A Delegate in Congress to a Correspondent in London;

[August 24, 1775] You will see by the publick Papers some of the Proceedings of our Congress; the rest will soon be published. Three million of Dollars are now striking by their Orders, for defending the Rights of America. The very Quakers in this and other Provinces are in Arms, and appear in the Field every Day in their Regimentals, and make as good a Figure as the best; you may be sure we are in earnest, when they handle a Musquet.

All trade to England, and every other Part of the World, will most certainly be stopped on the 10th of next Month, and if the Ministry do not very soon see the Justice and Equity of placing the Colonies in the same Situation they were in before the Year 1763, in which both Sides experience Satisfaction and mutual Benefit, then you may expect to hear in the Course of next Winter that the Congress have opened all our Ports to every foreign Power that will come with their Manufactures, and trade with US for our Produce. Whether that will not be one Means of dissolving our Connection entirely with Great Britain, I shall leave to wiser Heads to determine; I am far, very far, from wishing such an Event; but, nevertheless, I am very apprehensive, from the present Temper of our People, that a few more violent Steps will lay a Foundation for it.

MS not found; reprinted from the Daily Advertiser (London), October 19, 1775. Printed under the heading: "Extract of a Letter from one of the Gentlemen of the Provincial Congress at Philadelphia, Aug. 24." Force, who took his text and date for this letter from the Weekly! Magazine, or Edinburgh Amusement, October 26, 1775, printed it under the date August 26. 1775. Am. Archives, 4th ser. 3:435. Aside from the fact that the writer was probably a delegate from Pennsvlvania, it is impossible to identify the author or the recipient on the basis of available evidence .