1To Benjamin Franklin from Benjamin Vaughan, [before 7 December 1779] (Franklin Papers)
AL (incomplete): Library of Congress This letter is one of the many fragmentary or undated Vaughan manuscripts which have challenged our editorial skill. Although we include it here, as belonging to the general period before Political, Miscellaneous, and Philosophical Pieces was published, it was most likely written just after Christmastime, 1776, when Vaughan arrived in Paris bearing an early...
2To Benjamin Franklin from ——— Joyce, [before 18 October 1779] (Franklin Papers)
AL : American Philosophical Society Miss Joyce presents her best respects to Docter Franklin sends him a letter Inclosed to her from Lisbon— Mr. & Mrs. D’arcy desires their most affte Compliments to Docter Franklin Mr. D’arcy’s Ammendment still continues. Addressed: A Monsieur / Monsieur Franklin / a / Passy Possibly a niece who lived with the d’Arcys: Butterfield, Adams Correspondence , III ,...
3Pay Book of the State Company of Artillery, [1777] (Hamilton Papers)
The Continent of Europe is 2600 miles long and 2800 miles broad. The Dutch in the Greenland fishery have from 150 to 200 sail and ten thousand seamen. It is ordered that in their public prayers they pray that it would please God to bless the government, the Lords, the states, and their great & small fisheries. The Dutch were computed by Sir Walter Raleigh to have 3000 ships & fifty thousand...
Drafts: American Philosophical Society These drafts are impossible to date, except perhaps in a general way. Four of them were composed after Franklin’s move to Passy at the end of February, and are in the hand of Le Veillard, his friend and neighbor there. The fifth is in the hand of the abbé Martin Lefèbvre de la Roche, a house guest of another neighbor, Mme. Helvétius; it does not mention...
5Editorial Note on Franklin’s Accounts, 1777 (Franklin Papers)
We have already discussed and described in the previous volume most of the accounts that are relevant to this one; only two of the ten listed there, nos. II and VIII, no longer apply. All that need be done here is to give details of the one newcomer. XI. Ferdinand Grand’s Accounts with the Commission, June 10, 1777, to February 11, 1779: Harvard University Library, 33 pp. plus a 1-p. extract....
6To Benjamin Franklin from the Abbés Arnoux and de Chalut, [late 1777?] (Franklin Papers)
AL : American Philosophical Society This is the first extant communication, if we are correct in our guess at its date, from an inseparable pair of abbés. They were “elderly but spritely enthusiasts for the American cause,” in Lyman Butterfield’s words, and the following spring they tried to serve it by teaching John Adams French. Arnoux was fifty or sixty (guesses differed) and Chalut, the...
7Editorial Note on Undated Letters Assigned to 1777 (Franklin Papers)
The undated and, at least as yet, undatable material from the French years is massive. Taking notice of it all together at this point would be in keeping with our general policy of assigning each document to its earliest plausible date. Doing so, however, would not only produce a headnote of stupendous length and dullness but also, more important, would foreclose the possibility that clues...
8To Benjamin Franklin from ——— de Bansais, [1777?] (Franklin Papers)
ALS : American Philosophical Society Begging is the common theme of a number of undated letters like this one. The writers run the gamut of occupation and social status, from unemployed sailors to gentlefolk; most want a donation, but a few offer to sell some remaining treasure. None of these appeals seems to have received a response; those that elicited anything, even a few livres, we handle...
9To Benjamin Franklin from [the Marquise de Boulainvilliers], [1777?] (Franklin Papers)
AL : American Philosophical Society Il y a bien Longtems que les habitans De passy n’ont eu L’honneur De voir monsieur franklin. Veut il bien qu’ils se rapellent a son souvenir et qu’ils luy proposent de Leurs faire L’honneur De venir Diner chez eux jeudy prochain. Ils le priront aussy de leur rendre les papiers en question s’il n’en a plus besoin parce que les personnes qui les ont preté a...
10From Benjamin Franklin to [the Marquise de Boulainvilliers], [1777?] (Franklin Papers)
AL : American Philosophical Society Mr. Franklin presents his best Respects to the amiable Family of Passy, with many Thanks for their obliging Invitation to dine with them on Thursday which he and his Friends should embrace with the greatest Pleasure, but that they happen all to be engag’d. Mr. F. returns the Papers with Thanks, and will do himself the Honour of taking his Tea with his kind...