One-page autograph letter signed

New York: October 9, 1809. 4to, blank integral leaf attached; previous folds, very good. Leonard (?-1832) writes a favorable recommendation for a former shipmate. "This is to certify that I am personally acquainted with Dr. George C. Quackenbos of this city & that he has borne a commission as Surgeon in the Navy of the United States, & has acted under my orders in that Capacity during the year 1807, & that he served on board the Bomb Ketch Aetna." Signed "James Leonard, late Commanding Naval Officer at New Orleans." Dr. George Clinton Quackenbos served in the capacity of surgeon in the United States navy for several years, and subsequently practiced his profession for several years in New York, where he died in 1858. Leonard was appointed a midshipman in 1799, served on Constellation and President during the Quasi-War and on President and New York in the Mediterranean in 1802-1803. In addition to assignments on Hornet and the bomb-ketch Vesuvius he commanded the New Orleans Station in 1807 where he became acquainted with the subject of this letter, Dr. Quackenbos. He was promoted to Lieutenant in January of that year, two months before he was seriously wounded in a duel with Lieutenant Jacob Jones. His career ran aground permanently during the War of 1812 while serving with Chauncey on the Lakes as a Master Commandant and commander of the sloop Madison. Leonard was indiscrete in his relationship with a woman not his wife. When Madison broke free of her mooring on Lake Champlain and was lost while Leonard was ashore sleeping with his friend, contrary to Chauncey's direction that commanders would sleep aboard their ships, Leonard suddenly found himself freed of command. Despite this incident he was promoted to Captain in 1815 and closed out his career as commander of a Vermont naval station presiding over rotting naval craft constructed for the war on the lakes. (See Christopher McKee's A Gentlemanly and Honorable Profession (Annapolis, 1991), pp. 441-442).