Cooper, Langford and Skinner to Newcastle

A catastrophe of the most melancholy kind has rendered it imperative
on us, as a Committee elected, to act in the matter on which we have the
honor of addressing you, by our fellow Colonists, to wait upon your Grace
with the prayer of the independent residents of this Island for
protection from the arbitrary and unconstitutional enactments of the
present Governor.

Situated as we are at so Great a distance from the Imperial
Government, & feeling that the most certain and speedy way
of laying a
clear statement of our grievances before Your Grace, would be by securing
the presence in England of some member of our Community to whom we might
entrust our Cause, the Colonists, at a meeting held on the 4th Feby
(Ulto) for the purpose of arranging the preliminaries of the proposed
step, unanimously selected the Revd R.J. Staines, Chaplain to the Hudsons
Bay Co for this Island, as the most proper person to proceed to England
for the purpose of waiting on Your Grace.

This Gentleman, at the earnest request of the Colonists, undertook
the Commission, & sailed hence for San Francisco, in route to England,
on the 1t March (Ulto), but never, as it has pleased the Almighty, to
reach his destination, the vessel having been discovered some short time
since 
by a passing Ship in a waterlogged state, & but one of the crew
surviving to tell the sad fate of his fellows.

Deeply regretting as we do the untimely end of one who had the
interests of our infant Community so much at heart, & than whom none
could more efficiently have depicted the crushing effect of the incubus
under which our energies are paralysed, we at the same time are so well
assured of Your Graces earnest wish, as ever shewn, for the protection of
the true interests of this Colony, that in laying before you the
Documents with which our Delegate would have been charged, we do so with
a perfect Confidence that they will meet from Your Grace every
Consideration & attention, their importance entitles them to.