David Franks: Colonial Merchant

10. A Time of Transition

Ten a time of transition With the departure of Colonel Bouquet for Florida in 1764, new officers took over the posts in the western section. Along with the change went years of close personal working relationships and good will. At Fort Chartres , Colonel Wilkins had a long-standing business connection with Baynton , Wharton and Morgan, although he and George Morgan disliked each other. Clearly, Levy and Franks were the agents for the contractors with the assignment to supply Fort Chartres, but Wilkins was not making things easy for them. In 1770 David Franks complained to General Gage, outlining the history of one particular pork purchase that Wilkins had rejected, even though he had known about the order well in advance and had acknowledged that he anticipated the delivery. Franks pointed out Wilkins’s habit of favoring Baynton, Wharton and Morgan’s products over those of competitors and some of the administrative hurdles placed before others in order to accomplish receipt of merchandise. No effort was being made at Chartres to hide this favoritism. Gage took Franks’s side, but after settlement Wilkins was surely not going to have warm feelings, having been ordered to reverse himself. Wilkins was no Bouquet—in any sense of the word. Working relationships were going to change dramatically.1 The year 1770 was not a good one for Gage. He sent lengthy messages to Lord Hillsborough, the secretary of state for the colonies, describing the “Misunderstanding between the People and the Troops in this Place [New York]” and the subsequent situation in Boston. In New York the quartering of troops aroused serious objections, which were settled by negotiation, but in Boston things got out of hand. A few soldiers and a much larger group of angry colonists had words, which led to pushing and shoving. Captain Preston, the officer in charge, detached a squad of troops A Time of Transition 103 and a sergeant to the area and decided to go there himself to keep control of the soldiers. The crowd grew more strident, and Preston stood between the Soldiers and the Mob parlying the latter, and using every conciliating Method to perswade them to retire peaceably. . . . All he could say had no Effect, and one of the Soldiers receiving a violent Blow, instantly fired. Captain Preston turned round to see who had fired and received a Blow upon his Arm, which was aimed at his Head; and the Mob at first seeing no Execution done, and imagining the Soldiers had only fired Powder to frighten, grew more bold and attacked with greater Violence: continualy Striking at the Soldiers and pelting them, and calling out to them to fire. The Soldiers at length perceiving their Lives in Danger, and hearing the Word Fire all round them, three or four of them fired one after another and again three more in the same hurry and Confusion. Four or five Persons were unfortunately killed, and More wounded.2 Preston and the soldiers were arrested and taken to the local prison. This was the first British report of the Boston Massacre. Without conferring with Gage, Lieutenant Governor Hutchinson and Lieutenant Colonel Dalrymple had the troops moved out of Boston to the Island of Castle William in Boston Harbor. Gage was displeased about not being consulted but confessed, “It has indeed been proved, that they [the Soldiers] were of no use in the Town of Boston, for the People were as Lawless and Licentious after the Troops arrived, as they were before.” The major cities in the colonies were in ferment; anti-British feelings were aroused generally. Throughout the period following Pontiac’s Rebellion, the British Parliament , the Board of Trade, and the constantly rotating officials at the head of the British government debated endlessly whether to retain the system of forts and military settlements that had been established when the French were there. Everyone had an opinion. Certainly one of the most valued was that of General Gage, who represented the front line in the conduct of Indian relationships. In 1768 the Board of Trade issued a report, in conjunction with a contemplated reorganization of the government, dealing with management of the Indian/western problem. Among other issues, they concluded that it would “be in the highest degree expedient to reduce all such posts in the interior country, as are not immediately subservient to the protection of the Indian commerce and to the defeating of French and [18.221.165.246] Project MUSE (2024-04-23 13:17...