and remain with you this night. I hope your bridge is finished, as I intend to reinforce you considerably.

To Colonel Moultrie.

Point-Haddrell, June 28, 1776.

DEAR COLONEL: If you should unfortunately expend your ammunition without beating off the enemy, or driving them on ground, spike your guns and retreat with all the order possible; but I know you will be careful not to throw away your ammunition.

CHARLES LEE, Major-General.

To Colonel Moultrie.

June 28—6 o’clock A. M.

DEAR COLONEL: I shall send you immediately a reinforcement. If the bridge cannot be finished without taking down the old, take it down without ceremony; but it would be better to have both. Yours,

CHARLES LEE.

To Colonel Moultrie.

Armstrong’s, June 28—3 o’clock P. M.

DEAR COLONEL: Mr. Byrd makes reports of your conduct which does you infinite honour; they are, indeed, such as I expected. I have sent for more ammunition for you, and ordered a large corps of Riflemen to reinforce Colonel Thompson.

To Colonel Moultrie.

[The following Letter from President Rutledge, written with a pencil on a slip of paper, was sent in the height of the engagement.]

June 28.

DEAR SIR: I send you five hundred pounds of powder. I should think you may be supplied well from Haddrell’s. You know our collection is not very great. Honour and victory, my good sir, to you, and our worthy countrymen with you. Yours,

J. RUTLEDGE.

P. S. Do not make too free with your cannon. Cool and do mischief.

Charlestown, June 29—9 o’clock.

DEAR COLONEL: I should have thanked you and your-brave garrison this morning, vis-à-vis, at the fort, but am prevented by a great deal of business. I do most heartily thank you all, and shall do you justice in my letters to Congress. I have applied for some rum for your men. They deserve every comfort that can be afforded them. We have sent for more powder; inform me of all your wants.

To Colonel Moultrie.

P. S. The General desires that Colonel Thompson will send, as soon as he can, a return of all occurrences in his part of the Island.

JOSEPH NOURSE, Secretary.

June 29, 1776.

DEAR SIR: My very particular thanks are due to you and the brave officers and men in your garrison for their heroick behaviour of yesterday. I beg that you will receive them yourself, and make them acceptable to the gentlemen, officers and soldiers. Seeing the necessity of supporting you properly, I will strain every nerve to supply you with ammunition; no man would go a greater length than myself in this matter; but, my good sir, you know the scantiness of our stock; I send you fifteen hundred pounds, and think more cannot be spared. Indeed, to do this I have been obliged to get two thousand pounds from Dorchester. We must not wholly exhaust ourselves for the forts; small-arms must decide the matter at last.

I daily expect powder from Eustatia, then I hope to supply you plentifully. If those gentry think proper to revisit you, after saying what I have done, you will not need any caution to spare your powder. I beg and entreat you only to fire your heaviest guns very slowly, only now and then, and take good aim; if a brisk fire is kept up on your side, to attempt, by any means, to equal theirs, your ammunition will soon be expended, and what shall we do then? I therefore once more request most earnestly that you will observe this advice. I send this powder upon Roberts’s pressing it much, in consequence of a letter from Captain Beekman; but yet I think it cannot be wanted, I mean what you have had cannot have been near expended. I think you had twenty-one rounds to each gun, besides the five hundred pounds sent yesterday, and surely nothing like that quantity could have been fired yesterday. I presume there must be a good deal made up for the guns that were not fired, which Beekman has not thought of when he was writing to Roberts. Pray, sir, have this matter investigated, and let me have a correct state of it by the bearer, Captain Legarée, or any other good hand coming up soon, let me have it. Acquaint me if anything, and whatever you may think material or proper for me to know. I should mention, and you will please communicate to the garrison, General Lee’s sentiment, which he thus expresses to me: “Their conduct is such as does them the greatest honour. No men ever did, and it is impossible ever can, behave better.” I hope you will caution the men with their field-pieces at the advanced guard, and the Riflemen also there, not to expend their ammunition at random shot, or unnecessarily.

To Colonel Moultrie.

Fort Johnston, July 1, 1776.

DEAR SIR: I most heartily congratulate the Colony on the drubbing you gave those fellows the other day, and only wish you had had powder enough, that it might have been complete. Enclosed I send you a copy of a letter I sent General Lee this morning, containing the information I received from five honest fellows (Americans) that got away last night.

If they come up again, they are determined to come as close to the forts as possible, in order, I suppose, to command us more easily from their tops. Two of these men were on board the Commodore in the action. They say your first fire killed a man in the tops, upon which the Commodore ordered them all out of the tops, from whence they assured us there was not a gun fired. The Sphinx lost her bowsprit by running foul of the Acteon, and they were obliged either to cut away their bowsprit or the Acteon’s mainmast. These men all belonged to the Acteon, and two of them were drafted on board the Commodore just before the action. I fired three cannon at the Syren, merely to please several of my officers, which fell far short, as I expected. We admired your behaviour, but could do no more. My compliments to all your corps; we drink their healths every day. If you will send this account to General Armstrong I shall be obliged to you.

P. S. As soon as the action began, the Commodore ordered to be put into a place of safety negro Sampson, a black pilot.

C. G.

Charlestown, July 1, 1776.

DEAR COLONEL: Huger’s Regiment have offered themselves to work at your fort. I believe a corps of blacks would have answered better, but the President and Vice-President think otherwise. You must desire the Baron to throw up the redoubt I ordered near on the beach to prevent their landing. The carpenters, I hope, will soon finish the gate. I have applied for six horses, and hope I shall procure them for you. Five deserters have just arrived here from the ships of war. Enclosed I send you a list of the murders your garrison have now to answer for, but I hope it will sit light on their consciences.

I am, dear Colonel, yours,

CHARLES LEE.

To Colonel Moultrie.

P. S. I must request that your garrison may be kept more vigilant than ever, and that Colonel Thompson and his corps do not relax, for it is almost proverbial in war that we are never in so great danger as when success makes us confident. Let the bridge be finished as soon as possible.

JOHN CRADOCK TO MARYLAND COUNCIL OF SAFETY.

Baltimore County, July 1, 1776.

GENTLEMEN: With a grateful sense of your good opinion of me, I beg leave to resign the commission of first Major in Soldiers’ Delight Battalion, since (having attended last