Letter from Captain Jeremiah Yellott to Colonel Henry Hollingsworth Concerning Work on the Susquehanna River, 1798
- Single 8 x 9.5” letter, folded
- Baltimore, Maryland , 1798
Baltimore, Maryland, 1798. Single 8 x 9.5” letter, folded. Small tears at folds with one larger tear; ripped at location of seal; overall near fine. Captain Jeremiah Yellott (1749–1805) immigrated from Great Britain to Maryland in 1774, and there made a fortune as a privateer and merchant. In 1798, he was made a naval agent by America’s first Secretary of the Navy, Benjamin Stoddert, under the Adams administration. Colonel Henry Hollingsworth (1737–1803) was Yellott’s father-in-law’s brother; Jesse Hollingsworth, Yellott’s father-in-law, was a shipping magnate who owned a wharf in Baltimore adjacent to Yellott’s property, and they eventually went into business together.[1] Colonel Hollingsworth was Lieutenant Colonel of the Elk Battalion during the Revolutionary War. After being wounded in battle, Hollingsworth became Deputy Quartermaster General, supplying the Continental Army with food and weapons.[2]
Offered here is a single letter from Yellott to Hollingsworth, discussing plans the two had for work—probably dredging—on the Susquehanna River, which empties into Chesapeake Bay in Maryland. Yellott writes:
“I am much pleased to learn that the people on the West side of the Susquehanah are so well prepared to go to work on the bed of said River – and that Mr. Mongomery is pleased with our Scheame – I think we have hit on the favorable moment, and that we may be the means of stimulating them and they us – Mr Carroll has sugested the Publishing [of] your letter in our News Papers about the time we begin to take sub-scriptions and wished me to ask your permision to do it (without signature). Mr Stump came to town yesterday for the first time since the winter, I hope we shall soon be able to make our intended arrangement and there write you fully on the subject [...] yours Jere.h Yellott”
[1] John Bosley Yellott, Jr., “Jeremiah Yellott – Revolutionary War Privateersman and Baltimore Philanthropist,” Maryland Historical Magazine 86 (1991): 176–89.
[2] William B. Hollingsworth, Hollingsworth genealogical memoranda in the United States: from 1682–1884 (W.K. Boyle & Son, Printers: 1884), 21.
Offered here is a single letter from Yellott to Hollingsworth, discussing plans the two had for work—probably dredging—on the Susquehanna River, which empties into Chesapeake Bay in Maryland. Yellott writes:
“I am much pleased to learn that the people on the West side of the Susquehanah are so well prepared to go to work on the bed of said River – and that Mr. Mongomery is pleased with our Scheame – I think we have hit on the favorable moment, and that we may be the means of stimulating them and they us – Mr Carroll has sugested the Publishing [of] your letter in our News Papers about the time we begin to take sub-scriptions and wished me to ask your permision to do it (without signature). Mr Stump came to town yesterday for the first time since the winter, I hope we shall soon be able to make our intended arrangement and there write you fully on the subject [...] yours Jere.h Yellott”
[1] John Bosley Yellott, Jr., “Jeremiah Yellott – Revolutionary War Privateersman and Baltimore Philanthropist,” Maryland Historical Magazine 86 (1991): 176–89.
[2] William B. Hollingsworth, Hollingsworth genealogical memoranda in the United States: from 1682–1884 (W.K. Boyle & Son, Printers: 1884), 21.