8o Staten Island Association of Arts and ScifeNCES 



up arms against a Master whom I have served for thirty years and 

 in a Cause of which I always entertained a bad Opinion and 

 always believed, and does not now, that it will terminate in the 

 destruction of the Authors of it, for which I am very sorry, they 

 should Merit the treatment I am afraid they will meet with, I 

 am not an Enemy to any individual upon Earth, nor have a Grudge 

 against any, and I dont wish to meet my friends or old acquaint- 

 ances in a place where they or I must fall, yet I am determined 

 to be true to the trust reposed in me, and discharge my duty with 

 honour or a Long as I Live and Whoever Criminal the friends 

 of the Congress may think this Conduct in me, why should an 

 innocent woman with her Children be troubled as my wife was 

 soon after my Coming away from Staten Island. A parcel of 

 fellows went to my house with more than Savage rudeness, rum- 

 maged the house as they pretended for arms, swore they would 

 have me dead or alive, and frightened her out of her Senses, by 

 whose order they went I am not able to Learn, but whoever ordered 

 them he is not a sound pollitician for I think he had better secure 

 my friendship than by this behavior making me a more Inveterate 

 Enemy than otherwise I might be. The affairs of America are 

 not far from being settled and it is as hard to know how Matters 

 will turn out, and upon the whole I think they might as well 

 make me a friend as force me to be a more inveterate enemy than 

 otherwise I should incline to. I'll Cut short and Say No more 

 on this Subject but that I wish to God a Mode of reconciliation 

 between Great Brittain & her Colonies Consistent with the dignity 

 and Grandeur of Great Brittain as well as the interest and happi- 

 ness of America — " 



Captain McDonald went with his command to Halifax, while 

 the wife and children remained on Staten Island. On March 28, 

 1776, he writes, calling her " My Barest Life." As near as I can 

 locate the farm it is now known as the Decker estate in the old 

 town of Northfield. 



" I would wish that I had but you & the children along with 

 me," he writes, " and yet the fear of Exposing you to Eminent 



