Folios 235-236: John Hayes, Purbrook Hampshire. Responds to a request for the circumstances...

Folios 235-236: John Hayes, Purbrook Hampshire. Responds to a request for the circumstances about a black man said to have been taken from New Providence by his ship HMS Majestic. Advises he had already responded to such a request the previous July. He encloses a new enclosure being an affidavit sworn by his Clerk who examined and took the description of the only black man who entered service on board HMS Majestic at New Providence which makes it clear that this black man was not the slave lost by Major Poitier's brigade.

Folio 237: enclosed with folios 235-236. Copy affidavit dated 17 July 1815 by Robert Mason before Mr. D Forrest, Mayor, Plymouth. Advises that as Clerk of HMS Majestic he was present on shore at New Providence on the evening of 10 June 1814 when James Baldwin, a black man, entered with Lieutenant John George Victor who interrogated him as to whether he was a slave or otherwise. He declared himself to be a free man and is the same man that deserted at Halifax. Gave a description of the man and that he was free from lameness.