Extract of a letter

from a Gentleman in Providence, dated May 25

It is strongly suspected here, that the provisions on board Webster were really purchased for the King's service, and that the Capture was a SHAM. If this be not the truth of the case, pray set it in a true light, for the report spreads fast; and as surely as it is believed that the ENEMY is supplied from Newport, will every supply for that town be stopped from every colony upon the continent.

Last Saturday [May 20] put in here, the ship Peggy, Capt. William Baron, in 28 days from Baltimore, in Maryland: This vessel was bound to Cork, with a load of flour and Indian corn, 'tis said, but having contrary winds, was likely to fall short of wood & water. She is now in custody of the men of war in this harbour, and we hear is to be sent to Boston.

Another ship, said to be from Virginia, loaded with wheat, &c. was lately taken, near Nantucket, by the Falcon sloop of war, and sent to Boston; this ship was said to be bound to Europe.1

That two ships, bound from Virginia and Maryland to Europe, should, at this juncture, fall in with Nantucket and Rhode-Island, is a matter of some speculation.


1. The ship Champion; see Graves's Conduct, MassHS Transcript.
Source: Naval Documents of the American Revolution, I, 560