Robert Treat Paine Papers, Volume 3
A letter from General Washington, of the 15th, was laid before Congress, and read; and also, sundry intercepted letters from Lord Howe to Governors Franklin, Penn, Eden, Dunmore, Martin and Wright, together with sundry letters to several private persons:
The several letters being opened by order of Congress,1
Resolved, That the letters from Lord Howe, with the proclamations enclosed, be referred to a committee of three;
The members chosen, Mr. Jefferson, Mr. Paine and Mr. Carroll.2
Resolved, That a committee of three be appointed to examine the private letters, and deliver to the persons to whom directed, such of said letters as contain nothing but private matters.3
Journals of the Continental Congress, 5:574–575
The committee reported back to Congress the next day, and the following resolution was adopted: “Resolved, That a copy of the circular letters, and of the declarations they enclosed from Lord Howe to Mr. W[illiam] Franklin, Mr. Penn, Mr. Eden, Lord Dunmore, Mr. Martin, and Sir James Wright, late governors, which were sent to Amboy, by a flag, and forwarded to Congress by General Washington, be published in the several gazettes, that the good people of these United States may be informed of what nature are the commissioners, and what the terms, with the expectation of which, the insidious court of Britain has endeavoured to amuse and disarm them, and that the few, who still remain suspended by a hope founded either in the justice or moderation of their late King, may now, at length, be convinced, that the valour alone of their country is to save its liberties” (Journals of the Continental Congress, 5:592–593). The circular letter from Lord Richard Howe to governors William Franklin of New Jersey; John Penn of Pennsylvania; Robert Eden of Maryland; John Murray, 4th earl of Dunmore, of New York; Josiah Martin of North Carolina; and Sir James Wright of Georgia appeared in the Pennsylvania Gazette, July 24.
Charles Carroll of Carrollton (1737–1832) was a European-trained lawyer and a landed proprietor in Maryland. He became politically active in 1773, was a continental commissioner to Canada in 1776, and a delegate to the Continental Congress from Maryland (1776–1778). He later served as a Federalist senator from 1789 to 1792. Carroll was the last surviving signer of the Declaration of Independence (
DAB
).
Journals of the Continental Congress, 5:575, notes that “The manuscript Journals do not indicate the members of this committee; but the printed Journals show that they were the same as were just named for the committee on Howe’s letters.”