Certainly he missed his family but he dared not let them know where he was for fear of being dragged back to Boston. He did not realize that in the small and intimate world of the colonies news of a stranger was likely to get around. He had a brother-in-law, Robert Holmes, who was a sloop owner living in New Castle, forty miles from Philadelphia. Somehow Holmes learned of his whereabouts and wrote to tell him the worry he had caused his parents. Benjamin answered in considerable detail, explaining the reasons for his departure.