Catalogue description Captured ship: La Diligente of Bayonne (master Jean Mathieu Veyres). History: a French...

Captured ship: La Diligente of Bayonne (master Jean Mathieu Veyres).

History: a French merchant ship (160 tons, 12 guns, 28 men), bound from Bayonne to Havana and Martinique, laden with wine, beef, flour, cod, butter, pitch, tar, iron bars, cheese, hoes, hatchets, tallow candles, linens, anchovies and pepper; taken on 15/26 July 1745 in 45°N by the privateer Leviathan (Andrew Breading commanding), and brought into Lisbon.

Documents:-

Court Papers:

• [CP 1]: copies of four examinations taken at Lisbon, with commissioners' attestation;
• [CP 2]: allegation;
• [CP 3]: attestation of papers;
• [CP 4]: abstract and translation of 10 ship's papers.

Ship's Papers: SP 1 to SP 11: papers abstracted in [CP 4], plus wrapper.

Personal Collection: one letter, numbered 1.

Mail-in-Transit:

• nos. 2 to 16: letters from Bayonne etc mostly to Martinique, in French (including several from wives to husbands, some of whom were serving on ships);
• nos. 17 to 71: letters to Havanna, Caracass, Puerto Caballo etc, in Spanish (including several from wives to husbands, some of whom were serving on ships);
• no. 72: wrapper used by the court.

[Decision: condemned as prize, 4 November 1745]