Tea Leaves / Being a Collection of Letters and Documents relating to / the shipment of Tea to the American Colonies in the year / 1773, by the East India Tea Company. (With an introduction, / notes, and biographical notices of the Boston Tea Party)

by Francis S. Drake

Dear Brother:

Cap^t. Curling arrived here the 2^d inst., with 257 chests of tea. There were many meetings of the merchants and planters, but by the result they came to no determination; the gentlemen that the tea was consigned to refuse receiving it. The tea staid on board 20 days. We then gave the captain a permit to land it by sunrise. In the morning I went on board, and called the captain out of his bed, begged he would begin to get the tea out of his vessel. I expected that he would not have been permitted to land it, but we immediately got six chests into the warehouse, and the sailors hard at work hoisting out the rest. We began about 7 o'clock, and had by 12 about half the tea in the warehouse, and the rest before the door. There was not the least disturbance; the gentlemen that came on the wharf behaved with their usual complaisance and good nature to me, and I believe the same to the rest of the officers that were there. I thought it my duty to exert myself on this occasion, which I did with great pleasure, (as I was serving my old masters,) as well as doing my duty as a revenue officer.

I am, &c., &c.,

John Morris.[57]

Corbyn Morris, Esq^r.,
Custom House.

LETTER FROM Cap^t. ELLIS,

Of the New York Establishment, to the Chairman.

Cox & Mair's Office, 4^th Feb^y.

Sir: