This year, France will send more than thirty warships (plus a huge fleet of support ships) to fight America’s war!
Saturday, February 12, 1780. Today, in Paris, John Adams writes French Foreign Minister Vergennes:
I have now the honor to acquaint you that, on the twenty ninth day of September last, the Congress of the United States of America did me the honour to elect me their Minister Plenipotentiary to negotiate a peace with Great Britain and also to negotiate a Treaty of Commerce with that Kingdom …
I am persuaded it is the Intention of my Constituents, and of all America, and I am sure it is my own determination, to take no Steps of Consequence in pursuance of my commissions, without consulting his Majestys Ministers …
I beg the favor of your Excellency’s opinion …1152
Sunday, February 13, 1780. Today, the French Foreign Minister surprises John Adams with his response:
I have received the letter which you did me the honor to write me on the 12th of this month … I am of the opinion that it will be prudent to conceal your eventual character and above all to take the necessary precautions that the object of your commission may remain unknown to the Court of London …1153
John Adams immediately answers the Comte de Vergennes:
I have received the Letter which your Excellency did me the honour to write me … I have now the Honour to inclose, attested Copies of both [my commissions].
With regard to my Instructions … they contain nothing inconsistent with the Letter or Spirit of the Treaties between his Majesty and The United States …1154
Thursday, February 24, 1780. Today, the French Foreign Minister is insistent with John Adams:
As to the Full Power which authorizes you to negotiate a Treaty of Commerce with the Court of London, I think it will be prudent to make no comment of it to any Person whatsoever and to take all possible Precautions that the English Ministry may not have any Knowledge of it prematurely.1155
John Adams:
[The Comte de Vergennes’] anxiety to have my Commission … concealed excited some Surprize and some perplexity. I was not clear that I suspected his true Motives … However Time brought to light what I but imperfectly suspected. The Count … meditated … to get my Commission to negotiate a Treaty of Commerce annulled …1156
Friday, February 25, 1780. Today, John Adams gives in to the French Foreign Minister:
I … shall conform myself to your advice … I shall not think myself at liberty to make any publication of my Powers to treat of Peace … My other Powers shall be concealed, according to your advice …1157
Saturday, March 4, 1780. With the French government imposing demands of silence on him, John Adams can do nothing and suspects that Franklin is responsible. Today, he writes his friend, Massachusetts congressional delegate James Lovell:
My Situation here will naturally make all the Dr.’s Friends jealous of me, lest I should be Set up as his Successor—and this will make my Situation delicate and disagreeable.—I assure you … I have no Ambitions to be the Dr.’s Successor.—it is a Plan of too much Envy, and too much difficulty for any body to be happy in.
What the Congress will think proper to do with me, I know not.—To keep me here will cost them a great deal of Money …1158
Sunday, March 5, 1780. France has decided to send America a six-thousand-man army, under General Rochambeau, and a substantial fleet, under Admiral de Ternay. Today, French Foreign Minister Vergennes issues instructions to the Marquis de Lafayette, who is returning to the United States:
Monsieur the Marquis de La Fayette may return to America in eagerness to join General Washington, whom he will alert, on the condition of secrecy, that the King of France, wishing to give United States a new sign of his affection and his interest for their security, has decided to despatch, at the beginning of the spring, the relief of six ships of the line and of six thousand regular infantry troops.
The convoy is ordered, if there is no obstacle to confront, to Rhode island in order to be at closer range to assist the main American army and to join it if General Washington judges it necessary …1159
Today, Ben Franklin writes George Washington some words which should warm Washington’s welcome for arriving French officers:
Some day you will come to France. On this side of the water you would enjoy the great reputation that you have acquired. It would be free from the reproaches made by the jealousy and envy of fellow citizens, the contemporaries of a great man who strive to cast a slur upon him while he is living …1160
Saturday, March 18, 1780. To pay for the war, the Continental Congress has printed so much paper money that the Continental dollar has only one fortieth of its original face (nominal) value in the marketplace. Adjusting for this inflation, the Continental Congress today reduces its obligation to redeem paper dollars in gold or silver (specie), officially devaluing its currency so that a holder of Continental dollars must pay forty paper dollars to receive one milled silver or gold dollar. The Journals report:
[I]nsomuch that [Continental bills] are now passed, by common consent, in most parts of the United States, at least 39–40ths below their nominal value, and still remain in a state of depreciation …
Resolved, That … silver and gold be receivable [by holders of Continental bills] … at the rate of one Spanish milled dollar in lieu of 40 dollars of the bills now in circulation …1161
Sunday, March 19, 1780. Today, Ben Franklin writes the president of Pennsylvania’s executive council, Joseph Reed:
I am glad to see that you continue to preside in our new State [of Pennsylvania] … The disputes about the [Pennsylvania state] Constitution seem to have subsided. It is much admired here and all over Europe and will draw many families of fortune to settle under it as soon as there is peace.1162
Wednesday, May 3, 1780. Today, in France, a French army of 5,500 soldiers, commanded by French General Comte de Rochambeau, departs the French port of Brest for the United States. Transporting and accompanying this army is a French fleet commanded by French Admiral Le Chevalier de Ternay, consisting of six French ships of the line, five frigates, thirty-two transports, and a hospital ship. The French force is destined for Newport, Rhode Island, which another French fleet, under Admiral Comte d’Estaing, liberated last October by threatening British forces along the coast.1163
Friday, May 12, 1780. Today, after three days of naval bombardment, Charleston, South Carolina falls to the British Southern Army, led by General Charles Cornwallis. American Major General Benjamin Lincoln surrenders his American army of two thousand Continentals, four hundred cannon, and three of the United States’ seven frigates. With South Carolina and Georgia now securely in British hands, only American General Horatio Gates’ army remains to challenge Charles Cornwallis in the south.1164
Tuesday, May 16, 1780. Today, George Washington writes the Marquis de Lafayette, who informed Washington less than a week ago1165 that France is sending him a large army and a fleet of several ships-of-the-line:
Since you left me I have more fully reflected on the plan which it will be proper for the French fleet and army to pursue on their arrival upon the Coast; and it appears to me, in the present situation of the enemy at New York, that it ought to be our first object to reduce that post … I would therefore advise you to write to the [General] Count De Rochembeau and [Admiral] Monsr. De Ternay …1166
Sunday, May 28, 1780. Today, George Washington writes the president of Pennsylvania’s Executive Council:
I assure you, every Idea you can form of our distresses, will fall short of the reality. There is such a combination of circumstances to exhaust the patience of the soldiery that it begins at length to be worn out, and we see in every line of the army, the most serious features of mutiny and sedition. All our departments, all our operations are at a stand, and unless a system very different … be immediately adopted throughout the states, our affairs must soon become desperate beyond the possibility of recovery … Indeed I have almost ceased to hope. The country in
general is in such a state of insensibility and indifference to its interests, that I dare not flatter myself with any change for the better …
This is a decisive moment; one of the most—I will go further and say the most—important America has seen. The Court of France has made a glorious effort for our deliverance, and if we disappoint its intentions by our supineness, we must be contemptible in the eyes of all humankind …
We should consider what was done by France [in sending its fleet] as a violent and unnatural effort of the government, which for want of sufficient [financial] foundation, cannot continue … In modern wars, the longest purse must chiefly determine the event … France is in a very different position [from Britain] … [I]f the war continues another campaign, [the French Minister of Finance] will be obliged to have recourses to the taxes usual in time of war which are very heavy and which the people of France are not in a condition to endure for any duration. When this necessity commences, France makes war on ruinous terms [for its society] …
I mention these things to show that … we must make one great effort for this campaign …
The matter is reduced to a point. Either Pennsylvania must give us all the aid we ask of her, or we can undertake nothing. We must renounce every idea of cooperation, and must confess to our allies that we look wholly to them for our safety. This will be a state of humiliation and littleness … I have [not] the least doubt that you will employ all your influence to animate the legislature and the people at large. The fate of these states hangs upon it.1167
Friday, June 16, 1780. Today, French military supplier Jacques-Donatien Le Ray de Chaumont (at whose residence Ben Franklin and John Adams are staying in Passy) makes a report to the French Foreign Ministry of a conversation he has had with John Adams:
I have had a conversation with Mr. Adams so interesting that I think His Excellency the Count de Vergennes should be informed of it … Mr. Adams … persists in thinking … that it is France which is under obligations to America. These principles, on becoming one of the Peace Congress, he will carry with him into it, and he is a man to publicly support them, which, in my opinion, would be very scandalous …
I called on M. Adams to give him news … adverse to the American Congress, because [Congress] had fixed the [convertible] value of paper [money] at forty per cent in specie [gold]. I observed to M. Adams that the commercial world had reason to complain, and especially French merchants … I added that many merchants would be unable to fulfill their obligations …
Mr. Adams replied that … the French had less reason to complain than anybody else, since France derived the greatest advantages, because, without America, to which France would not be under too great an obligation, England would be too powerful … that the merchants in danger of bankruptcy would be delighted to have the pretext of the fixed valuation (fixation) …1168
John Adams:
After the arrival of the news from America of the resolution of congress of the 18th of March 1780, for the redemption of the paper money at forty for one … M. Leray de Chaumont, Dr. Franklin’s landlord and intimate friend and companion, and M. Monthieu, another of his intimate friends, came to visit me in my apartment at the Hotel de Valois, Rue de Richelieu in Paris … concerning that resolution of Congress which they said had excited a sensation in France and an alarm at court … I endeavored to show them the equity, the policy, and the necessity of the measure …1169
Tuesday, June 20, 1780. In America, the failure to enlist soldiers in George Washington’s army has created a crisis. Today, George Washington writes the Continental Congress:
The period is come when we have every reason to expect the [French] Fleet will arrive, and yet … it is impossible for me to form and fix on a system of cooperation. I have no basis to act upon and of course were this generous succour of our [French] Ally now to arrive, I should find myself in the most awkward, embarrassing, and painful situation. The General [Rochambeau] and the Admiral [de Ternay] … will require of me a plan of the measures to be persued … but circumstanced as I am, I cannot even give them conjectures …
[F]or want of knowing our prospects, I am altogether at a loss what to do. For fear of involving the Fleet and Army of our Allies in circumstances, which, if not seconded by us, would expose them to material inconvenience and hazard, I shall be compelled to suspend it …1170
Wednesday, June 21, 1780. The Continental Congress’ devaluation of America’s paper currency to demand forty paper dollars (rather than one paper dollar) for a milled silver or gold dollar (specie) has created a crisis for French suppliers who have accepted American paper dollars on their one-to-one promise of silver or gold. Today, in Paris, French Foreign Minister Vergennes writes John Adams:
[T]he assembly of Massachusetts has determined to adopt the resolution of Congress, fixing the value of the paper money at forty for one in specie …
I have no right to analyze or comment upon the internal arrangements which congress may consider just and useful … But … I am far from agreeing that it is just and agreeable … to extend the effects to strangers as well as to citizens of the United States … I shall content myself to remark to you that the French, if they should be obliged to submit … would find themselves victims of the zeal, and I may say the rashness, with which they have exposed themselves in furnishing the Americans with arms, ammunition, and clothing; in a word, with all the things of the first necessity of which the Americans stood in the most urgent need … [T]he subjects of the king … have counted on the thanks of congress … It was with this persuasion, and in a reliance on the public faith, that they received paper money … The unexpected reduction of this same paper overturns their calculations, at the same time as it ruins their fortunes …
I shall not conceal from you that [our Minister in the United States] the Chevalier de la Luzerne has already received orders to make the strongest representations on the subject in question …1171
Thursday, June 22, 1780. Today, despite the fact that he no longer holds a commission to negotiate with France (his commission is now to negotiate with Britain), John Adams addresses French Foreign Minister Vergennes on the question of America’s currency devaluation, including:
No man is more ready than I am to acknowledge the obligations we are under to France; but the flourishing state of her marine and commerce and the decisive influence of her councils and negotiations in Europe, which all the world will allow be owing in great measure to the separation of America from her inveterate enemy and to her new connexions with the United States, show that the obligations are mutual. And no foreign merchant ought to be treated in America better than her native merchants …1172
At the same time, John Adams tries, by a separate letter, to prevent the French Foreign Minister from making an appeal to Congress:
When your Excellency says that his Majesty’s minister at Philadelphia has already received orders … I would submit it to your Excellency’s consideration whether those orders may not be stopped and delayed a little time, until his Excellency Mr. Franklin may have opportunity to make his representations to his Majesty’s Minister to the end that, if it should appear that those orders were issued in consequence of misinformation, they may be revoked …1173
Friday, June 23, 1780. Today, John Adams writes Benjamin Franklin:
Count de Vergennes … informs me that the Chevalier de la Luzerne has orders to make the strongest representations [to Congress on the devaluation question]. I am not sure whether his Excellency means that such orders were sent … I submit to your Excellency, whether it would not be expedient to request that those orders may be stopped until proper representations can be made at court …1174
Saturday, June 24, 1780. Today, in a letter to the Comte de Vergennes, Ben Franklin tries to prevent the French protest to Congress:
In consequence of the enclosed letter, which I have received from Mr. Adams, I beg leave to request of your excellency that the orders [to the French Minister at Philadelphia] therein mentioned, if not al
ready sent, may be delayed till [Mr. Adams] has prepared the representations he proposed to lay before you on that subject, by which it will appear that these orders have been obtained by misinformation.1175
Friday, June 30, 1780. Today, the French Foreign Minister writes John Adams:
I have received the letter which you did me the honor to write me on the 22d inst … I had … thought … to convince you that the French ought not to be confounded with the Americans and that there would be a manifest injustice in making them sustain the loss with which they are threatened.
The details into which you have thought proper to enter have not changed my sentiments; but I think all further discussion on this subject will be needless …
His Majesty is the more persuaded that Congress … will assuredly perceive that the French deserve a preference before other nations who have no treaty with America and who even have not, as yet, acknowledged her Independence.1176
John Adams will recall:
I thought it my indispensable duty to my country, to congress, to France and the Count himself, to be explicit … I could see no practicability of any distinction … I thought if any was equitable, it would be in favor of American soldiers and early creditors … and not in favor of foreigners … However, upon the receipt of my letter the Count fell into a passion, and wrote me a passionate and ungentlemanly reply.1177
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