Toward the end of June he had the fairest opportunity of getting the troops removed from the Massachusetts, but opposed the measure. General Gage desired general Mackay to consult with him concerning the necessity of continuing the troops at Boston, and to procure his opinion in writing, whether his majesty’s service required that troops should remain there any longer, and what number, whether one or two regiments. It is impossible to express his surprise at the proposition. The knowledge of it, so far as it reached, occasioned a consternation among the civil officers of government, its friends, and the importers of goods from Great-Britain. Gage, in a letter, requested his opinion, and assured him he should not publish it, or make it known on this side the Atlantic. He immediately answered, that he had no hesitation to declare his opinion that it would be detrimental to his majesty’s service to remove any of the two regiments remaining; and that it would be quite ruinous to the cause of the crown to draw all the troops out of Boston; but that he was inclined to think, that a regiment in town, and another at the castle, might be sufficient. He had time enough in which to have ripened a plan with the court for the removal of the troops, to the joy of the country, and with safety to the civil officers and supporters of government. But he too early for his own peace and the happiness of his government, deviates from the line of conduct marked out for him by lord Halifax immediately after his appointment, when it was recommended to him to see and converse with governor Pownal, of whom his lordship wrote in the same letter, “It is impossible to pursue a better plan of government than what he directed himself by.” However, his conduct was so agreeable to the ministry, that a title was secured him. He was created a baronet, March the twentieth, 1769; and his majesty took upon himself the whole expence of passing the patent, which added greatly to the honor done him, as it was a favor seldom or ever before granted. Sir Francis, during his eleven years residence in America, made very little advance in his estate. The Boston sons of liberty had great advantages against him, from the early intelligence procured by the supposed author of Junius Americanus, and forwarded for safety under an unsuspected coarse paper cover, to Mr. Thomas Bromfield, glover, at Boston. Sir Francis was astonished to find that the contents of his letters from ministry were known by them as soon as by himself. When he embarked from the castle on board the Rippon man of war, for Great-Britain, August the first, few lamented his departure. Even his friend, the lieutenant governor, Mr. Hutchinson, regretted not his recal; by it he gained an opening for succeeding to the chair, to which he had been long looking, and was in hopes of being advanced.