I represent Rev. William Gordon. I was minister at Mobile during the British period in West Florida, and my name appears on a list of Mobile inhabitants in 1770. After the death of Rev. Nathaniel Cotton in 1771, I petitioned Governor Peter Chester to replace him as Minister of Pensacola. My request was denied as I was apparently not very popular among the inhabitants. I did provide ministerial support to Pensacola in the years following Cotton’s death, and was granted part of Rev. Cotton’s previous salary for doing it. In 1773, I complained to the provincial council that the Assembly had not met in two years, and that my “impoverished parish” needed approval for a housing allowance for its needy clergyman. I kept records of my parish, including counts of the inhabitants, both white and black. In 1779, I sought a grant of 2,000 acres in West Florida; I titled myself “Dr. William Gordon, Chaplain of Mobile.” In July 1781, I petitioned the Crown for restitution for my losses to the Spanish, which was my house in Mobile. I presented two witness testimonies: one said that my house was burned; the other that the British had dismantled it as it was in the way of the defense of the fort. My petition said I was a widower with four children.
Sources: 3, 7, 32, 92