ADAMS, Samuel (1722-1803), Signer (Massachusetts) and Robert Treat PAINE (1731-1814), Signer (Massachusetts) . Manuscript document signed ("Samuel Adams" and "Robert Treat Paine") also signed by Massachusetts patriots John Warren and Artemas WARD (1727-1800), WITH AN EXTENSIVE AUTOGRAPH ENDORSEMENT (SOME 275 WORDS) IN ROBERT TREAT PAINE'S HAND. Boston, 15 June 1787 (and later dates). 3 pages, folio . REVOLUTIONARIES TURNED LAWMAKERS CONSIDER THE CLOUDED TITLE TO MOUNT DESERT ISLAND A legislative document signed by three leaders of the Massachusetts Revolutionary movement, two of them Signers of the Declaration of Independence. It addresses a fascinating legal problem brought on by the shifting continental boundaries of the war-torn 18th century: whose law should apply to a property that moved from French, to British and then American control in a space of thirty years? A committee of the House refers "the Claims of Monsieur Gregoire in the right of his Lady to the Island of Mount Desert" to the "Judges of the Supreme Court," as the case involves "questions relative to the Law of the Land, as well as to the Law of Nations, founded upon the Changes which the property has undergone, & upon divers foreign Treaties." Artemas Ward signs as Speaker of the House, and Samuel Adams as President. Mount Desert, in present-day Maine, had been a fur trading post since Giovanni da Verazanno discovered it and King Henri IV claimed it for New France in the 16th century. Louis XIV granted title to the Cadillac family in 1688, but after the French and Indian War, Gov. Francis Bernard tried to turn it into an English settlement. Now, after the American Revolution, a Cadillac granddaughter, Marie Therese Gregoire, has petitioned to re-establish ownership (interestingly, her husband and not "his Lady" is the named petitioner). Paine, writing as Attorney General, offers his opinion that "the claimed Premisses belonged to the Ancestors of the Petitioners, and it is highly probable were possessed by them, as the place early obtained the name of Frenchman's bay & continues it to this time," but it was less clear to Paine whether the owners "were removed among other French neutrals in 1754...but it appears certain they were not in possession after 1754, and that no claim hath been made till since it hath been ceded to this state by the late treaty," that is, the Paris peace treaty between Britain and the U. S. of 1783. The Massachusetts lawmen devised a Solomonic solution, awarding half the island to the Gregoire family and the other half to the son of former governor Bernard. Provenance : Philip D. Sang (sale, Sotheby Parke Bernet, 26 April 1978, part lot 262). Same provenance, lots 6-7, 9-15.
ADAMS, Samuel (1722-1803), Signer (Massachusetts) and Robert Treat PAINE (1731-1814), Signer (Massachusetts) . Manuscript document signed ("Samuel Adams" and "Robert Treat Paine") also signed by Massachusetts patriots John Warren and Artemas WARD (1727-1800), WITH AN EXTENSIVE AUTOGRAPH ENDORSEMENT (SOME 275 WORDS) IN ROBERT TREAT PAINE'S HAND. Boston, 15 June 1787 (and later dates). 3 pages, folio . REVOLUTIONARIES TURNED LAWMAKERS CONSIDER THE CLOUDED TITLE TO MOUNT DESERT ISLAND A legislative document signed by three leaders of the Massachusetts Revolutionary movement, two of them Signers of the Declaration of Independence. It addresses a fascinating legal problem brought on by the shifting continental boundaries of the war-torn 18th century: whose law should apply to a property that moved from French, to British and then American control in a space of thirty years? A committee of the House refers "the Claims of Monsieur Gregoire in the right of his Lady to the Island of Mount Desert" to the "Judges of the Supreme Court," as the case involves "questions relative to the Law of the Land, as well as to the Law of Nations, founded upon the Changes which the property has undergone, & upon divers foreign Treaties." Artemas Ward signs as Speaker of the House, and Samuel Adams as President. Mount Desert, in present-day Maine, had been a fur trading post since Giovanni da Verazanno discovered it and King Henri IV claimed it for New France in the 16th century. Louis XIV granted title to the Cadillac family in 1688, but after the French and Indian War, Gov. Francis Bernard tried to turn it into an English settlement. Now, after the American Revolution, a Cadillac granddaughter, Marie Therese Gregoire, has petitioned to re-establish ownership (interestingly, her husband and not "his Lady" is the named petitioner). Paine, writing as Attorney General, offers his opinion that "the claimed Premisses belonged to the Ancestors of the Petitioners, and it is highly probable were possessed by them, as the place early obtained the name of Frenchman's bay & continues it to this time," but it was less clear to Paine whether the owners "were removed among other French neutrals in 1754...but it appears certain they were not in possession after 1754, and that no claim hath been made till since it hath been ceded to this state by the late treaty," that is, the Paris peace treaty between Britain and the U. S. of 1783. The Massachusetts lawmen devised a Solomonic solution, awarding half the island to the Gregoire family and the other half to the son of former governor Bernard. Provenance : Philip D. Sang (sale, Sotheby Parke Bernet, 26 April 1978, part lot 262). Same provenance, lots 6-7, 9-15.
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