On this day 250 years ago in Bristol, England, merchants wrote to Richard Randolph in Virginia:

We are very sorry to inform you that there seems little prospect of a speedy reconciliation between the Government here and the Colonies, for by a Letter received this day from our WJ (who with another Gentleman) was deputed from this City to attend their Petition to the House of Commons, he writes that the Ministry carry every thing in the House by a great Majority, and that from the best information he can procure, they are determin’d to enforce those cursed Acts which have caused these unhappy differences, and for that purpose more Men of War and Troops are order’d for America; what will be the consequence of these measures God only knows. Heaven grant that some Friends to their Country may yet start up and be enabled to bring about an happy reconciliation.

Source: “XX. Farell & Jones to Richard Randolph, 27 January 1775,” Founders Online, National Archives, https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Jefferson/01-15-02-0620-0021. [Original source: The Papers of Thomas Jefferson, vol. 15, 27 March 1789 – 30 November 1789, ed. Julian P. Boyd. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1958, pp. 668–669.]