(This is a sequel to the fiction I wrote recently titled: "Our Wills are Unbreakable". This one, however, it written from England's perspective...)

Rocheller, Kent, England

August 17th, 1776 A.D.

Dear Brother,     

It has hardly been five years since you have settled on the new America’s shores, yet your letter that I have read was written with a tone that I liked not to read. You lived in England with our mother and me until the rashness of youth took you and swept you onto a ship bound for America, and scarcely half a decade had elapsed that you took allegiance with a foreign thought. Why, just a year ago your letter at Christmastide was written and signed by a loyal British subject. You had inquired of the new fashions, dances, and cigar; of the politics, economics, and commerce of England’s rule. I had not doubted of your proud loyalty to the crown. But now you have changed my view of you, and I deem not for the better.        

     Hearing of the resistance found in Lexington, the harassment on the roads of Concord, the treasonable taking of Fort Ticonderoga, the taking of the British ship ‘Diana’, the British victory in the Battle of Quebec, and the foolery of Bunker Hill, I assured myself that you had not taken the side of the ‘Americans’ but had yourself remained a British subject and were helping our men achieve their victories over the rebels. But when I received your letter, the first letter since the one I had received at the end of 1775, I was appalled, dumbfounded, even scandalized by the way you carried on about how you had joined the ‘Sons of Liberty’, was refusing to purchase British tea, had hidden weaponry at your farm, and had even taken up arms in the Battle of Bunker Hill. My brother, I cannot deny that these deeds of yours were treasonable so I must regard you for who you now are: a traitor to the Crown of England.         

       These times are tried by a disunity caused by you, the colonists. We, the British, are not accountable for the resistance that you have given against our just and reasonable taxes. As British subjects, you are to pay taxes to the crown. How else is the king to provide protection for you from foreign enemies? Yet, you refused to pay them and even refused to receive the ships docked in the Boston harbour. How can you refuse the protecting and providing arm of your Mother, England?          

      Upon picking up a newspaper this past week, I was shocked to see the headline: “The Thirteen Colonies Declare Independence”, and under this title was the document itself. Reading it through, I found it absurd. Why would a few colonies of great, ancient England wish to separate itself in the name of freedom? Freedom’s lure is strong, but beware! For it shelters great responsibility and the possibility of a great fall into evil. For, when a person has the freedom to do good, so also does that person have equal freedom to do wrong. Why would you want the burden of ruling thrust upon your inexperienced shoulders, when a king descended from olden times now rules you in his great wisdom with the aid of a parliament of great and just men?         

      My brother, I am ashamed of your conduct. Your disloyalty to the Crown abhors me. I ask you to change your frame of mind and again take your stand by the Crown. England will reward you for your loyalty. Your good deeds to our men will not be overlooked. Be not lured by the false representation of Freedom presented to you by the patriots! Stand! I bid you stand with England!      

I sign this letter as you brother,

Edward George Standford

Sources:

http://www.theamericanrevolution.org/battles.aspx

http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~genmaps/genfiles/COU_Pages/ENG_pages/aaEng.htm