[Extract]

Gentn: I am to acknowledge the receipt of your favors of the 18th. 19th and 23d Instant, which, from the unsettled situation of our affairs, I have not been able to answer before.

That of the 18th incloses a list of Stores taken in the Hancock and Adams Continental Ship and carried into Dartmouth in New England, with a Resolve of Congress to deliver the Muskets, Powder, Lead and Flints to my order, as the other Articles of the Cargo will be full as useful to the Army, as those included in the Resolve, I would advise, that you given directions to have the whole Cargo removed from Dartmouth to some secure place in the Neighbourhood of Philadelphia, and there deposited till call'd for. It is by no means proper, that so great a Quantity of Military Stores should be lodged with the Army, especially at present, as we know not today, where we shall be obliged to remove tomorrow, and that will in all probability be the case, while the Enemy continue with a light Army on this Side the North River.