To Benjamin Franklin from Pierre-Samuel Du Pont de Nemours, 10 August 1783
From Pierre-Samuel Du Pont de Nemours7
LS: Library of Congress
Paris 10 Aout 1783
Monsieur,
Mgr. Le Margrave rêgnant de Bâde8 me charge de vous prier de vouloir bien faire toutes les démarches qui dépendront de vous, pour avoir l’Extrait-Mortuaire du Sr. Adam Marggrander, né Sujet de ce Prince, et qui doit être mort noïé à Philadelphie. Ce S. Marggrander est parti pour Philadelphie, en 1774, avec un S. Gucker de Schreck,9 et il étoit emploïé à Philadelphie chéz un Brasseur nommé heintz, qui demeuroit dans la rüe du Marché.1
Son Altesse Sérénissime me charge de vous témoigner d’avance toute la reconnoissance qu’elle aura des peines que vous voudréz bien prendre à ce Sujet.
J’ai bien de l’impatience d’aller vous faire ma cour, et causer un peu sur le Commerce de l’Amérique.
Vous connoisséz le profond respect avec lequel je Suis Monsieur De votre Excellence Le très-humble et très-obeissant Serviteur
DU
Pont
chever. de l’ordre ral. [royal] de Vaza2
hotel de la Rochefoucaut rue des
Petits
Augustins
A Son Excellence Monsieur Francklin Ministre plenipotentiaire des Etats-unis de l’Amérique
Note in Franklin’s hand:3 Mr. Franklin requests earnestly of Mr Thomson, to procure if possible what is desired in this Letter.
7. Though Du Pont’s last letter dates from 1777 (XXIV, 382–3), the old friends presumably spoke more than they wrote. Since 1781, Du Pont served as an economic adviser to Vergennes and in this capacity worked on a commercial plan for Bayonne, including its potential selection as a free port for American merchants (for which see XXXIX, 104–5). In December, 1783, the king rewarded him by conferring lettres de noblesse: Ambrose Saricks, Pierre Samuel Du Pont de Nemours (Lawrence, Kans., 1965), pp. 76–84.
8. Karl Friedrich (XXI, 387n), whom Du Pont had met in Paris in the summer of 1771. Du Pont periodically visited the margrave in Karlsruhe and wrote to him regularly. In 1783 Du Pont became the unofficial chargé d’affaires for Baden, despite being an official of the French government: ibid., pp. 57–9, 84.
9. Georg Adam Marggrander and Jacob Gucker (as their names were recorded on the Philadelphia arrivals list) sailed on the Union from Rotterdam, arriving in September, 1774: Ralph Beaver Strassburger, comp., “Pennsylvania German Pioneers: a Publication of the Original Lists of Arrivals in the Port of Philadelphia from 1727 to 1808,” Pa. German Soc. Proc., XLII (1934), 758–60.
1. Charles Thomson, to whom BF forwarded this letter, understood this to be Market Street brewer Reuben Haines, long known to both of them: XI, 223, 315n; Smith, Letters, XXI, 279. Haines (1728–1793) was involved in various real estate and business affairs: Robert E. Wright, “Artisans, Banks, Credit, and the Election of 1800,” PMHB, CXXII (1998), 221–2; Elaine F. Crane et al., eds., The Diary of Elizabeth Drinker (3 vols., Boston, 1991), III, 2158.
2. The Order of Vasa was instituted in 1772 by Gustavus III in recognition of contributions to agriculture, mining, trade, and the arts. Du Pont, who had corresponded regularly with the king, was knighted in 1775: H. Arnold Barton, “Gustav III of Sweden and the Enlightenment,” Eighteenth-Century Studies, VI (1972), 16; Saricks, Du Pont de Nemours, pp. 57–8, 66, 71.
3. BF sent this letter to Thomson on Sept. 13. Thomson endorsed it, “Letter from M. Du Pont to Doct Franklin respecting the Sr. Maggrander.” It remains among his papers.