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Resolution of Continental Congress relating to Arms and Speech
I came across this January 3, 1776 resolution of the Continental Congress and thought it worthy of sharing.
Resolved, That Colonel Nathaniel Heard, of Woodbridge, in the colony of New Jersey, taking with him five or six hundred minute men, under discreet officers, do march to the western part of Queen’s county, and that Colonel Waterbury, of Stanford, in the colony of Connecticut, with the like number of minute men, march to the eastern side of said county; that they confer together, and endeavour to enter the said county on the same day; that they proceed to disarm every person in the said county, who voted against sending deputies to the said convention, and cause them to deliver up their arms and ammunition on oath, and that they take and confine in safe custody’ till further orders, all such as shall refuse compliance.
That they apprehend and secure, till further orders, the persons named as principal men among the disaffected in the said county, in a summons for their appearance before the convention of New York, issued the 12 of December last, viz.
Of Jamaica township, Captain Benjamin Whitehead, Charles Arden, Joseph French, Esq! Johannes Polhemus.
Of Newtown, Nathaniel Moore, John Moore, [Sr.], Samuel Hallet, John Moore, [Jr.] William Weyman. John Shoals, Jeromus Rapalje.
Of Flushing, John Willet.
Of Barnstead, Justice Gilbert VanWyck, Daniel Kissam, Esq. of Cow neck, Captain Jacob Mott, Thomas Cornell,
[O]f Rockaway, Gabriel G. Ludlow, Richard Hewlet, Captain Charles Hicks, Dr. [Samuel] Martin, Justice Samuel Clowes.
Of Oyster bay, Justice Thomas Smith, of hog island, Justice John Hewlet, Captain George Weeks, Dr. David Brooks, Justice John Townsend,
And all such other persons who shall be found in arms, or who shall oppose the carrying the above resolutions into effect, as they the said Colonel Heard or Colonel Waterbury may think prudent to detain.
Vol. 4. Journals of the Continental Congress, pages 27-28 (footnote omitted).
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