Charter Party between the Secret Committee and Joseph
Harper and James King
DS: The Rosenbach Foundation
<February 1, 1776: The agreement is between members of the
committee and James King and Joseph Harper, Philadelphia merchants
and owners of the brigantine Cornelia of approximately 100
tons, Thomas Genn master, to hire her for a voyage to France.
She is to sail to a port in South Carolina to be subsequently designated,
there to be loaded with rice, indigo, or whatever the
committee’s agents select; she is to deliver her cargo at Nantes,
replace it with whatever the committee’s agents there may choose,
and return to a port between Virginia and New Hampshire and
deliver her goods to the order of the committee. She will be in
good condition and well provisioned and manned. The owners
will pay all the expenses, and the crew will give the customary
assistance in loading and unloading and diligently performing
their duties.
The committee will pay £120 Pennsylvania per month for the
hire of the ship, from the date of the charter party until the day
after she returns to Philadelphia or the day when she is sunk or
captured. If she is captured, the committee will also pay her assessed
value of £650 Pennsylvania. Each party binds itself, if it
defaults, to pay the other £2,000 Pennsylvanian. Signed by Harper
and King and by Franklin, Josiah Bartlett, Joseph Hewes,
Thomas McKean, Robert Morris, and Samuel Ward for the committee.>
627015 = 022-333a.html