High Court of Admiralty. Captured ship: St Anne [of Philadelphia] formerly Nancy...

High Court of Admiralty.

Captured ship: St Anne [of Philadelphia] formerly Nancy and Sukey (master James Robinson).

Capture history: an American merchant ship (185 tons, 13 men) bound from [Philadelphia to] Charleston, South Carolina and then to Bordeaux, laden with rice and indigo; taken on 10 June 1777 in Bay of Biscay by HMS Hector (Sir John Hamilton commanding), and brought into Portsmouth.

Intended voyage: from the United States to France.

Court papers numbered CP 1-2:-

• [CP 1]: attestation of papers (numbered 1-23) brought in by Hamilton, with commissioner's affidavit, 25 June 1777; Hamilton noted that there were 'several private letters not relative to the said ship or her cargo which [he] transmitted to the several persons to whom the same were addressed';
• [CP 2]: three depositions of James Robinson of Philadelphia, Lewis Ogier of Charleston, and William Harkley of Philadelphia, a copy of the additional interrogatories, and commissioners' affidavit, 25 June 1777.

Ship's Papers numbered SP 1-22 including mail in transit - all letters annotated 'opened on board... 10 June 1777' (South Carolina papers, and patriot letters):-

• SP 1: see SP 10;
• SP 2: personal letter from Thomas Eveleigh to George Eveleigh [his father], care of William Freeman, merchant, Queen's Square, Bristol, 18 April 1777, mentioning Mr Laurens, difficulty of transmitting money and doing so via Holland, houses, cost of 'field negroes'(£700 or £800), and the state lottery;
• SP 3: business letter from Thomas Eveleigh to Jacques Gruel, Nantes, 18-30 April 1777;
• SP 4: personal letter from John Lucena, of Augusta, to his father James Lucena, Lisbon, 25 April 1777;
• SP 5: business letter (ordering fifes, drums, linens etc) from John Hugin to Captain Benjamin Evanse, master of the brig Constant Friend at Bordeaux, 27 April 1777;
• SP 6-SP 7: two personal letters from William Nisbett to his brother Thomas Nisbett (laughing at him for suggesting the delivery of letters via a British Army officer or others 'dressed in scarlet') and mother Susannah Nisbett (telling her how to send letters via Holland or France), both of 28 Bishopsgate Street, London, 23 April 1777;
• SP 8-SP 9: order for goods to be purchased on account of the brig Three Sisters, and bill of lading, Thomas Evesleigh;
• SP 10: contract for the building of a ship, 24 July 1775 (incorporating the paper wrongly numbered 1);
• SP 11: ship's account book;
• SP 12: bill of lading;
• SP 13: business letter from Ogier & Lushington, to Jean Lafitte cadet, Bordeaux, 29 April 1777;
• SP 14: business letter from Thomas R Randall & Son, Philadelphia, giving the Philadelphia partners in the St Anne, and the role of Lewis Ogier in selling the rice, to Jean Lafitte cadet, Bordeaux, 6 March 1777;
• SP 15: business letter from [torn], Charleston, to Mr George Bague, Copthall Building, Throgmorton Street, London, by way of Lewis Ogier, 30 April 1777;
• SP 16: business letter from William Sykes, Philadelphia, a partner in the St Anne, to Jean Lafitte cadet, Bordeaux, 10 March 1777;
• SP 17: business letter from Powell, Hopton & Co, Charleston, to Figur Frères, Bordeaux, 25 April 1777;
• SP 18: personal letter from R Lushington [Richard Lushington], Charleston, to his mother Mrs William Pilcher, Walton, Folkestone, Kent, telling her 'I could wish to forget there was ever such a country as Britain', and to reply under cover to Jean Lafitte cadet, Bordeaux, 29 April 1777;
• SP 19: invoice for rice and insurance, Ogier & Lushington;
• SP 20: bill of lading for indigo, Powell, Hopton & Co;
• SP 21: clearance from Charleston, 23 April 1777;
• SP 22: journal of the [Englishman] Thomas Reed, starting 1773 with a voyage in the Sukey of Poole (master Christopher Whitewood) from Newfoundland to Barbados, and the St Anne (master Robinson), with three drawings, of two ships in a chase in a storm, and another of two ships, and a man and two women (at pp37-38).
• SP 23: a very large logbook: see HCA 30/734.

[Papers previously wrongly identified as Court papers: 1-9; Ship's papers: 10-29. (large pencil numbers): sorted and renumbered in 2024]. SP 22 log added from HCA 30/734 in May 2023. See also HCA 30/734 for SP 23, a log of the St Anne.

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