1791-07-29 (static/transcriptions/1791/07/255.jpg)
360.)
John Ryan, Sworn.
I am a private in the sixth European battalion, & I was at Dynapore last March. About nine o’clock in the morning of that month, 20 of us went out to drink toddy at the village of Ussuri. I had before drunk some toddy in the fives alley. after we had drunk toddy, we were returning home, some going one way, some another; some of us were drunk, others a little in liquor. I was sober enough to observe what passed & to recollect it. I saw William Donevan strike a black man with a bamboo thicker than my finger, not so thick as my rist, and as high as my hip from the ground. He struck the native on the head. I saw only the one blow. Two black men were doing something with a sheep by a jill on one side of the village: one of them ran away but was not struck; the other stayed by the native. I do not know of any fray before, nor of the villagers throwing stones at us.