To Benjamin Franklin from ——— Baudouin, 25 December 1777
From ——— Baudouin6
ALS: American Philosophical Society; copy: Library of Congress
Paris ce 25. xbre au soir [1777]
Monsieur,
Je recois la lettre que vous me faittes l’honneur de m’ecrire avec celle qui y etoit jointe, je vais la traduire aussitot et je l’enverray demain a Mr. de Sartine par son courier.7 Dans cette occasion comme Dans toutte autre, vous me trouverés toujours pret a vous convaincre de toutte la veneration et du respect avec lesquels je suis Monsieur votre trés humble et très obeissant serviteur
Baudouin
Notation: Answer of Mr Baudoin Secy. to M. de Sartine To B Franklin Decr 25. 1777.
6. This is the first letter from a man about whom we know little, and who will reappear from time to time as Sartine’s go-between with the Americans; we can find nothing to substantiate the statement in the notation that he was the Minister’s secretary. Baudouin attended the commissioners’ celebration of the 4th of July in 1778, and had some dealings with John Paul Jones: Butterfield, John Adams Diary, II, 317; Mrs. Reginald de Koven, The Life and Letters of John Paul Jones (2 vols., New York, 1913), I, 354, 374, 380; II, 179.
7. The commissioners’ letter to Sartine, now missing, forwarded Delap’s letter to them of Dec. 19; see their reply to Delap below, Dec. 26.