The convention resolved at once "That Application be made to the Inhabitants of said Grants, to form the same into a separate District." The convention laconically declared that "the Spirited Conflict," which had so long continued between the Grants and New York, rendered it "inconvenient in many respects to associate with that province." But, to prove their readiness to join in the common defense of America, they, with one exception only, subscribed to the following association: "We the subscribers inhabitants of that District of Land, commonly called and known by the name of the New Hampshire Grants, do voluntarily and Solemnly Engage under all the ties held sacred amongst Mankind at the Risque of our Lives and fortunes to Defend, by arms, the United American States against the Hostile attempts of the British Fleets and Armies, until the present unhappy Controversy between the two Countries shall be settled." The convention invited all the inhabitants to subscribe to this "Association," and resolved that any who should unite with a similar one under the authority of New York should be deemed an enemy to the cause of the Grants. Persons were appointed to procure the signature of every male inhabitant of sixteen years upwards, both on the east and west sides of the Green Mountains. Thus the convention took the first formal steps toward severing the connection with New York, and uniting all the towns within the Grants in a common league. Only one town on the east side of the mountains was represented in this meeting; but pains were taken to confer with those inhabitants, and at the adjourned session, in September, ten eastern towns were represented. At this session it was voted that the inhabitants should be governed by the resolves of this or a similar convention "not repugnant to the resolves of Congress," and that in future no law or direction received from New York should be accepted or obeyed. The power was assumed of regulating the militia, and furnishing troops for the common defense. For the especial safe-keeping of Tories, a jail was ordered to be built at Manchester. It was to be constructed with double walls of logs, eighteen inches apart, the space to be filled with earth to the height of seven feet, "floored with logs double." The convention appointed a "Committee of War," vested with power to call out the militia for the defense of the Grants or any part of the continent. Fines were exacted from every officer and private who should not comply with the orders of the convention; and each non-commissioned officer and private was required to "provide himself with a suitable gun and one pound of powder, four pounds of bullets fit for his gun, six flints, a powder horn, cartouch box or bullet pouch, a sword, bayonet, or tomahawk."