for seven days, and two jills of rum for seven men, if on deck, for twenty-four hours, and no more, tho' at the same time obliged to do equal duty with their own hands ー The ship was bound for New York, and as we had reason to believe, suspecting the prisoners would rise and take the ship from them, put 20 of us on board of a sloop, which had been captured by them, in her passage from the West-Indies, first discharging her cargo, which was salt, into the sea, stripping her of her sails and rigging, cables, anchors and boat, and [illegible] itting her decks and upper works in several places, and then turned her adrift, without giving us either victuals or drink; the nearest land we could make to leeward, was as near as we could judge, fifteen miles, the wind then being to the eastward. ー We had some blankets on board, which we were allowed to bring from the ship; of these we made a squaresail, in the best manner we could, got it up and made for the land, and in about eight hours we struck on Gwin's island, near two miles from the shore; we then made a raft of our hatches, and some other plank, on which one of us the subscribers, viz. William C. Meserve, ventured ashore, got a boat and come off, conveyed the rest of the prisoners ashore. ー We further declare, that had the wind shifted to some other point of the compass, we should have drifted to sea, and all have perished, unless we had been fortunate enough to have been taken up by some other vessel. ー The following are the names of such of the prisoners as we know, who came ashore with us, viz. Capt. Nathaniel Thayer, Capt. William Russell, Capt. Simonton, Capt. Newall, William Pickett, John Pickett, Jonathan Alby, Benjamin Keith, Skillon Brooks, Benj. Brooks, and James Arms.
William C. Meserve Robert Neall.
Boston, March 15, 1777.
Suffolk ss.
William C. Meserve and Robert [Neall] made oath to the truth of the f[oregoing] declaration, by them subscribed
Joseph Gardner [notary public].
