Lordships were pleas'd to look upon the Navy-board's Report to be scandalous viz. full of Falsities and Prevarications to weary and impose upon your Lordships to set aside Proposals that may be so beneficial to the Publick Good and Safety of the Nation then I shall humbly leave to your Lordships Justice what Censure to pass on the Navy-board for making such a Report to obstruct the King's Service which is sign'd by no less than eight of their Members ††R. Haddock E. Dummer G. Sergison Tho. Wilshaw D. Liddall J. Hill S. Pett G. S. Loe. George Everett Febr. 25th 1695. There 's no rational Man but will conclude this Proposal of Mr. Everett's practicable tho the Navy-board took indirect Means to crade it In short the Design of his Proposal is no other but to root out all those Evils which Custom and the Corruption of the Age hath produced and no ways to alter the Oeconomy of the Navy as is insinuated in the Lords of the Admiralty and Commissioners of the Navy's Reports upon his Proposal So that had it been put in practice by this time His Majesty might have sav'd three or four hundred thousand Pound And for the Commissioners of the Navy to assert the Building and Repairing of the Royal Navy did not annually amount to 100000 l. which plainly appears to be a prevaricating with Mr. Everett's words when they knew at the same time the Estimate given into the House of Commons for the Wear and Tare of the Royal Navy for this present Year was 780000 l. as appears by the Votes of the House of Commons is a most notorious Falshood One would therefore think any Man that had the least spark of Honour or Justice in him would have been ashamed to sign such a Report And why the Lords of the Admiralty should keep it so long by them and not acquaint His Majesty therewith I know not however it 's plain it was never intended it should have seen the light it being forced from them and the design being to weary out the Man that he might waste and spend his Substance and so be forced to decline A most effectual Way indeed and sufficient warning to all Men to take care how they offer any thing for the Publick Service tho never so advantagious Besides this Proposal Mr. Everett hath made appear by a cloud of Witnesses the great Embezlements made in the King 's Yards and proved * Before a Committee of Council many things in the face of the Commissioners of the Navy and made them eat and drink Shame Yet still they stand as firm as a Rock and say they have done no evil The Sailors being inhumanly and barbarously treated is the only true Cause why they so much decline the Publick Service The poor Sailers that venture their Lives and Limbs to serve their King and Country and who are one of the greatest Bulwarks of the Kingdom have been all along most inhumanly and barbarously treated and they and their Families reduced to a miserable and deplorable State particularly by the wicked Practices of putting Queries and Runs upon their pay For amongst those great numbers that are set on Shore sick those that die and others that continue sick above thirty days and those sent to the London Hospitals for cure who are thereby disabled to return to their Ships are for the most part made run Others whose Ships are sailed before recovery having gone on Board other Ships are prick'd run from the Ship they were sent from and if a Seaman is turn'd over from Ship to Ship and by that means has serv'd on Board four or five Ships in the Navy yet if he happens to be prick'd run in the last Ship he serv'd in he shall of consequence be prick'd run in all the preceding Ships By this means a Query or Run takes away a Man's Pay worse than an Execution and by the present Practice no Seaman or his poor Family is at any certainty of having the Benefit of the King's Pay for it is in the Power of the Captain Captain 's Clerk Purser Clerk of the Cheque Muster-Master or Clerks in the Navy-Office when ever they please to put a Run or Query upon any Seaman's Pay without giving Reason for so doing or the Name of the Person that put it So that for these black pieces of Robbery no one is liable to be called to accompt but the poor Sailer is kept wholly in the dark and he or his Wife may wait at the Navy-Office Month after Month with Petitions to no purpose till he has spent all his Substance And when he begins to talk of his being thus cheated and robbed he is threatned to be tried for his Life as a Mutineer So that the Barbarity the poor Sailors do and have suffered during this War is unexpressible The Blood of thousands of Families are poured out as Sacrifices to the Covetousness of those whose Duty and Place it is to be their Guardians and Protectors By all which it 's plain that whatever good Laws may be made for the Increase and Encouragement of Seamen will prove ineffectual so long as these Practices continue These Grievances have been at large set forth in Print by one Mr. Hodges and a Scheme of their true Cause laid barefac'd before the Admiralty by Mr. Trevor in a Letter and a Remedy for them propos'd in Writing to the Admiralty by Mr. Gibson by order of a Committee of Council and why there 's nothing done but this Fraud and Robbery still practised and supported is what no reason can be given for Since neither Mr. Hodges's Mr. Trevor's nor Mr. Gibson's Papers before mention'd have ever been exploded the Lords of the Treasury were so fully convinced of these Cheats that their Lordships did by Warrant under their Hands in December last appoint Mr. Gibson to receive all Informations of Abuses in Paiment of Seamens Tickets which doubtless would have put a stop to these wicked Practices Notwithstanding which the said Mr. Gibson has never been suffered to act and so their Lordships good Intentions have been wholly defeated But why their Lordships have not been able to put their own Orders in execution is another strange thing to me I shall now lay down Mr. Trevor's Letter before mention'd by which the Reader will be satisfied as to the Humour and Temper of these Gentlemen and after what rate things are and have been carried on It is as followeth My Lords HAving consider'd your Lordships Commands to wit That I lay before your Honourable Board a Proposal to prevent false Tickets and Powers for the future I find my self oblig'd humbly to represent the following Particulars in order to satisfy your Lordships therein so far as I may at present not being willing to take on my Shoulders who am so much loaded already such a burden as an effectual Proposal to that purpose must be Therefore to let your Lordships see I am no Stranger to that Practice
Navy and their Accomplices plainly make a Prey of the Publick and withal not doubt but the Contracts made on behalf of the King are for the most part fraudulent which has prompted them all along to protect those Criminals that have embezled the Publick Stores nothing else could induce them to do it unless they really design'd to ruin the Government which then must be confessed to have been a most effectual way so that the Navy which has been heretofore our Security is now become a Gulf to swallow the Publick Treasure If any Man endeavours to lay these Evils open he must undergo infinite Difficulties and Hardships having a corrupt Party to contend withal who by Time and Interest have knit and link'd themselves so fast together that he 's certainly crush'd by the Navy-board or their Adherents or otherways exposed to the World as I have been as a Fool or Madman or both and render'd to His Majesty as a vain idle Person and look'd upon with as much Contempt and Scorn as if he were the worst of Criminals I must confess I do not look upon this ill Treatment to be an Act of the Government but that it arrives from the same Fountain all the rest of the Evils have done nevertheless such Proceedings are a Dishonour to the Nation and Government and may at last prove fatal to them Some have assum'd to themselves a Power of dispensing with the Law Tho we have good and wholesom Laws that are not put in execution as those against Embezlements c. yet those that endeavour to have them put in practice do even run themselves upon their own Destruction as is seen by experience he that discovers any Breach of those Laws being in far more danger than those that committed the Facts which is highly pernicious and strikes at the very foundation of the Government I shall now relate something I have cause to remember and which is not altogether foreign to the Matter in hand At the first opening of the Session of Parliament begun and held in the fourth and fifth Year of his Majesty's Reign I published a Book entituled England's Glory Reviv'd wherein I propos'd an Act of Tunnage for laying six Pence per Tun upon all Coasters c. and likewise laid open the great Evil that attended the laying Embargo's upon Shipping which had been done every Year during the War until that time giving full Demonstration there was no cause for it and so there has been none laid since tho far greater occasion than at any time before All these Matters here related with some others I would have laid open the last Session of Parliament and in order to it declar'd in Print I could discover 2 or 300 thousand Pounds of the Publick Money that had been embezled Whereupon I was order'd to appear at the Bar of the House of Commons which I did and there declar'd the same so I had the Assistance of that Honourable House Upon which I was ordered to withdraw and in a quarter of an hour's time one of the Commissioners for Taking and Stating the Publick Accompts came to me in the Lobby and told me I had given great Satisfaction to the House and that I was referr'd to their Board where I should be heard with all imaginable Fairness But several Gentlemen told me that let my Cause be never so just I must expect to be trick'd by that Board none being more corrupt than they Which seem'd strange considering the care taken in Parliament in the Choice of those Persons and withal it being well known they had good Fortunes I thought it morally impossible they should ever be so corrupted as to act any thing against the Publick Good yet to my great Surprize I found my self mistaken But to proceed in obedience to the Order of the House I waited on the Commissioners for Stating the Publick Accompts and laid before them the great Injury done to the Souldiery by Agents and others in the Clothing of the Army to the Discouragement of the Souldiery and Hindrance of His Majesty's Service and then would have laid before them the Corruptions of the Navy afore-recited but they would not receive it all the Arguments I could use being to no purpose All the Answer I could obtain was that it did not lie before that Board and by way of Derision they said they might as well examine a Justice of Peace why he did not do Justice as to enquire into those Matters But with Submission they should have pursued the Order of the House of Commons which was to receive what I should lay before them and make report thereof with all convenient speed and not made themselves Judges what was sit for them to receive for as His Majesty and the Nation was injur'd and the Publick Money and Stores embezled it was their Duty to have heard me and left the House of Commons to be Judg. But they refusing to hear me put me to such a Nonplus that for sometime I knew not what to do and fearing I should do little in the House of Commons that Session I resolv'd to petition the House of Peers and acquainted some of the Witnesses with my Intention who very well approv'd on 't Whereupon I drew up a Petition with five Heads thereunto annex'd and presented it to a Noble Lord which his Lordship was pleas'd readily to receive and deliver to the House of Peers where it was receiv'd with much Freedom and Readiness by their Lordships and forthwith order'd to be read And that the ensuing Matter may be the better understood I have here set down a true Copy of the same which is as followeth To the Lords Spiritual and Temporal in Parliament Assembled The humble Petition of Robert Crosfeild Sheweth THAT your Petitioner having lately dedicated and presented to your Lordships a Book entituled Great Britain's Tears setting forth the great Abuses committed in the Government by Persons in Places of Trust and also the Embezlement of the Publick Treasure to the great Hazard of the common Safety of the Nation And your Petitioner having in the Paper annex'd drawn up some part of the said Miscarriages and Grievances that the Nation now labours under relating to the Royal Navy and being ready by good and substantial Evidence to prove the same before this most Honourable House Your Petitioner therefore most humbly prays that your Lordships will please to hear and examine the said Grievances that the Offenders may have such Punishment and the great Numbers that are oppressed such Relief as to your Lordships Wisdom shall seem meet And your Petitioner shall ever pray c. 1. That the present Commissioners for Sick and Wounded Seamen and Exchanging Prisoners at War depending on the Admiralty not regarding Instructions or the Good of the Government have committed gross Ennormities as Holding or Conniving at an unlawful Correspondence with the French and Wronging both the King and Subject in their Accompts with other great Miscarriages All which has
been about a Year since laid in Writing before the Secretary of State by one Mr. Baston and by the King's Command examin'd before the Lords of the Admiralty c. And it will appear that the said Commission has been very injurious to the poor Sailors in particular and very detrimental to the Government in general 2. That the Lords of the Admiralty and Commissioners of the Navy have acted contrary to the Publick Good by countenancing supporting and preferring Criminals and on the contrary persecuting the Discoverers and turning just Men out of their Offices 3. That their Lordships have had great Discoveries laid before them of Embezlements and other great Frauds committed in the King 's Yards attended with Forgery and Perjury 4. That it is manifest some of the Commissioners of the Navy have in that Office advanced themselves from Salaries of 30 l. per Annum to vast Estates having passed great Frauds and totally discouraged the Discovery of embezled Stores to the great waste of the Publick Treasure 5. That it has been a long Practice in the Navy to make out false Tickets and Powers suspending and delaying the poor Sailors in their just Paiments to the general Discouragement of them and Starving their Families Upon the Reading of this Petition Mr. Baston and I were call'd to the Bar of the House to know if we could make good what I had set forth in reference to the first Head Which we asserting in a little time their Lordships were pleas'd to order me to give in a List of my Witnesses which I did in part and so proceeded to the Examination of some of them upon the first Head which was done with all imaginable Fairness But there being some Depositions and other Papers in the hands of the Commissioners of Accompts which I desired might be transmitted to the House of Peers They thereupon sent their Secretary with some Papers who said the Depositions were long and would be so voluminous as they had not leasure to draw them out so begged the Favour they might have the Examination of the Matter Which was soon granted by their Lordships and an Order accordingly issued out bearing date the 20th of March for their taking the Examination of the first Head and for them to make their Observations upon the same and to transmit both to the House of Peers And by another Order of the 21st of March they were order'd to take the Examination of the second and third Heads and then to transmit the same to the House But when I came to understand that the Commissioners of Accompts had drawn this Matter to them again which they had before rejected I had just cause to fear they had a Design to prevent the Discovery of all these evil Practices yet how to help my self I knew not not knowing how corrupt that Board might be All which put me to a great stand foreseeing I should be baffled But I cannot omit relating one remarkable Passage which is worthy of Observation Upon the Reading my Petition in the House of Peers and Order being given to call me to the Bar of the House and a Door-keeper calling me with a loud Voice one of the Commissioners of the Publick Accompts then accidentally passing by and hearing my Name call'd met me in the Painted-Chamber just as I was going into the House an honest Gentleman only has wanted Resolution to withstand the Charms of these Sirenes who seem'd to be in great Confusion and Disorder of Mind and was taken with such a Fit of Trembling as Belshazzer was when he saw the Hand-writing upon the Wall not being able to hold one Joint still and asked me if I accused the Justice of their Board But I soon put him out of his pain by assuring him I did not only I did seek for Relief and Justice which I could not obtain at their Board Thus we may see when Men are surprized and a Guilt attends their Actions how all their little Arts and Intrigues fail them But to return Finding my self oblig'd to proceed with these Gentlemen the Commissioners of Aecompts Mr. Baston and I waited on one of them at his House whom we knew to be a leading Man at that Board and acquainted him that we had not been well treated by their Board before yet hoped we might now have things fairly examined He bad Mr. Baston whose Business was first to come on not trouble himself with what was past he should be fairly treated for says he we 'll take care to put our Finger upon the right place that was his Expression Which I must confess they did to the purpose but to a wrong end having thro' the whole Course of this Examination shew'd much Injustice and Partiality for when they went upon the Examination of the first Head they brought three Informations I can call them by no other name against Mr. Baston the Consequence of the first being High-Treason and put him upon his Oath to clear himself from the other two And when I waited on these Gentlemen first being the 23d of March I desir'd that the Witnesses as to the second and third Heads might have Precepts issued out for them many of them living in the Country at a great distance Upon which the Board did assure me they would take care it should be done and as we proceeded upon the first Head I desiring to know whether the Witnesses were order'd to appear in relation to the second and third Head was several times answer'd Care was taken therein but I sound it otherways there being no Precepts issued out for any Witnesses in the Country till the 12th of April Yet during the time of examining the first Head the Board sent for Mr. Trevor here in Town who was a Witness to the second and third Head and causing them to be read asked him what he knew concerning them He said he knew them to be true and that they would be fully prov'd by good and substantial Evidence and that things would appear to be much blacker than they were represented With which they seem'd to be well pleas'd and upon the 18th of April we began to examine Witnesses upon the second and third Head and ended the 19th of the same Month the Board declaring they bad so much Business upon them they could proceed no farther that Session of Parliament So there was little Progress made therein the most material Witnesses not being examin'd But during the Examination of these things the Board did what in them lay to ridicule the whole Affair and one of the Commissioners who said he 'd lay his Finger upon the right place affirm'd the whole Matter was but a Contrivance of Mr. Trevor's and nothing in it I acquainted Mr. Trevor with it who afterwards told the Commissioners that a Gentleman of that Board had said that those Articles I had brought were a Contrivance of his He said whoever did it acted very unworthily for that it was none of his doing and offer'd