To George Washington from Winthrop Sargent, 12 March 1776
From Winthrop Sargent
Glocester [Mass.] March 12 1776
Sir
This is to Aquant your Excellency that Last Sunday Commodor Manley with Warter Tucker & Ayrs Tuck a Ship from London Jams Watts Commander[.] the Contence of Hur Cargow you have inclosed with Two Letters for Genl How, but thay Had the Misforten it being Verey dark thick night to Run a Shoar upon the Rox About three Miles from the Harbor of Glocester[.] She is Bilged & Most of the Cargow will be Lost[.] the Com[mo]d[ore] Manley Damaged his Vessel Verey Much Lost his Bowsprit but is Refeted, I Shall dow all in my Power to Save what I Can of the Cargow[.] I Should be glad to Know what I Shall dow with the Capt. & Sallers as thay have Know Ship to Cheap on bord1 I Rem. Y. Excl. Very Hue Sar.
Winthrop Sargent
ALS, DLC:GW.
1. On 10 Mar. Commodore John Manley in the and the captains under his command (Daniel Waters in the Lee, Samuel Tucker in the Franklin, and John Ayres in the Lynch) captured the ship Stakesby, James Watts, master, off Cape Ann. The enclosed invoice and the intercepted letters have not been identified, but it was reported in the Boston-Gazette, and Country Journal of 18 Mar. 1776 that the Stakesby, which was “out 17 weeks from London, bound for Boston,” carried a cargo consisting of “180 casks of porter and 30 casks of sour krout, together with coal, chesse, &c. She also brought out 164 live hogs, but only 3 of them lived through the passage.” For Sargent’s subsequent efforts to save the cargo, see his letters to GW of 14, 26 Mar., and 7 April 1776.