Your goodness and humanity will I hope exercise the liberty, that I really am reduced to take, of adressing myself to You—I am a native of George Town district in South Carolina, and while yet a child was sent to England for the benefit of Education; Upon becoming of age, in the year Eighty One, I returned to Charles Town, where refusing to sign any certificates of allegiance to the British government, I was not permitted to go without their lines but under certain restrictions—I at length resolved to go back to England, and return by Amsterdam. Ostend, or by some port or other in France; it was my misfortune to meet with a variety of obstacles, such as being captured, recaptured, and detained for several months in the West Indies; after my arrival in England, I was assured that persons as exceptionable as myself were daily permitted to leave the British lines, at New York I was advised to take that route myself, and not being able to reject the advice of those to whom I was indebted for the immediate means of support sat out from Falmouth in the last packet and arrived at New York the 20th instant—No sure mode offerd of conveying letters to my friends, and the accounts I heard, of the etiquettes lately established by Your Excellency being various and opposite I have ventured to come this far, where I am now detained untill I can be honored by Your Excellency’s passport to Philadelphia, which I humbly trust You will not refuse me, seeing that tho’ I have not yet renderd any services to my country, I have not however done any thing that can deserve the misfortune of being disown’d—I have the honor to be with the warmest and sincerest Respect Your Excellency’s Most Obedient And Attached Humble Servant