| Home | Governor's Proclamations 1757 '58 '59 |
Board of Trade |
Historical Biographies |
Seven Years War |
By His EXCELLENCY
CHARLES LAWRENCE, Esq;
Captain-General and Governor in Chief in and over His Majesty's Province of Nova-Scotia or Accadie in America, Vice Admiral of the same, &c. &c. &c.
A PROCLAMATION
WHEREAS since the issuing of the Proclamation dated the Twelfth Day of October 1758, relative to Settling the vacated lands in this Province, I have been informed by Thomas Hancock, Esq; Agent for the Affairs of Nova-Scotia, at Boston, That sundry Applications have been made to him in Consequence thereof, by Persons who are desirous of settling the said Lands, and of knowing what particular Encouragement the Government will give them ; Whether any Allowance of Provisions will be given at their first Settlement ; What Quantity of Land will be given to each person ; What Quit Rent they are to pay ; What the Constitution of the Government is ; Whether any and what Taxes are to be paid ; And, Whether they will be allowed the free Exercise of their Religion ?
I HAVE therefore thought fit, with the Advice of His Majesty's Council, to issue this Proclamation, hereby declaring in Answer to the said Enquiries, That by His Majesty's Royal Instructions to me, I am impowered to make Grants in the following Proportions, Viz.
THAT Townships are to consist of One Hundred Thousand Acres of Land, or about Twelve Miles square ; That they do include the best and most profitable Land ; and also, That they do comprehend such Rivers as may be at or near such Settlement ; and do extend as far up into the Country as conveniently may be, taking in a necessary Part of the Sea Coast.
THAT the Quantities of Land granted will be in Proportion to the Abilities of the Settlers to plant, cultivate or inclose the same, viz. That One Hundred Acres of wild Wood-Lands, will be allowed to every Person, being Master or Mistress of a Family, for himself or herself ; and Fifty Acres for every White or Black Man, Woman or Child, of which such Person's Family shall consist, at the actual Time of making the Grant, subject to the Payment of a Quit Rent of One Shilling Sterling per Annum for every Fifty Acres ; such Quit Rent to commence at the Expiration of Ten Years from the Date of each Grant ; and to be paid for His Majesty's Use, to His Receiver-General at Halifax, or to His Deputy upon the spot.
THAT the Grantees will be obliged by their Grants to Plant, Cultivate, improve, or inclose, one third Part of their Lands within the Space of Ten Years ; another third Part within the Space of Twenty Years ; and the remaining Third within the Space of Thirty Years, from the Date of their Grants.
THAT no one Person can possess more than One Thousand acres (by Grant) in his or her own Name.
THAT every Grantee, upon giving Proof that he or she has fulfilled the Terms and Conditions of his or her Grant, shall be intitled to another Grant, in the Proportion and upon the Conditions above-mentioned.
THAT the Lands proposed to be settled situated on the Bay of Fundi, as expressed in the formed Proclamation, will be distributed with such Proportions of interval Plow-Land, Mowing-Land, and Pasture, as will be sufficient to maintain the respective Families that shall be established thereon : Which Plow-Lands, &c, produce Wheat, Rye, Barley, Oats, Hemp, Flax, &c. and have been culitvated for more than one Hundred Years past, never failing of Crops, not needing to be manured.
THAT the Government of Nova-Scotia is constituted like those of the Neighbouring Colonies ; the Legislature consisting of Governor, Coucil, and Assembly ; and every Township, so soon as it shall consist of Fifty Families, will be intitled to send Two Representatives to the General Assembly. The Courts of Justice are also constituted in like manner with those of the Massachusetts, Connecticut, and the other Northern Colonies.
THAT as to the Article of Religion, full Liberty of Conscience, both by His Majesty's Royal Instructions, and a late Act of the General Assembly of this Province, is secured to Persons of all persuasions, Papists excepted, as may more fully appear by the following Abstract of the said Act, viz.
“PROTESTANTS dissenting from the Church of England, whether they be Calvinists, Lutherans, Quakers, or under what Denomination soever, shall have free Liberty of Conscience ; and may erect and build Meeting-Houses for Publick Worship, and may choose and elect Ministers for the carrying on Divine Service, and Administration of the Sacraments, according to their several Opinions ; and all Contracts made between their Ministers and their Congregations, for the support of the Ministry, are hereby declared Valid, and shall have their full Force and Effect, according to the Tenor and Conditions thereof : And all such Dissenters shall be excused from any Rates or Taxes to be made and levied for the Support of the Established Church of England.”
THAT no Taxes have hitherto been laid upon His Majesty's Subjects within this Province ; nor are there any Fees of Office taken upon issuing the Grants of Land.
THAT I am not Authorized to offer any Bounty of Provisions.
AND I do hereby declare, That I am ready to lay out the Lands, and to make Grants immediately, under the Conditions above described ; or to receive and transmit to the Lords Commissioners for Trade and Plantations, in order that the same may be laid before His Majesty for His Approbation, such further Proposals as may be offered by any Body of People for setling an entire Township, under other Conditions that they may conceive more advantageous to the Undertakers.
THAT Forts are established in the Neighbourhood of the Lands proposed to be settled, and are garrisoned by His Majesty's Troops, with a view of their giving all manner of Aid and Protection to the Settlers, if hereafter there should be any need.
GIVEN in the Council-Chamber at Halifax, this Eleventh Day of January 1759, in the Thirty-second Year of His Majesty's Reign.
Cha's Lawrence
By His Excellency's Command,
with the Advice of His Majesty's Council,
Jno Duport, Secr' Conc'
God Save the KING.
BOSTON in NEW-ENGLAND: Printed by John Draper, 1759.
Note: In the above transcription, the original punctuation and spelling have been preserved — except for the “long-s”, a letter of the English alphabet then in common use but now unknown. Where the long-s appears in the original proclamation, it is replaced here by the modern “s”.
|
Annotation: Supplementary explanations provided for words or phrases; explanatory notes added to or supplied with a text; editorial comments published adjacent to but not part of a text. In this webpage, care has been taken to present accurately the original source text. The annotation has been added in a way that is unambiguously separated from the text attributable to the original source. If the text is read as presented on-screen, without any intervention by the viewer using his/her mouse cursor, that text is an accurate presentation of the original source text. The annotation – which can be made visible only by using the viewer's mouse cursor – is provided in two forms: (1) As a hyperlink pointing toward additional information related to the subject As is true for all hyperlinks, this additional information can be accessed or not as the viewer chooses. (2) As a tooltip comment. A tooltip is a short block of text that appears on-screen – with information about the item being hovered over – only when a user hovers the mouse cursor over, but does not click on, a word or phrase. In this webpage, text that is equipped with a tooltip comment is identified by being displayed against a pale yellow background. Note: People using the Internet Explorer (MSIE) browser may sometimes not see all of the text in the tooltip comment. The MSIE browser cuts off any text exceeding an arbitrary limit set by Microsoft. |
Hits per calendar month
2015 Feb 104
2015 Jan 90
2014 Dec 71
2014 Nov 67
2014 Oct 66
2014 Sep 90 1-9 September 2014
2014 Aug 348 150th anniversary (sesquicentennial)
2014 Jul 952 of the 1864 Charlottetown Conference
2014 Jun 514
2014 May 100
2014 Apr 86
2014 Mar 97
2014 Feb 79
2014 Jan 83
2013 Dec 77
2013 Nov 79
2013 Oct 78
2013 Sep 74
2013 Aug 78
2013 Jul 91
2013 Jun 83
2013 May 91
2013 Apr 81
2013 Mar 88
2013 Feb 79
2013 Jan 95
2012 Dec 108
2012 Nov 70
2012 Oct 75
2012 Sep 70
2012 Aug 73
2012 Jul 53
2012 Jun 57
2012 May 64
2012 Apr 82
2012 Mar 88
2012 Feb 69
2012 Jan 92
2011 Dec 92
2011 Nov 59
2011 Oct -
2011 Sep 16
2011 Aug 19
2011 Jul 26
2011 Jun 15
2011 May 8
2011 Apr 6
2011 Mar 7
2011 Feb 7
2011 Jan 3
"-" means data is not available
This site can be viewed with any browser.
First uploaded to the WWW: 29 January 2010
Latest update: 18 March 2015