Extract of a Letter from Sir Joseph Yorke to Mr Fraser dated Hague 12th May 1778.
I received Yesterday the inclosed Letter from a friend of mine a Merchant at Amsterdam and a good Subject,1 I have made the best and most immediate use of it I could to put our People on their Guard, but it would have been better had the giver of the Intelligence mention’d some particulars about this Privateer to distinguish it; it is odd to blow himself by taking a light Collier & that Circumstance almost makes me suspect the truth of the Report; but for many Reasons the appearance of Our Flag to the Northward may have a good effect.
Copy, UkLPR, Adm. 1/4135, fol. 103. Enclosed in William Fraser to Philip Stephens, 15 May 1778. Yorke was the British ambassador at the Hague; Fraser was Undersecretary of State, Northern Department.
1. The letter that Yorke enclosed was from Alexander Henderson, dated 10 May. In it he reported that an American privateer had captured an unnamed “Light Collier” shortly after the collier sailed from the Texel. Henderson pointedly suggested that “Government” send “Cruising Ships” to patrol the Dutch coast, the waters off the Elbe, the Weser, and also the “Sound [i.e., Skagerrak]” so trade with the Netherlands, “Bremen, Hambourg and the Baltick may not be molested.” To emphasize the need for British Navy patrols, he observed: “Colliers furnish no inconsiderable Number of Sailors for his Majesty’s Service.” Fraser enclosed a copy of Henderson’s letter in his letter to Philip Stephens, secretary to the Lords Commissioners of the Admiralty, of 15 May.
