The New Hampshire Gazette And General Advertiser

LONDON, October 26.

To the King's Most Excellent Majesty:

The humble address and petition of the
Loyal Inhabitants and Refugees, within
the British lines at New York:

May it please your Majesty.

OUR Majesty's dutiful and loyal Sub-
jects, inhabitants of New York, and
those who from the several provinces have
taken refuge within these lines, beg leave to
make their humble address and petition to
your Majesty on the present important oc-
casion.

Your Majesty's Commissioners for restor-
ing peace to those Colonies, have commu-
nicated to us the unexpected information,
that Mr. Grenville, invested with full pow-
ers to treat with all the parties at war, has
been directed in the execution of his commi-
ssion at Paris, to propose in the first instance
the independence of the Thirteen Provinces
--an information which we have received
with inexpressible concern.

Unfeigned sentiments of the warmest af-
fection, and the most inviolable attachment
to your Majesty's person and government,
have led us willingly to hazard life and for-
tune, with every thing dear in life, on this
issue of a contest, in which we were con-
vinced your Majesty was engaged by the
purest motives of justice and humanity, to
vindicate the dignity of your Crown, and
the essential rights of your people, in the re-
storation of constitutional harmony and
union to the British empire.

In every stage of this contest we have la-
mented the fatal influence of that groundless
jealousy, by which the gracious terms of re-
conciliation, so often proposed on the part
of your Majesty, and renewed with addition-
al marks of Princely condescension, have
been rendered ineffectual.

The mischiefs of civil dissention have
been prolonged and aggravated by the haz-
ards of a foreign war, in the course of which
Great Britain has had to contend with a for-
midable combination of ambitious enemies;
but, as we gloried in the justice of her cause
we trusted that her resources of wealth and
courage were equal to the task.

We are not unapprised that persons of
much weight and influence in the nation
have received unkind impressions concern-
ing us and our fellow loyalists without the
lines, and have been led to consider this as
an impracticable war. As to the former,
we trust that time and more candid infor-
mation will yet secure the good opinion of
all our fellow subjects in our favour, and
convince the nation at large, that both in
point of numbers and zeal for the British
Government, we are entitled to national at-
tention and regard; and, as to the latter,
we appeal to the present state of this coun-
try, of which we trust your Majesty will
now have received a just and authentic
representation.

The joy and confidence inspired by the
arrival of Sir Guy Carleton to command your
Majesty's army in America, and by the brilli-
ant victories which have lately crowned your
Majesty's arms in so many quarters of the
world, had with us effaced the remembrance
of past misfortunes.

The ruinous consequences of indepen-
dency began to be heavily felt throughout
the Colonies; the necessity of levying
enormous taxes, which the people protested
their inability to pay, was openly avowed
and we had good reason to believe, that in
every province the numbers were daily in-
creasing who, notwithstanding their former
zeal for a separation, were already wishing
this war to terminate not in the establish-
ment of Independency, but in a happy
re-union of the empire. We have there-
fore been persuaded beyond a doubt, that
were the system only of a defensive war pur-
sued in this country and the force of the
nation vigorously exerted against our foreign
enemies, this important part of the British
empire might soon be recovered, on terms
of mutual advantage to all your Majesty's
dominions, and with the blessings of an ho-
nourable and lasting peace.

But if reasons of necessity to us unknown
do indeed exist, sufficient to justify so great
a sacrifice as the making these provinces,
without reserve, independent of one crown
of Great Britain, it then remains for us to
implore your Majesty's attention to this our
earnest and dutiful petition.

That no treaty of peace may finally take
effect in America, nor the army be with-
drawn, until full and sufficient security be
had for our future personal safety, and res-
titution of our property, and some asylum
prepared for such of us as cannot remain in
this country.