I received the very polite Letter which your Excellency in the Name of the Council was pleased to write to me, on being informed that the Frigate I command lay in a dangerous Situation from the Violence of the Ice; and am extreamly thankful for the obliging Expressions of your Excellency’s Desire to preserve her, in affording any necessary Assistance. I beg that your Excellency would have the Goodness to acquaint the Council with what grateful Acknowledgments I receiv’d the kind Offer, of which the two Captains of the Port will inform you; and that I find myself under the pleasing Obligation of acquainting immediately the King my Master with so friendly an Act of these States.

God preserve your Excellency many Years. On board the Frigate N.S. De Loreto, at Anchor in the Delaware, now secured in one of the Moles at Marcus Hook, the 17th. of December 1786. Excellency Sir, from your most obliged &c. &c (signed)