The New Hampshire Gazette And Historical Chronicle

To the Printers.

Please to publish the following for the Benefit of the unhappy Youth undermentioned.

It were hoped that the Papers would cease to afford further Instances of the Ingratitude of Man, and that no longer the wretched Victims of Avarice would be compelled to call upon the Publick for Compassion and Justice: But however rational and humane were this hope, it is nevertheless entirely groundless: For a Gentleman lately arrived from Cape-Francois, gives authentic Intelligence, "That one George Henderson; a Lad of 14 Years of Age, (a very sprightly, active, pretty youth,) who arrived at the abovesaid Place as an Hostage, so long ago as September 15th, 1761, for the Brig Duebeck, Captain Robert Fabridge, bound from Newcastle in Ballast, to South-Carolina."-

Though the Boy was but an Apprentice to the Capt. he avowed him to be his Brother, that he might seem of more Importance, and that the Frenchman might be led into an Opinion that the Money would be paid punctual, so that the Ransom might be small:

This Stratagem was effectual, it reduced the French Demand to so small a Sum as One Hundred Pounds Sterling-the Delay in discharging which, hath irritated the disappointed French to so high a Degree that they wreak their Resentment on the poor unhappy trapped Boy, who is thus betrayed at these early Years into the most shocking of human Calamities,-
to all the Miseries of a French Goal, -

Must not this Betrayer tremble if he dare think, That he hath not only thus repaid the Kindness of the innocent Hostage, with the above Miseries, not only debarred him the natural Blessings of his Friends and Country, but have caused the grief and solicitude of the former, and depriv'd the latter of a promising Member: and all to satisfy his wretched and abandoned Self with less than nothing, One Hundred Pounds Sterling.