Page:History of Australia, Rusden 1897.djvu/273

 LOSS OF OOVERNOR'8 DESPATCHES. LIEUT. GRANT, 34 I I I Kiiig replied (1st March 1804) that he " observed*' Lord Hobart's sentiments and those of the Commander-in-Cliief "with that respect which a life so far speut» and I hope may add usefully and honourably" devotetJ to Hia Majesty's service, tells me it iu my duty to receive with all hecomiug huoiility; Htill I cannot hut regret the ulniost certain niisfoitiine that has prevented my having au officer (Lieut. McKellrir) in Englanci to contradict such lis^ertiona . . . and to have stated such circn instances as exceeded the bounds^ of a correspondence. I shall not trespass further on your lordship on this head tlian to represent that every means whieh couUl he exerted to IninK Captain Macarthur to a fiiense of his civil and military duty wa.s tried and failed before I determined on sending him to England -except trying him by a court- martial compoaed <jf tive officers belonging to hia corps, who had espoused his cjnarrel against thtu fiovernor and liis commanding officer. From such a tribunal what the result would have been was too evident- » . . I indulge the idea of experiencing that support which my eonscience tells me my rectitude and conduct may encourage me in the hope of receiving/' A singular accident frustrated the safe conveyance of the first copy of King's despatches ; bnt fiu'nished no excuse for a decifiion in their absence. Lieut. Grant, found in- competent to act as naval surveyor in the Ladt/ NcIson, resigned and went to Enghmd on leave* He took charge of King's desptttches concerning Paterson and Macarthur, and the sending home of the latter under arrest. He sailed from Sydney in a prize which had been captured by a whaler on the coast of Peru, and condemned and sold in Sydney. In her he carried letters to the naval Commander-in-Chief at the Cape of Good Hope, who was requested by King to give Grant a passage thence in a king's ship to England. King advised the government by another vessel that Grant carried the despatches. Copies w^ere also sent by McKellar, who took Macarthur s Bword, When Grant arrived in Pliigland he had lost the despatches. King spoke of them to Lord Hobart (9th May 1808) as ** shamefully, I may say viUainously lost."^'' " Dr. Lang asserts that the despatches were pnrloined before Grant left Sydney, but produces no authority for his statement; and a«j he adds that the Wx was found void of its proper contetita in " the Duke of Portland's office in Downing-street," although Lord Hobart held at the time the seals of the Colonial and War Offices, there is room to doubt the accuracy of other parts of the statement. Grant may have lost the despatches. He sailed from Sydney in the Anna Jostfpha {Mi Nov. ISQlJj i*ounded Cape Horn; waa at the Falkland Islands on ^Ist Jan. 1HU2 ; on the way to the Cape of Good Ho|ie he with others wna without sufficient food/and he was taken on Ix^ard the American vessel Ocmn at sea ; he reatihed the Cape on the lat April, and the Anwi Jo*epha avrived ou te 'Av. l ^ I f