Ralph Nailer

STATEMENT OF RALPH NAILER, 1765

When I Presented the Depositions of my Drivers that Had Been whip’d by the Black Boys the time my Horses was Killed, to Mr. Wm. Allen, he then told me to Wait on him at Five o’clock that Afternoon and he would Give me an Answer, (I went,) and he told me he had look’d them Over, and Desired to Know what I wanted him to do in it.  I told him as they had Acted Contrary, as I thought, to the Laws of our Government, and him the only Person to Apply to For Redress, Hop’d he would Issue out King’s Writes and Have them Prosecuted According to Law; at which he told me, as there was no person Killed he had no Business with it, and Further Said, if that Officer, Sarjeant, or Soldiers had Killed any of that Party, we Would have sent for them & had them Tried for their Lives, at which I told him I thought a party of men Assembld on the King’s Road in Disguise as they were, and Robing People of their Private Propertys, I Imagined had the Soldiers Killed them, the English Laws would have Protected them, tho’ the Black’d Men Gave the first fire; he then said, there was no such Law only in England, to put a Stop from Killing the King’s Deer; he then said, we had no Business to Carry the Goods; at which I told him they Were Chiefly for the use of the Garrison; at which I told him they Were Chiefly for the use of the Garrison; and he said five or six Loads was Quite Sufficient for that Garrison; and he said five or six Loads was Quite Sufficient for that Garrison, and not forty or Fifty, tho’ Great Part of them Loads was the Officer’s Stores Belonging to Fort Pitt, and the Remainder was Intirely Rum, Spirits & Wine, Except Seven Loads of Loaf Sugar, Shirts, Shoes, and other Dry Goods; he then Said we had Done Wrong in Carrying the Goods, and he had done Wrong in Shooting our horses & Whiping the Drivers, and that we were a Lawless People.

RALPH NAILER.

N.B.—I Delivered the Horse Drivers Depositions to Mr. Allen the Second Day of June, 1765.

PENNSYLVANIA ARCHIVES VOLUME IV page 225