Commodore Arent S. Crowninshield, Chief of the Bureau of Navigation to Rear Admiral William T. Sampson, Commander, North Atlantic Fleet
(official business.)
No.__________
(TELEGRAM.)
Navy Department,
BUREAU OF NAVIGATION.
Washington,
July 1, 1898.
Sampson, Playa.
Please discharge colliers in rotation and send them North for coal as twice before has been telegraphed. Bureau Equipment1 much exercised because no colliers come North for coal. There are no more colliers to send to you and unless some system of rotation is followed in discharging and returning colliers your supply of coal will be alternately banking up and stopped/ when will you send a collier to Lamberts Point2
Crowninshield
Source Note: CyS, DNA, RG 45, Entry 29. Handwritten file no. below date: “123474.”
Footnote 1: The Bureau of Equipment oversaw the acquisition and distribution of coal for the fleet.
Footnote 2: Lamberts Point, Norfolk, VA contained a coaling pier.
