Tho: Turner Esq^r Accountants Office Accountant of the Navy &c March 21. 1800 Sir I have reciev'd your letter of this date requesting to be furnished with the amount charged in this Department for the first and equipment of Meville Hull previous to the establishment of the Navy Department. In reply to which I have to inform you, that the nature of the appropriations at this Office consisted only in the payment of Pay & subsistence of the [undecipherable] Navy, & the [undecipherable] contingent expenses thereof, the precise limits & [undecipherable] contain no charge which you require, and the [undecipherable] is confined principally [to] the Pay and allowances made to the [undecipherable] of the frigates, & the Books of the Navy [undecipherable] — no expenditure for equipment [undecipherable] having been made at the Treasury Department, no particular record was ever [undecipherable] on the Books of my official [undecipherable], but the sums paid were immediately [charged] to one of the above mentioned [undecipherable] of expenditure. If you wish a particular account of the payments made and charged to contingent expenses of the Navy which account can only embrace [some] of the things you require I will on an information thereof from your have the [undecipherable] stated & forwarded to you &c Sam R [undecipherable]