Daily National Intelligencer

The severe cold and high winds for nearly three weeks back, the river being now passable on the ice for many miles below this, has done much mischief to the coming up trading vessels, and caused the death of two or three persons: a large lime loaded schr. the Sophia, capt. Blythe, from an eastern port bound to this district, narrowly escaped a critical situation in Nanjemoy reach from the floating ice, but got into safety below Black stone's Island. A passenger and part-owner who has come up from St. Mary's, states, "That the river had not been closed with ice during the winter for a mile above Portobello and Chancellor's point. The distance of a mile above those points would include the spot most suitable for the Naval Depot on that river; which furnishes a proof of the truth of an assertion of one of the writers in favor of St. Mary S, that this River was the spot where the ice ceased to obstruct the waters."