[Extract]
May it Please Your Excellency

I am induced to trouble Your Excellency with this Letter, lest You should be deceived by the Information I Gave You with respect to the Depth of the River Opposite this Fort which was very Erronious: Oweing intirely to want of Recollection in the Gentleman fr[om] who I had my Information he had tak[en] its depth but had forgot it. I have since sounded it and found it to be 28. 31. & 32 Fathoms oposite Our two Northermost Batteries. Over against Our southermost (which is now ready to Mount ten Guns) & 3/4 of a Mile from it, It begins to Shoal from 18 to 11 Fathoms in the Channel it then remains at 11: 12 & [13] till Near Fort Montgomery opposite to it on this side the Creek Called poops it deepens again to 18 Fathoms just over the Creek to the southward it is 22 Fathoms and in the Mouth of it 31. Near the shoal water Mentioned on the West side the River is an Eminence that Commands a Long reach both up and down the River if it should be thought Necessary to Boom Across I think it much more practicable there than in any Other part of the Highlands....