From Benjamin Franklin to Vergennes, 29 November 1782

To Vergennes

ALS: Archives du Ministère des affaires étrangères

Passy, Nov. 29. 1782

Sir,

I have the honour to acquaint your Excellency, that the Commissioners of the United States, have agreed with Mr Oswald on the Preliminary Articles of the Peace between those States & Great Britain. To-morrow I hope we shall be able to communicate to your Excellency a Copy of them.8 With great Respect I have the honour to be, Sir, Your Excellency’s most obedient and most humble Servant

B Franklin

Comte de Vergennes.

[Note numbering follows the Franklin Papers source.]

8. That copy is unlocated, but Vergennes sent a translation to Rayneval on Dec. 4. In his cover letter he commented that the English were not so much making a peace as buying it. Their concessions exceeded anything that he had thought possible. But as he had observed to BF, even though the preliminary articles would only go into effect when a peace was concluded between France and England, “La Signature n’en est pas moins prématurée”: AAE; trans. in Giunta, Emerging Nation, I, 706.

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Source Project: Franklin Papers
Title: From Benjamin Franklin to Vergennes, 29 November 1782
Author: Franklin, Benjamin
Recipient: Vergennes, Charles Gravier, comte de
Date: 29 November 1782

Reference

Cite as: “From Benjamin Franklin to Vergennes, 29 November 1782,” Founders Online, National Archives, https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Franklin/01-38-02-0283. [Original source: The Papers of Benjamin Franklin, vol. 38, August 16, 1782, through January 20, 1783, ed. Ellen R. Cohn. New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 2006, p. 378.]

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