Honored Sir
I am happy in this Opportunity of thanking you for the kind and favourable mention which Mr [Abraham] Livingston informs me you have made of my former letters, —
Should Mr H[ewes] be at present Absent from Congress I must beg you to look over the Inclosed letters for him before you forward them Should the expidition Spoke of in my last to you be put in execution, as it may take up eight Months or upwards and as the Season is now So far Advanced it will be most Advisable to Set out early in the Spring so that the Prizes may reach the Continent in the beginning of the ensuing Winter. —2
I need not observe to you that Secrecy is Above all things to be attended to in every expidition — None besides the Principle in Command ought to be made Acquainted with the plan or d[e ]stination — the bounty Offered by the Artillery who are enlisting here being from 26 to £36 lawful Money for three Years Service induces all the Seamen to Enter. — the Seamen have been [very] ill used and the Navy hath been much hurted by [the cursed] Association for the Joint Share of Prize M[oney] [illegible] the Fleet whither present at t[he capture or absent] the Gentry who Set that Agreement on Foot and who Carried it thro' the Fleet at Reedy Island have taken Care to keep out of harms Way themselves ever Since our Grand Affair with the Glascow — Nay one of those Arch Patriots when Ordered to Philadelphia told the Commodore who repeated it to me, that if the other two were willing himself would Agree to be Broke if the Congress would Allow them half pay -— the Same Gentleman kept his Ship Eight months in Providence River and then left her with a Fished Main Mast and only one Common pump that would work.3 — But we Surely never can have a Navy Under good disciplin or well Manned Untill Some effectual expedient is Adopted to induce the Seamen to enter for an Unlimited time — perhaps it might answer if the Seamen in America were Numbered and formed into a certain Number of Classes Subject to serve in their turns — but the most infallible method is to give them All they Take — I will add something more as I shall have Another Opportunity in a day or two I have the Honor to be with Grateful Esteem and Respect Sir [&c.]
N.B. If you please to — look over the inclosed copy of my letter to the Council here and of their Answer or rather Order to me you will See the treatment which I have had from that House — I wish to know [whether] they Ought or ought not to Assume Authority over the Navy.
[Endorsed] Boston Jany 12th 1777 Copy of a letter to the Honble R. Morris Esqr by Express from Council
