'
Therefore they could not be indulged with such permission.
Later they were ordered into confinement.
On the 25th of July a memorial signed by over two hundred
of the inhabitants of Annapolis Royal was laid before
the Council. The memorialists said they had unanimously
consented to deliver up their firearms, although they
had never had any desire to use them against His Majesty's
government. They declared that they had nothing to reproach
themselves with, for they had always been loyal, and that
several of them had risked their lives in order to give
information regarding the enemy. They would abide by the
old oath, but they could not take a new one. The deputies
who had brought this memorial from Annapolis, on being
called before the Council and asked what they had to say
regarding the new oath, declared 'that they could not
take any other oath than what they had formerly taken.'
If it was the king's intention, they added, to force them
out of the country, they hoped 'that they should be
allowed a convenient time for their departure.
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