2794 AWARD OF THE FISHERY COMMISSION. 



Q. Did he represent himself to be a custom-house officer ? A. Yes. 



Q. Did you ask him for his authority? A. Yes. 



Q. And did he show it? A. No. 



Q. And then you threw him overboard ! A. I told him he had to 

 leave, and seeing he would not go, I seized him by the naps of the neck 

 and the breeches and put him into his boat. He was bound to take me 

 because I had landed a poor girl. 



Q. Was this girl contraband ? A. Yes, I suppose they called her so 

 at any rate. I do not know that she is now in town, but she became 

 lawyer Blanchard's wife afterward. I merely took her on board as a 

 passenger, and landed her. Afterward I was fired at and chased by 

 three cutters. 



Q. For putting this officer overboard ? A. No, I did not nut him 

 overboard, but I put him into his boat. 



Q. In lawyers phrase, did you gently lay hands on him? A. I put 

 him in his boat in the shortest way. He stripped off and said it would 

 take a man to handle him, but I made up my mind that he should not 

 stop, though I did not want to fight ; still, I was well able to take my 

 own part. I talked with him and told him that I had merely landed a 

 poor girl with her effects, a trunk and a bandbox, &c. ; but this would 

 not do him. When he came aboard he asked, "Who is master of this 

 vessel ?" Says I, " I am for lack of a better." Says he, " I seize this 

 vessel," and with red chalk he put the King's broad R on the mainmast. 

 He wanted the jib hauled down in order to have the boat taken on 

 board we had not come to an anchor but I told him that he would 

 have to wait a while. Finally he came down below and I took the pa- 

 pers out of a canister; and being a little excited, of course, in hauling 

 off the cover a receipt for light-dues, which I had paid that year, 

 dropped on the forecastle floor. He picked it up and said he would give 

 rne a receipt on the back of it. Says I, " Who are you ?" He answered 

 u I am Mr. Bigelow, the light-collector." " Well," says I, " where are 

 your documents?" Says he, "I have left them ashore." "Then," says I, 

 " go ashore, you vagabond, you have no business here." Says he, " Won't 

 you pay me !" "Not a red cent," says I; " out with you." He cried out, 

 "Put the helm down." Says I, "Put the helm up '*; but he came pretty 

 near shoving us ashore, as we were within 10 fathoms of the rocks. 

 Says he, " Who are you ?" I said, " I am Mr. Pattillo." Says he, " You 

 vagabond, I know the Pattillos." " Well," says I, " then you must 

 know me, for there are only two of us." Says he, " I will take you any- 

 how j I will have a cutter from Big Canso. There will be a man-of-war 

 there; and if there is not a man-of-war, there will be a cutter; and if 

 there is not a cutter I will raise the militia, for I am bound to take you." 

 I asked him if he meant to do all that, and he said he was just the man 

 to do it. I seized him to put him back into his boat, and he stripped off 

 and told me that it took a man to handle him ; with that I made a lunge 

 at him, and jumped 10 feet. If he had not avoided me, I would have 

 taken the head off his body. I then seized him and chucked him into 

 his boat. Then three cutters came down and chased me. 



Q. But they did not catch you ? A. No ; that was the time when they 

 chased me at Port Hood and around there, and fired 11 balls 12 pound- 

 ers at me, one boring her right through and through. The first shot 

 flew about 6 feet over my head, through the mainsail ; the next went 

 right under the bends, through a plank, cut the timber, and went through 

 a sail and into the main- boom ; the next struck on the port side, taking 

 a piece of about 5 or 6 inches out of the bulwarks, and striking the main 

 chains; the next knocked a piece off the forward part of the main-mast, 



