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- #81
Continuing to beat this dead horse...one wonders whether this letter from Lt. Governor Spotswood is merely a political expedient to hide his true designs on wrecks in La Florida or is a true account of supposed recoveries in the Bahamas...
"Representation of the Lt. Gov. and Council of Virginia to the Council of Trade and Plantations. As we conceive it our duty to your Lordships to represent wtever injurys are done to H.M. subjects here, we beg leave to lay before your Lordps. the case of divers of the inhabitants of this Colony lately taken by the Spaniards and detained prisoners, in violation of theTreaty of Peace between H.M. and the Crown of Spain. In the beginning of last summer, one Harry Beverley,an inhabitant of this Colony, being owner of a sloop then launch'd called the Virgin of Virginia and design'd for the West India Trade, hearing from severall masters of vessells belonging to Bermuda, of considerable quantitys of plate fish'd up by the people of that Island from wrecks lately discovered upon the Bahama shoals, within the Dominions of H.M.; and being likewise told that the Spaniards gave great rewards to such vessells belonging to the British subjects, as entered into their service, and assisted in recovering the treasure lost in the Spanish wrecks on the coast of Florida, thought he could not better imploy his said vessell and his own time, than either in offering his service to assist the Spaniards in fishing on their wrecks, or searching himself for the wrecks said to be in the seas of the British Dominions: and if either of these projects should fail, he might then proceed to the West Indies with the cargo of provisions which he had then ready to put on board..."
From: 'America and West Indies: May 1717, 16-31', Calendar of State Papers Colonial, America and West Indies, Volume 29: 1716-1717 (1930), pp. 303-322.
"Representation of the Lt. Gov. and Council of Virginia to the Council of Trade and Plantations. As we conceive it our duty to your Lordships to represent wtever injurys are done to H.M. subjects here, we beg leave to lay before your Lordps. the case of divers of the inhabitants of this Colony lately taken by the Spaniards and detained prisoners, in violation of theTreaty of Peace between H.M. and the Crown of Spain. In the beginning of last summer, one Harry Beverley,an inhabitant of this Colony, being owner of a sloop then launch'd called the Virgin of Virginia and design'd for the West India Trade, hearing from severall masters of vessells belonging to Bermuda, of considerable quantitys of plate fish'd up by the people of that Island from wrecks lately discovered upon the Bahama shoals, within the Dominions of H.M.; and being likewise told that the Spaniards gave great rewards to such vessells belonging to the British subjects, as entered into their service, and assisted in recovering the treasure lost in the Spanish wrecks on the coast of Florida, thought he could not better imploy his said vessell and his own time, than either in offering his service to assist the Spaniards in fishing on their wrecks, or searching himself for the wrecks said to be in the seas of the British Dominions: and if either of these projects should fail, he might then proceed to the West Indies with the cargo of provisions which he had then ready to put on board..."
From: 'America and West Indies: May 1717, 16-31', Calendar of State Papers Colonial, America and West Indies, Volume 29: 1716-1717 (1930), pp. 303-322.
