642 | To William Dalrymple

    Roxbury July 3 1768

    Sr

    I hereby send you some Dispatches which I received by Express from Genl Gage on Fryday last.1 I have reason to beleive that one of the Letters relates to Measures to be taken to restore Peace to the Town of Boston & Authority to the civil Power there; tho’ by my receiving the Letter sealed I am happily not made acquainted with its Contents. You know that my Situation requires that I should appear to know as little of and act as little in the Proceedings of this Kind as can well be. I should therefore be obliged to you if in conducting a Business of this Kind you would let me appear a Stranger to it untill it becomes necessary to communicate it to me officially. In the mean Time any private hints conveyed to me by a safe hand will be acceptable. If I had seen you before you sailed this Letter would have been unnecessary.

    I am &c.

    Col Dalrymple

    L, LbC     BP, 5: 272.

    In handwriting of Thomas Bernard. Scribal emendations not shown. The RC2 enclosed Gage’s orders to Dalrymple, New York, 25 Jun. 1768 (Appendix 8). On 4 Jul., FB requested that Capt. Corner dispatch Dalrymple’s orders promptly in a cutter (No. 644), and they may have been carried in the Gaspee, Capt. Murray, which departed Boston harbor on 6 Jul.3