Scope and Content: In 1776 the Massachusetts General Court appointed a Committee of Sequestration to inventory, lease, and otherwise manage estates abandoned by Loyalists, primarily in Boston, and to forward their confiscated goods or proceeds from their auctioning to state authorities, until its charge was withdrawn in 1781. Series documents chiefly the first and last of these functions. –Vol. 1, 1776-1778, includes inventories of personal and real estate by absentee, listing items such as furnishings, buildings, slaves, books, by room, store, or other location where found. Sheriff William Greenleaf is noted in some entries as the seller at auction. Absentees include Thomas Hutchinson, Lewis Deblois, Gilbert Deblois, and Edward Lyde. Cover title: Absentees’ estates. –Vol. 2, 1776, lists articles delivered to the commissary by order of the committee, and from whose holdings they were taken (many from the Debloises or Edward Lyde). Items include tools, compasses, locks, lead, files, paper, and pans. Notations indicate that Commissary General Francis Abbott received items as of July 1, 1776 and Commissary General Richard Devens after that date. The volume is signed by Jonathan Browne, committee chair. Another version of this record is found in: Massachusetts. Office of the Secretary of State. Massachusetts archives collection ((M-Ar)45X), v. 280, p.121 et seq., along with other records of the committee, such as inventories, receipts, vouchers, and accounts. Caption title: Account of sundry articles sold to the commissary.
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