There is another thing I wish to mention. My brother came into
the river in a flag of truce, on special application of our
commissary of prisoners, to take a number of prisoners who
were exchanged, to save us the expense and trouble of sending
them by land; this was in the month of May, 1781. He was
detained, about nine miles below the city, upwards of four
weeks, and never permitted to visit it, although application
was made for that purpose, by several captains of vessels, who
had been prisoners, and to whom he had rendered civilities. I
declined making application myself, as I supposed my being in
the service from the commencement of the war, and having
endured a rigorous confinement for eighteen months, in the
worst of times, to have been sufficient to have obtained
permission for a brother to have been in my house, in
preference to a cabin in a small vessel in a river;--however,
I endeavoured to make his situation as agreeable as possible,
by visiting him often, and by taking my friends with me. I
REMEMBER Col. Francis Nichols went with me one day, to whom my
brother mentioned Mr. Reed's intended desertion, and who, I
doubt not, will acknowledge it, on any person's applying to
him; he is at present in Virginia, but is expected in town in
a few days.
DAVID LENNOX.
Having been called upon by General Cadwalader, to certify, so
far as my knowledge extends, as to the matter hereinafter
mentioned, I do declare, that in the spring of the year 1781,
I went with Major Lennox, of this city, on board of a flag of
truce vessel, then lying in the river Delaware, where she had
arrived from New York, and heard Mr. Robert Lennox, deputy
commissary of prisoners under the British king, say, that in
the year of 1776, a person had arrived at Count Donop's
quarters, near Bordentown, in New Jersey, who told the Count,
that he had been sent to him by Gen. Reed and another person,
whose name I do not think necessary to mention, to procure a
protection for them; that the Count refused to grant them a
protection in that manner, and was about to treat the person
who had applied to him as a spy, but was prevented by the
entreaties of the said Robert Lennox, and some other
gentlemen.
_Philadelphia, 17th March, 1783._ FRANCIS NICHOLS.
Here, then, it fully appears, that the testimony contained in the above
certificates, all point to the same object, and to the same period
mentioned by me, supporting and confirming each other. They likewise
clearly prove the whole progress of your meditated defection; they prove
that you deceived me by those professions, by which I had been induced to
trust to your appearances of fidelity, as you absolutely made an
application for a protection to Count Donop, in which an intimate friend of
yours was included.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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