plugged ball

Question
Good evening,
My question is regarding a plugged ball. My second shot on a par 5 I used a 4 iron. It was very obvious to myself and my playing partner that my ball landed in the fairway. As we approached the area where the ball landed we could not locate the ball, we both knew that the ball was embedded and  we would never find it due to the course conditions. The course was extremely wet and soggy in many places with pools of water in many places. My partner informed me to take a drop where the ball landed and to add a stroke penalty for lost ball. Is this the correct ruling?

Answer
Ray,

Here is the verbiage for an embedded ball.

A ball embedded in its own pitch-mark in the ground in any closely mown area through the green may be lifted, cleaned and dropped, without penalty, as near as possible to the spot where it lay but not nearer the hole. The ball when dropped must first strike a part of the course through the green. "Closely mown area" means any area of the course, including paths through the rough, cut to fairway height or less.

Since you could not find your ball, it would have deemed lost. You would then follow Rule 27. At any time, a player may,
under penalty of one stroke,
play a ball as nearly as possible at the spot from which the original ball was last played (see Rule 20-5), i.e., proceed under penalty of stroke and distance.

Hope this helps,

Michael Hoffman