Balt[imor]e 8t Septr 1775
Gent
We wrote you the 29t Ulto Copy of which you have above. we hope Capt [William] Frost will have arriv'd Ere this goes to Hand. ー2
A few Days more & Oppty to write will not be for England3 we therefore take the Liberty to inclose you Invoices of the diff[eren]t Cargoes of produce we Shipp'd in which we were Concern'd, except Such as are already Settled for & must beg you'll write the difft Gent to hand you the Accot Sales & Curr[en]t of Such Cargoes as they have, the Ballances of which they are to remit to you. press them if they prove dillatory as 'twill Seldom be in our power to write them. when you receive their accot & any Oppty offers you'll please inclose them to us. The Invoice of the Sidney's Cargo you have already. we expect it will yield a profit with the unlucky Ship we beg you'll act between us the Underwriters & Murray & Sons of Gib[raltar]. as you would do for yourselves. if M[urray] & S[on]s Charges are allow'd to be just we expect the Underwriters must pay them,4 We See no probability of the present Disputes being at an End Soon & must therefore be much Oblig'd to you to Act for us in our Business on your Side the Water. ー
Mr Robert Buchanan intends visiting New Orleans & Florida & will have Occasion perhaps to draw on you for as far as £100 Stg Should he you'll please pay due Honour to his drafts & place it to our Accot Inclosd you have Bills [of] Excha as at Bottom amotg to £533.1.8 Stg which when pd apply to our Credit. We are Gent [&c]
1. Letter Book of John Smith & Sons, Merchants of Baltimore, 1775-84, MdHS. Hereafter cited as Smith Letter Book, MdHS.
2. Frost was master of the 200 ton ship Friendship, which had arrived at Annapolis, June 12, 1775, and apparently was dispatched to London after July 19, 1775. See Appendix A, Volume 1, 1381.
3. The second stage of the Continental Association, September 10, 1775, prohibiting exports to the British Empire.
4. The ship Sidney, Thomas Drysdale, master, sailed from Baltimore December 22, 1774, with a cargo of wheat for Nice, in the kingdom of Sardinia. Just after clearing the Virginia Capes, she sprung a leak and put back into Norfolk harbor, where, in order to make repairs, it was necessary to remove part of her cargo. Drysdale had a dispute with the first mate, who left the ship. The captain's young brother-in-law, Joshua Barney, who, at fifteen years of age, was second mate, took over the post of first mate. A few days after the Sidney put out from Norfolk, Captain Drysdale fell ill, and died within a week. The command passed to Barney, who took the ship safely across the Atlantic, but a heavy gale as they were entering the Mediterranean so damaged the Sidney, that he was forced to put into Gibraltar. There he applied to Murray & Son, and, after a survey, the ship was found to require extensive repairs. These took three months before the vessel was fit to proceed; the firm of Murray & Son advancing £ 700 sterling for the work. Barney executed a Bottomry bond to that firm for the amount, reloaded his cargo of wheat and sailed for Nice. Letters from Gibraltar had advised Smith & Sons that the cargo was in good shape when the Sidney left that port. Mary Barney, ed., A Biographical Memoir of the late Commodore Joshua Barney (Boston, 1832), 11-16. Hereafter cited as Barney, ed., Life of Joshua Barney. See: Smith & Sons to Vierne & Veillon, Baltimore, September 22, 1775.
