To Captain Duncan Hill.

FRANCIS WARE TO MARYLAND COUNCIL OF SAFETY.

Baltimore, May 31, 1776.

Gentlemen : The bearer will produce to the Board three gun-locks, sent by Mr. Messersmith for your inspection, who tells me he has now twenty-five more finished off, and if the publick will encourage him properly, he can finish ten or twelve per week. I believe the encouragement he expects is three dollars per lock. If you approve of the work and price, please to let me know by a line, and I will older him to employ all his hands in that business.

I am under the necessity of soliciting a sum of publick money, to be lodged in the hands of some gentlemen in or near this place, to discharge contingencies, as I find it impossible to furnish our Hospitals with proper necessaries for the like, such as milk, vegetables, &c, without ready money. There are also blankets wanting for the sick, which cannot be got without the money. I have been obliged to borrow twenty odd pounds since I came here, to pay the people who are at work on our tents, tent-poles, beds for the sick, &.c, 8tc, who are chiefly needy, and must have a little money to go to market.

I am, gentlemen, very respectfully, your obedient, humble servant, v w

Francis Ware.