Thomas Cushing, Francis Dana, and Samuel Breck to Alexander Hamilton and Egbert Benson, 10 September 1786
Thomas Cushing, Francis Dana, and Samuel Breck
to Alexander Hamilton and Egbert Benson1
New York. Sept. 10. 1786
Gentlemen
Understanding on our arrival in this City last Fryday evening, that you had gone on for the Convention at Annapolis the week past, we take the Liberty to acquaint you and beg you to communicate to the Convention if it should be opened before we arrive there, that we shall set off from this Place to morrow to join them, as Commissioners from the State of Massachusetts, which we hope to do in the course of this week.2 The Commissioners from Rhode Island were to sail from thence for this city on the 7th Instant; so that they may be expected soon after us.
With great Respect Your most obed humble Servts
Thomas Cushing
Fra. Dana
Sam Breck
The Gentlemen
Commissioners for New York
LS, in writing of Samuel Breck, Hamilton Papers, Library of Congress.
1. Cushing, a leader of Massachusetts opposition to Great Britain in the decade before the Revolution, held many offices during and after the war. He was lieutenant governor of Massachusetts at the time of his appointment as a delegate to the Annapolis Convention. Dana, American Minister to Russia from 1781 to 1783, was appointed an associate justice of the Supreme Court of Massachusetts in 1785. Breck was a wealthy Boston merchant.
2. The Massachusetts delegates set out for Annapolis, but en route news reached them that the convention had broken up.