Description
Original Warrant Signed by Major General Robert Boyd, and Lieutenant Governor and Commander in Chief of the Town and Garrison of Gibraltar, to the Paymaster General, or William Sloper his Deputy at Gibraltar, authorising payment to John Sweetland “for Sundry Special Services for this Garrison”. Signed by Sweetland overleaf on receipt of 617 Mexico Dollars. 2 pp. 13 x 8 inches, wafer seal affixed, in very good condition. Gibraltar, 24 June 1775. Lieutenant-General Sir Robert Boyd (1710-1794). In 1756 he served at the Siege of Minorca, and attempted to reach Admiral John Byng’s fleet in an open boat with a message from the besieged Garrison Commander William Blakeney. He subsequently became commissary general to the Marquess of Granby in Germany (1758 to 1759); he then rose through the officer ranks to be three-times Governor of Gibraltar (1776 to 1777, 1790 and 1790 to 1794). Boyd considered that his and General Sir William Green’s work on the King’s Bastion in Gibraltar was so important that he asked to be buried there.