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Updated: September 20, 2025
Late as it was, and great as had been the fatigues of the negro troops, they were not yet weary of hearing the praises of their own Toussaint. Adding their numbers to those of the white inhabitants of Cap, they thronged the court of Government-House and the Jesuits' Walk; and even in the Place d'Archer and the Rue Espagnole, passengers found it difficult to make their way.
At ten in the morning, Lieutenant-Governor Ross, Captain Hunter, all the commissioned officers of marines and of the Sirius, and myself, assembled in the government-house, when the lieutenant governor laid the situation of the island before the meeting, and pointed out the necessity of a law being made, by which criminals might be punished with death for capital crimes, there being no law in force on the island that could notice capital offences: he also proposed the establishment of martial law until further orders, which was unanimously agreed to; and that in all cases where sentence of death was pronounced, five persons out of seven should concur in opinion: it was also resolved, that all private stock, Indian corn, and potatoes should be given in to the store-keeper, and appropriated for the use of the public; and that every person should go to half allowance of provisions until it should be known what quantity could be saved from the wreck; also, that three locks should be put on the store-house and barn; one key to be in the possession of Captain Hunter, another in possession of a person to be named by the lieutenant-governor, and the third to be kept by a person to be named by the convicts.
Forced to flee from her frail hut, by bullets actually whizzing through it, and to pass through the town amid the yells of an infuriated rabble, her path sometimes impeded by the dead bodies of men who had fallen in the conflict; driven from the shelter of the Government-house, again to fly through the streets to the warf-house, and there, with three or four hundred fugitives crowded together, to await death, which threatened them in every form; hearing over their heads the rush of cannon balls, and seeing from burning buildings showers of sparks falling, one of which, if it reached the magazines under their roof, was sufficient to tear the building from its foundations, and whelm them all in one common ruin; or, if they escaped this danger, to know that hundreds of merciless barbarians, with knives and cutlasses, might, at any moment, rush into the building and destroy them, can the female heart, we are ready to ask, endure such fearful trial?
He was presently walking leisurely down the sloping field, through which he could drop into the grounds of Government-house by a back gate, and have his interview with Hedouville before interruption came from the side of the town. As he entered the gardens, he looked, to the wondering eyes he met there, as if he had just risen from rest, to enjoy a morning walk in the shrubberies.
A window of the government-house that looked toward the direction of Capraya, or that in which the Proserpine was expected to arrive, was assigned to Griffin. The young man took his station at it about midnight, in readiness to burn the blue-lights with which he was provided the instant he should discern the signals of his ship.
The first occurrence out of the ordinary course of things that struck the American was the strong light of a lamp shining through an upper window of the government-house not that at which the lieutenant was posted, but one above it and which had been placed there expressly as an indication to the frigate that Griffin had arrived, and was actively on duty.
He is highly respected by the government in the island, and at home, and possesses the esteem of his fellow-citizens of all colors. He associates with persons of the highest rank, dining and attending parties at the government-house with all the aristocracy of Jamaica. We had the pleasure of spending an evening with him at the solicitor-general's.
"There is no need, friend. We shall be rid of the Commissary by an easier method; and these guns will be wheeled home, as harmless as they came. My belief is that not a drop of negro blood will be shed; and to that end do we plant our cannon. If we tranquillise the whites of the town, and empty Government-house of the French, the negroes of the plain will find none but friends when they arrive."
I have mentioned the murder of the Comanche chiefs, in the government-house of San Antonio, which, in itself, was sufficient. But such has been the disgraceful conduct of the Texans towards the Indians, that the white man is now considered by them as a term of reproach; they are spoken of by the Indians as "dogs," and are generally hung or shot whenever they are fallen in with.
The next day, a complaint was lodged at the government-house; but investigation is a long word when a man-of-war is ordered on service.
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