Jenkins, ROBERT, an English merchant captain, trading from Jamaica, who alleged that in 1731 his sloop had been boarded by a Spanish guarda costa, and that, though no proof of smuggling had been found, he had been tortured, and his ear torn off. The said ear—some said he had lost it in the pillory—he produced in 1738 in the House of Commons; and a member asking him what were his feelings in the hour of peril, he answered, 'I recommended my soul to God, and my cause to my country.' Walpole next year was forced by the popular clamour to consent to war against Spain.
Jenkins, ROBERT
Chambers's Encyclopaedia, Volume 6: Humber to Malta, p. 300
Source scan(s): p. 0315