July 14th, 2011
This lot is closed for bidding. Bidding ended on 7/14/2011
Autograph Document Signed “Patrick Magrader” 1pp. folio, “In the House of Representatives of the United States” February 20, 1808, and reads “Mr. Chandler presented to the House a petition of Robert Elwell of the district of Maine and state of Massachusetts, stating that in the year one thousand eight hundred and five, he chartered his ship called the ‘Huntress’ to the United States to carry naval stores to the American squadron then in the Mediterranean sea, and that the said ship was captured during her voyage by a Spanish privateer in consequence of not being furnished with the proper documents by the government, and after wards captured by a British vessel of war, and sent into England, where she was libeled for salvage, and upon trial ordered to be restored to the petitioner upon his paying all the reasonable expenses incurred by the captors in consequence of the said capture, when she was ordered by the American counsul to Liverpool, there to discharge her cargo; and praying to be allowed his expenses incurred...The said petition was read and ordered to be referred to the Secretary of the Navy, to examine the same, and report the opinion thereupon to the House...” Fine condition. The Embargo Act of 1807 and the subsequent Nonintercourse Acts were American laws restricting American ships from engaging in foreign trade between the years of 1807 and 1812. They led to the War of 1812 between the U.S. and Britain. Britain and France were engaged in a life-and-death struggle for control of Europe, and the small, remote USA became a pawn in their game. The Acts were diplomatic responses by presidents Thomas Jefferson and James Madison designed to protect American interests and avoid war. They failed, and helped cause the war. An act later passed called the Nonintercourse Act was opposed by New England because it stopped all American trade with Great Britain.
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