From Alexander Hamilton to George Washington, 10 September 1794
To George Washington
Treasury Department, September 10, 1794. Encloses “a claim of Joseph Tatlow’s against the United States for his services as an Express in April 1794 from New Castle to Philada.”1 Asks “whether it ought not to be discharged out of the fund of twenty thousand Dollars appropriated the last Session of Congress to defray the Contingent charges of Government.”2
LC, George Washington Papers, Library of Congress.
1. Tatlow’s bill, dated April 21, 1794, amounted to $12.11 for “The Hire of My Horse & Carriage from Newcastle to Philadelphia Carraing the Dispatches from Mr. [Thomas] Pinckney our Minnister At the Court of London Brought by the Delaware Capt. Thos. Truxton” (AD, RG 217, Miscellaneous Treasury Accounts, 1790–1894, Account No. 5917, National Archives). On the back of this bill Edmund Randolph wrote the following note, which is dated September 5, 1794: “The Letters by Capt. Truxton from Mr Pinckney were delivered to me. I do not know Mr. Tatlow and therefore I cannot say whether he did deliver them or not. But I cannot doubt it after the statement within. As to what the worth of such a service is, I am no judge” (ALS, RG 217, Miscellaneous Treasury Accounts, 1790–1894, Account No. 5917, National Archives).
2. “An Act making appropriations for certain purposes therein expressed” appropriated twenty thousand dollars “For defraying the contingent expenses of government … under the direction of the President of the United States” ( 394–95 [June 9, 1794]).
On September 12, 1794, the President approved Tatlow’s account (, 309).