L’Orient 1st. August 1778
Honorable Gentlemen
The Frigate Boston sails this morning with her three prizes.1 Captain Tucker happend accidentally to have mention’d to me that he had your orders to take on board some goods here, but that as the wind was fair, he determin’d not to wait for them.
if it is a disappointment to you, wch. in any manner can be remedied by loading them on a french bottom, I can give you freight for them on reasonable terms, by one that I shall dispatch in all the next month for America2
I am much obliged to Mr. Franklin for having advanced Mr. Ogden Eight Guineas, in that gentleman’s way hither, wch. sum I desire my friend in paris to pay him.3 I wou’d have acknowledged that favor sooner, if Mr. Ogden had acquainted me therewith before. I have the honor to be [&c.]
James Moylan
L, PPAmP, Benjamin Franklin Papers, vol. 11, no. 1.
1. On the disposition of those prizes: Britania, Elizabeth, and an unnamed Scottish brig, see Musco Livingston to the Commissioners, 24 Aug., in Adams Papers 6: 387.
2. The commissioners’ reply has not been found.
3. Presumably Titus Ogden, a merchant from North Carolina for whom Moylan had acted as agent. Moylan’s “friend” has not been further identified.
