1717._[1]

[Footnote 1: Suffolk Court Files, fragment 26283, paper 2. With this
memorial we may connect a passage in the pamphlet _Trials_: "Mr.
Valentine [counsel for Davis] moved, That an Affidavit under the firm
seal of a Notary Publick in Great Britain, and in favour of the
prisoner, should be read in open Court", but the request was denied,
as contrary to the act of Parliament requiring all evidence respecting
pirates to be given _viva voce_. Davis is recorded as a shipwright,
aged 22, born in Carmarthenshire, who "had used the sea these five
years".]

Province of the Massachusetts Bay. To His Excellency Samuel Shute,
Esquire, Governour, and the Honourable His Majesties Council for the
said Province.

The Memorial and humble Representation of Thomas Davis of Bristol in
Great Britain, Shipwright,

Sheweth, That in the month of September last past he sailed out of
Bristol as Carpenter of the Ship _St. Michael_, whereof James Williams
was the Commander, bound for Jamaica, and on or about the sixteenth
day of December following We met two Pyrate Sloops, One Commanded by
Capt Samuel Bellame, and the other by Monsr. Louis Le Bou[s], who
took the said ship about twenty Leagues off of Sabia and Carried us to
the Island of Blanco, w[h]ere we were kept till the ninth day of
January when your Memo. (with about fourteen more Prisoners taken by
the said Pyrate Sloope) was forced on board the ship _Sultan Gally_,
taken from Capt. John Richards, then under the said Bellames Command,
And afterwards the said Bellame took another ship called the _Whiddo_,
and your Memo., with the rest of the said Ships Compa., Came in her
upon this Coast, where she was Cast away, as is very well known, and
your Memo, (with one Jno. Julian[2]) only Escaped. And since his
Imprisonm't he is Informed That some have Reported That your Memo. was
several times on board the said ship after she was Cast away and knew
where a considerable part of her Treasure was, and that he had
Concealed some of it;[3] and many other things have been given out
Concerning your Memo. very falsely, to the great prejudice of your
Memo., Who is altogether Ignorant of what is Alledged against him, And
hath already Discharged his Conscience by making a true and full
Discovery of all he knows referring to the premises. But your Memo.
being a stranger was not Credited and therefore he had no better Fare
than the Pyrates, being in Chains as well as they; Whereas he declares
fro