The Jacobite Rebellions (1689-1746): (Bell's Scottish History Source Books.)Thomson, J. Pringle (James Pringle)
History
The Jacobite Rebellions (1689-1746): (Bell's Scottish History Source Books.)
Thomson, J. Pringle (James Pringle)
Jacobites; Scotland -- History -- Sources
... Our English plantations grew ... very jealous of this new colony:
they feared, that the double prospect of finding gold and of robbing the
Spaniards, would draw many planters from them into this new settlement;
and that the buccaneers might run into them: for by the Scotch act, this
place was to be made a free port; and if it was not ruined before it was
well formed, they reckoned it would become a seat of piracy and another
Algiers in those parts. Upon these grounds, the English nation inclined
to declare against this, and the King seemed convinced, that it was an
infraction of his treaties with Spain: so orders were sent, but very
secretly, to the English plantations, particularly to Jamaica and the
Leeward islands, to forbid all commerce with the Scots at Darien. The
Spaniards made some faint attempts on them, but without success. This
was a very great difficulty on the King; he saw how much he was like to
be pressed on both hands, and he apprehended what ill consequences were
like to follow, on his declaring himself either way.
D. INDIGNATION IN SCOTLAND (1699).
+Source.+--Bishop Burnet's _History of His Own Times_, vol. iv., p.
429. (Oxford: 1833.)
In Scotland all men were full of hopes, that their new colony should
bring them home mountains of gold; the proclamations sent to Jamaica and
to the other English plantations were much complained of, as acts of
hostility, and a violation of the common rights of humanity; these had a
great effect on them, though without these, that colony was too weak and
too ill supplied, as well as too much divided within itself, to have
subsisted long; those, who had first possessed themselves of it, were
forced to abandon it: soon after they had gone from it, a second recruit
of men and provisions was sent thither from Scotland; but one of their
ships unhappily took fire, in which they had the greatest stock of
provisions; and so these likewise went off: and though the third
reinforcement, that soon followed this, was both stronger and better
furnished, yet they fell into such factions among themselves, that they
were too weak to resist the Spaniards, who, feeble as they were, yet saw
the necessity of attacking them: and they finding themselves unable to
resist the force which was brought against them, capitulated; and with
that the whole design fell to the ground, partly for want of stock and
skill in those who managed it, and partly by the baseness and treachery
of those whom they employed.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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