Page:Augustine Herrman, beginner of the Virginia tobacco trade, merchant of New Amsterdam and first lord of Bohemia manor in Maryland (1941).djvu/14

 English policy retold. How amazing the saga sounds now; that within forty-eight hours after Captain Nichols sailed up before Fort Amsterdam one hundred fifty thousand square miles of the richest territory on the Atlantic Coast were added to the British dominions: all without the firing of one fatal shot.

In the preparation of the life of Augustine Herrman I am particularly indebted to Mr. Thomas Čapek of New York and to former United States Senator Thomas F. Bayard of Delaware. Mr. Čapek has been kind to give me suggestions from time to time, and he himself has made an exhaustive search of the ancestry of Herrman in the archives of Prague. I have made constant reference to the results of his researches that were published in Prague in 1930.

As one of the descendants of Augustine Herrman through his second daughter, Judith, Senator Bayard has long had an active interest in Herrman’s career. For a number of years he has lived on the site of Bohemia Manor and has gathered much material relating to the original manor house as well as other facts relating to the Maryland life of Herrman. These facts Senator Bayard has been kind enough to place at my disposal. He has also read the manuscript and has made many valuable suggestions. Without his constant aid and criticism this life of Augustine Herrman could not be as complete as it is.

E. L. W. H.

Englewood, Ohio. May, 1941.