Honoured Sr
I Recd. yours of the 1st instant the third at night & am Determined to serve you according to your Directions If Possable the Badness of the weather has hindered me to proceed on with any more Boats Since my Last but Expect to Start the Remainder in two or three days that I now have at my Ferry & when they are gone I will go after the Rest I am afraid I Cant Bring up any Cannon in the Flat Boats If Ther should be any Durn boats1 below as I Expect There is I Kno I Can Bring up Cannon in Them and will I have ingaged a number of Brave watermen for the Purpose & I am dr Sr [&c.]
Jno Coryell
Coryells Ferry March ye 6th 1778
PS There was a number of peaceis of Duck Left at My place I had to press Sleds to move them to Reading & I Kept one for the use of My Self & men: If it Cant be Spared it is not Cut I will send it on
J C
L, DLC, George Washington Papers, Series 4. Docketed: "Coryells Ferry 6th March/1778/from/John Coryell—."
1. Durham boat: A flat-bottomed boat, from forty to sixty feet in length, with a beam of eight feet and a draft of twenty inches, originally designed to cany iron ore and freight on the Delaware River. They were fitted with two masts and sails, and were propelled by poles. Alfred Hoyt Bill, The Campaign of Princeton, 1776-1777 (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1948), 28-29.
