Sir.

It having been represented to me on the part of Mr Joy Hair, the bearer hereof and owner of Schooner Nancy lately arrived from the port of Baltimore in the road of this Island, that on Tuesday the 12th Current, the said Schooner Nancy then Laying peacably at Anchor, under the neutral and friendly protection of the fortress in this Island Established for Security of the rights and franchises of the high and mighty the Lords States General of the United Netherlands, and the Honourable the West India Company by them priviledged; was by the certain persons of Charles Penman & Thomas Ramsy, feloniously and piratically carried away, under the Signal usually accorded to vessels of all Nations, requiring a Change of Birth; and by them delivered to William Gamier Esquire or other the Commanding Officer or Officers of his Britannic Majesty's Ship of War the Argo; and afterwards by him or them sent away to the Island of Antigua.

I flatter myself that your Excellency will readily believe, that this my public reclamation, in the name of my Masters, of the aforesaid Schooner Nancy, with whatever she had on board at the time of her being piratically carried away from under the protection of the fortress of this Island, flows from the purest and most disinterested motives, a Sense of the duty I owe to my Sovereigns.

Happy should I be in hearing that the unfortunate differences at present Subsisting between Great Britain and her colonies, were terminated in a Satisfactory manner. Extremely Cautious have I ever been of Administering even the smallest avoidable occasion of Offence to the former and impressed by a just Sense of the Dignity and justice of his Britannic Majesty, I am bound to believe that in the Chastisement of his disobedient Subjects, he will never be brought to approve of an Evident infringement of the priveledges of a friendly Port; and certain I am, that Enterprizes of so atrocious and flagitious a nature as those committed by the Persons who carried the afores[aid] Schooner Nancy out of the Road of this Island, in manifest violation of the law of nations, neither can or will be Countenanced by the worthy and distinguished representative of one of the first potentates in Europe.

I purposely avoid all reasoning upon the Subject; Submitting to your Excellency's own Wisdom and Sensibility the part you are to take upon this occasion and being with the highest Consideration anq. respect. ー Sir [&c.]

His Excellency James Young Esquire, Vice Admiral of the Red and Commander in Chief of His Britannic Majesty's Ships, Stationed at the Leeward Islands. Antigua.