To Benjamin Franklin from ——— Chabaud and Other Favor Seekers, 23 August 1784
From——Chabaud7 and Other Favor Seekers
AL: American Philosophical Society
During the months covered by this volume, Franklin continues to receive unsolicited appeals for favors or help of various kinds. We summarize here the letters to which no responses have been found, publishing the earliest request—from Chabaud—as an example. The descriptions are organized into three categories: letters soliciting positions with the United States, letters requesting assistance with financial affairs, and, finally, all others.8
Three of the four men seeking positions with the United States desire consulships.9 On September 8, Nicolas-Louis-Guillaume Lacoudrais proposes himself for a consulship in Honfleur, Normandy, where he is a merchant and served as the Swedish consul for nine years.1 The marquis de Benincasa, French consul general for Ancona and all other ports of the Papal States on the Adriatic, writes from Ancona on September 10. He has heard rumors that American ships will arrive that coming winter, and, unsure of how to respond to any captains’ inquiries, he consulted Castries, who directed him to welcome the ships as belonging to an allied power and to keep Franklin informed until Congress appointed its own consul. Benincasa recommends himself for this position, offering as qualifications the French court’s satisfaction with the service of his ancestors and Castries’ regard for him.2
The comte de Saint Léger,3 writing from Marseille, proposes himself for a consulship on December 1. On October 29, he had written to the comte d’Estaing, in whose regiment he once served, to ask him to sound out Franklin about this possibility. It would take Saint Léger only a short time to learn English. In addition to the comte d’Estaing, he can also refer Franklin to the maréchaux de France, under whom he served as lieutenant for fifteen years.4 As reward for his service as consul, he hopes to be awarded the Order of the Cincinnati, which several officers he knows have received. Enclosed with his letter is a lengthy “Eloge du Roi,” which he wrote the previous March and read to a select audience at the duc de Pilles’s.5 It contains lavish praise of the French king, Franklin, Congress, Washington, and the French commanders in America.
Châtelain Hagoa, who writes from Paris on November 11, desires an audience with Franklin for two reasons. He has a manuscript that he has long wished to discuss, but various illnesses and injuries (which he details) intervened; he is now, however, on the way to recovery. Second, he is interested in an assignment on behalf of the United States, having served his apprenticeship (unspecified) in Cayenne.
Appeals for help with financial matters, from inheritances to debts, remain common in Franklin’s mail. Charrin6 inquires on September 17 from Saint-Chamond about the fastest and safest way to receive reimbursement for a Pennsylvania loan office contract that he acquired in 1780, when Congress was borrowing money. The principal and interest were due in 1783. The contract is now in the hands of Raffaneau de L’Isle, a notary in Paris. If necessary, Charrin will ask the notary to convey the contract to Franklin. Charrin would be infinitely indebted to Franklin if he would send along with his advice a recommendation to the treasurers of Congress to pay Charrin without delay.7
Hüe, a lawyer, writes from Paris on September 19. He begs Franklin for 50 écus so that his infirm mother can live with him. He trusts in Franklin’s discretion as much as in his kindness.
Jean-Daniel Kerschner writes on November 5 from his native Landau, in the Palatinate, which he left twenty years ago to settle in Philadelphia. Last year, he returned to collect an inheritance of 2,000 imperial florins. In order to get the money, Kerschner had to conceal his residency in the United States and pretend that he intended to settle in Landau. In fact, Kerschner plans to return to Philadelphia as soon as possible. To avoid prosecution as an illegal emigrant, however, he is petitioning the French king for permission to emigrate and encloses a copy of that petition.8 Kerschner asks Franklin to support his request and ensure that it is granted without his having to go through the formal bureaucratic channels.
Barboutin l’aîné writes from Bordeaux on November 18, recounting his misfortunes. As captain of the ship l’Harmonie, he sailed from Bordeaux in June, 1777, loaded with a rich cargo that he sold in America.9 Over the next three years he was paid in installments and in paper money issued by Congress, which depreciated rapidly. His ship was overtaken by the English, who sank the vessel and took him prisoner. His property in America was pillaged, burned or stolen. Barboutin’s last hope is that Franklin will agree to exchange his paper money for interest-yielding bonds, as French consul general Marbois advised in a letter to him of August 24, 1784. Castries, as well as Dudon père et fils, jointly procureur général du parlement de Bordeaux, is ready to vouch for Barboutin’s probity.1
Christine Marguerite Häberlin, née Luther, writes on December 4 from Frankfurt am Main. She reminds Franklin of his visit to her late father, Heinrich Ehrenfried Luther, in 1765 or 1766. If she is not mistaken, Franklin was accompanied by Mr. Zimmerman, the royal physician of the British court.2 She was not at home at the time, being already married,3 but heard about the visit from her father and her younger brother. That brother, now also deceased, had told her that Franklin had promised Luther to support his claims for compensation from Pennsylvania and Massachusetts for recruiting countless immigrants to those colonies.4 Negotiations regarding land promised to Luther in Massachusetts were disrupted by the war. With peace restored, Häberlin and her siblings request Franklin’s help in finally obtaining their father’s recompense. She asks Franklin to direct his answer to her husband, who will act as the family’s representative.5
On December 8, Joseph Fichet writes from Saint-Malo. In 1778 he outfitted the ship Sartine, under the command of C. Rouxel, for a voyage to the United States.6 Rouxel sold the cargo in Charleston and in April, 1779, invested part of the proceeds (13,800 dollars) in loan office certificates for three years at 6 percent interest. In April, 1783, Fichet expected to receive the principal and interest and sent his certificates and a power of attorney to Florian-Charles Mey, a Charleston merchant. However, Mey has been unable to obtain even the interest, because Congress reportedly has not yet paid anything. Fichet asks Franklin to write on his behalf to Robert Morris and prevent an injustice, given that Fichet lost much of his outlay, despite the success of that particular voyage.
Sometime around January 1, as he sends Franklin New Year’s wishes, Havet, a priest of the parish Saint-Valois, in Montreuil-surmer, seeks aid for a poor widow. He encloses extracts from the parish records of Neuville, near Boulogne-surmer, certified on October 24, 1784, attesting to the following information: that a Scot named Benjamin Forbes served in the Irish Brigade of France and retired as a chevalier de Saint-Louis with the brevet of captain and an annuity of 100 pistoles; that he married Elizabeth Sterling, also Scottish, in 1777; and that the couple had two children. Forbes died in 1783, and his widow and children live in Havet’s parish. Their misery is extreme; she is without a pension or any other income, and unless they receive assistance they will die of hunger. Benjamin Forbes stood to inherit money from his nephew, John Forbes, who died in Jericho, in America, on February 25, 1775; Havet encloses a copy of the will.7 Would Franklin send it to the governor of Jericho, and try to obtain something for the widow and her children? While waiting for an answer, would he also use his influence with the king or other officials to help the Forbes family? Havet could send a memoir describing their misery.
New Year’s wishes are also conveyed by the baron de Gonneville, who writes from Paris on January 1. He joins the rest of the French nation in paying homage to Franklin’s virtues and wisdom and wishing him a long and prosperous life.8
Also around January 1, the abbesse Marie du Saint Esprit of L’Avé Maria de Paris sends her annual letter assuring Franklin of her gratitude, and asking for a charitable donation to her convent, which has become insolvent. Another annual request for charity, this one a printed form, comes from Mme Le Veillard and the parish priest of Passy, who invite Franklin to attend the assemblée de charite to be held on August 29, 1784.9
Johann Wilhelm Barth and Philipp Jacob Schuster write on February 1 in German from Edenkoben, in Rhineland-Palatinate. They plan to travel to Philadelphia to claim the inheritance of Philipp Jacob’s uncle Jacob, who died in Pennsylvania. They humbly request Franklin’s advice and support.
Grandjean de Flevy,1 who writes from Paris on February 5, needs help recovering a sum of money. A few days before Rochambeau’s army left Boston in December, 1782, Grandjean de Flevy, then secretary of the army’s general staff, received a letter from John Carter, printer and postmaster in Providence,2 asking him to help find the owner of a packet containing eight guineas that was found in an encampment near Hartford, Connecticut. The owner turned out to be a Sergeant Fourier of the Bourbonnois regiment.3 Grandjean de Flevy advanced Fourier the money and notified Carter, but had to return to France before receiving a response. In the fall of 1783 he wrote again to Carter to send the money to him through Franklin. Grandjean de Flevy wants to know whether Carter might have written to Franklin in the matter and, if not, whether Franklin could help him recover his advance.
La Grave, a cavalry captain who writes from Paris on February 22, has only three paper dollars, which no bank in Paris will exchange. His French currency, 8,000 livres, has been stolen by a man who ran off to Guadeloupe. Could Franklin please help him in this moment of distress? La Grave is already indebted to Franklin for recommendations he received for an ill-fated voyage to America on the Marquis de Lafayette, which was captured and brought into Scotland, where he remained for a long time.4
Finally, we turn to the other, miscellaneous requests. J. S. Blanquet has come to Paris, from whence he writes on March 1, because his parents disowned him for refusing to become a priest. He prefers to write poetry and has already penned two plays. Could Franklin become his second father and patron? Blanquet would be happy to bring his small talents to America. His late brother fought in the war.
On October 11, Veillon de Boismartin,5 a conseiller du Roi and officer of the admiralty of Poitou, writes from Les Sables-d’Olonne with a personal story that he believes will demonstrate why Franklin ought to support him for membership in the Society of the Cincinnati. On July 24, 1780, the American ship Whim, Capt. Conklin, wrecked off the coast of Poitou.6 With his customary zeal, Veillon de Boismartin helped secure the safety of the forty-four people on board and rescued and dried the waterlogged mail, some of which was addressed to Franklin and the French court. He hopes that this service will entitle him to join the class of “meritants” and awaits Franklin’s decision.
Jean Rousseau writes on December 24 from London because he never received a response to his respectful request to Congress.7 He fears that the reaction might not have been favorable or that the appeal has miscarried. Considering, on the one hand, Franklin’s protection and the unparalleled glory of the United States, and, on the other hand, his own critical situation, Rousseau remains convinced that his nephew,8 who delivers this letter, will return with good news. He has in mind a particular reward from Congress, which he proposed to Monsieur Grand, who will explain it to Franklin.
The meaning of a letter by Surges, dated December 29, is obscured by his idiosyncratic spelling and indistinct hand. Writing from New Orleans, Surges hopes that Franklin has been in good health since he saw him during his trip to Paris in May and July, 1782. At that time, Franklin told Surges about the brothers “John,” one of whom owed Franklin money.9 Both brothers are fine, and Franklin’s debtor is now in South Carolina. Surges goes on to complain about the lack of specie in the colony of Louisiana, all of which goes either to the troops or to royal officials, while other residents are forced to barter for provisions. He would make every effort to go to New York, but no American ships are allowed to enter Louisiana. It remains unclear how he wanted Franklin to help him.
On January 31 Urbain-René-Thomas Le Bouvyer Desmortiers, maître des requêtes at the financial court of Nantes,1 writes from Paris with a question that had been posed to him by his brother-in-law, Captain Bidé de Chavagnes, who, when commander of the French frigate Sensible, carried La Luzerne and John Adams to New England and later carried Adams back to France.2 The captain wishes to know if Adams is still in Europe and, if so, his address. Le Bouvyer Desmortiers, unable to find this information elsewhere, now turns to Franklin, pleased to be able to pay homage to the man of genius who enlightened the eighteenth century and brought liberty to his country.3
On March 4 Perrot de Chezelles, directeur général du bureau royal de la correspondance,4 forwards a now-missing memoir on behalf of ten Americans, who request Franklin’s support in dealing with “Monsieur L’amiral.”5
à Paris le 23 août 1784.
Chabaud habitant de St. Domingue suplie Son Excellence Monsieur Francklin, Ministre Plénipotentiaire des Provinces unies de l’Amérique, de vouloir bien penser à lui; et comme son depart pour St. Domingue approche, de l’autoriser a solliciter, pour une plus prompte expedition, auprés de Monsieur Barcklai, les renseignemens demandés, si son Excellence trouve qu’il n’y ait point d’inconvenient.6
M. Chabaud
rue St. jean de Beauvais
Notation: Chabaud 23 Août 1784
7. Possibly the owner of the Chabaud plantation in Limbé, which was the first target of the August, 1791, slave insurrection in St.-Domingue: Carolyn E. Fick, The Making of Haiti: the Saint Domingue Revolution from Below (Knoxville, 1990), pp. 95–6, 260–3.
8. Unless otherwise noted, the following documents are in French and are at the APS.
9. They were evidently unaware that, in March, Congress had resolved that only U.S. citizens could be appointed consuls: XLII, 68n.
1. Lacoudrais (1746–1811) inherited his family’s business fitting out ships and expanded it to Le Havre and Bec-de-Mortagne: Dominique Bougerie, Honfleur et les Honfleurais: cinq siècles d’histoires … (4 vols., Honfleur, 2002–07), 1, 74–5.
2. Members of the Benincasa family, one of the wealthiest in the Marche region of central Italy, served as French consuls in Ancona from 1671 to 1793. Louis-Lucien, marquis de Benincasa (b. 1730), assumed the office in 1754 and was indeed viewed favorably by his superiors: Anne Mézin, Les Consuls de France au siècle des lumières (1715–1792) ([Paris, 1998]), pp. 137–9, 754.
3. Pierre-Claude de Chauveton, chevalier and comte de Saint-Léger (b. 1730): Dictionnaire de la noblesse, under Chauveton.
4. The comte is listed in the Etat militaire for 1784, p. 36, as lieutenant des Maréchaux de France for Avignon, Brignoles, and elsewhere, stationed at Marseille.
5. Probably the maréchal de camp and former governor of Marseille, Joseph-Toussaint-Alphonse de Fortia, comte de Piles: DBF; Etat militaire for 1784, p. 99.
6. Probably Gaspard Charrin, who was a clerk at the Lyon conservation des hypothèques. He was executed as a counter-revolutionary in that city in 1793: Almanach astronomique et historique de la ville de Lyon … pour l’année 1787 (Lyon, 1787), p. xxvii; Louis-Marie Prudhomme, Histoire générale et impartiale des erreurs, des fautes et des crimes commis pendant la Révolution française … (6 vols., Paris, [1796–97]), 1, 208.
7. At the top of the first page, BF wrote this note for a reply: “Answer:— That the American Paper has nothing to do in Europe. It ought to be sent back to that Country, to some Correspondent there who may make the Demand. There is no need of any Recommendation, it would be of no Use.—” Certificates were redeemable at the respective state loan office, as BF had explained to another correspondent: XXXIII, 152–4.
8. The undated petition, addressed to the marquis de Ségur, requests permission to settle in Philadelphia.
9. BF and Silas Deane gave Francis Barboutin and his supercargo on the Harmony a certificate on Aug. 29, 1777, recommending them to whoever was in authority in the port they entered. This must have been their second voyage: XXIV, 478.
1. On Aug. 24, Marbois forwarded to Castries a memoir by Barboutin and mentioned the support of the captain by one of the Dudons: Abraham P. Nasatir and Gary E. Monell, French Consuls in the United States … (Washington, D.C., 1967), p. 175. Marbois’ counsel was based on a congressional resolution of June 3, 1784, which stated that should bills of credit have been advanced to any person in payment on behalf of the United States, the recipient would not be charged for the subsequent depreciation of the same. Creditors of the public would be allowed 6 percent interest on supplies furnished, but not yet paid: JCC, XXVII, 541–5.
2. BF visited Luther in Frankfurt in 1766 with Sir John Pringle: XII, 154n; XIV, 89–91. Häberlin must have been thinking of Johann Georg Zimmermann, who had served as the royal physician in Hanover since 1768: ADB.
3. Albert Sigismund Häberlin, whom she married in 1760, was an aulic councillor and director at the chancellery of the Palatine electorate: Barbara Dölemeyer, Frankfurter Juristen im 17. und 18. Jahrhundert (Frankfurt am Main, 1993), pp. 73–4.
4. Luther himself had asked for BF’s assistance with these claims in 1765 and 1767, and BF brought them to the attention of Thomas Hutchinson: XII, 153–6, 381–3; XIV, 91.
5. Her husband, fearing that this letter never reached BF, sent a copy of it to BF on June 4, 1785, from Frankfurt. She had sent the original to London, he wrote, under cover of the Bethmann banking house (XXVII, 656n). He reiterated the family’s plea for BF’s protection: Hist. Soc. of Pa.
6. Both Fichet and Capt. Claude Rouxel, his nephew, were recommended to the American commissioners in July, 1777. In May, 1778, Fichet protested the capture of one of his ships by an American privateer. The complaint was supported by Vergennes, and the commissioners forwarded it to Congress: XXIV, 304–5; XXXVI, 396–7, 464, 505, 506.
7. A certified copy of the will of John Forbes of Jericho, Ga., dated Feb. 25, 1775, is among BF’s papers at the APS.
8. Curiously, the ALS sent by the baron is a press copy, leading us to wonder whether he kept the original for other purposes. This letter asks no favor of BF, but the writer may be the baron de Gonneville, described as a poor Norman gentleman, who wrote repeatedly to Castries and La Luzerne in the mid-1780s soliciting a title based on a spurious family connection to the 16th-century explorer Binot Paulmier de Gonneville: M. Boissais, “Binot Paulmier, Dit le Capitaine de Gonneville, Commandant du navire ’l’Espoir’, 1503–1505 …,” Annuaire des cinq départements de la Normandie, LXXIX (1912), pp. 158–9.
9. This form (University of Pa. Library) is identical to that published in XXX, 295–6. We listed in annotation there all the subsequent invitations but this one.
1. Jean-Baptiste Grandjean de Flévy served after the war in various capacities in the naval and foreign affairs ministries: Frédéric Masson, Le Département des affaires étrangères pendant la Révolution, 1787–1804 (Paris, 1903), p. 374.
2. A former apprentice in BF’s printing shop: XXII, 183n.
3. Most likely Sébastien-Joseph-Prosper Fourier de Pochard, lieutenant in the Bourbonnais regiment: Bodinier, Dictionnaire.
4. The author is Nicolas Le Cointe de La Grave, who appears to have carried mail from BF for John Paul Jones in December, 1780. The Marquis de Lafayette was captured en route to Philadelphia in May, 1781, and brought into Leith Roads: XXXIV, 117, 141; XXXV, 15–16, 192, 233. We have found no recommendation by BF for La Grave.
5. His full name is René-François Veillon de Boismartin: André Collinet, Les Sables au temps de la grande pêche: manuscrits de Collinet (1739–1782) (La Roche-sur-Yon, France, 2002), pp. 346–7.
6. According to Capt. Conkling, the Whim ran aground on the night of July 22, 1780, and was brought to the Ile de Ré for repairs. When the Admiralty at Les Sables-d’Olonne seized the ship and its cargo, Conkling appealed to BF for help. Despite BF’s efforts, it took until November for the French authorities to release the ship: XXXIII, 196, 217, 218, 288, 358, 393–4; XXXIV, 299–300; XXXV, 204–8.
7. In March, 1780, Rousseau sent BF a memoir in support of American independence and offered his services to Congress. Having received no answer, he renewed his request for employment in June, 1783: XL, 157–8.
8. Presumably Jean-François Rousseau, who had carried Rousseau’s letter of June, 1783.
9. Perhaps Edward Jackson Jones, who ran a merchant house in West Florida with two of his brothers before moving to Louisiana, where he lived from 1776 to 1778. In August, 1780, he received a loan of 30 louis from BF: XXXIII, 181–2.
1. He later wrote about politics and science: Nouvelle Biographic, under Lebouvier-Desmortiers.
2. In 1779: XXXII, 113n.
3. Bidé de Chavagnes wrote to JA on Feb. 15, 1785, to share his joy at having been admitted to the Society of the Cincinnati and to express his deep admiration for JA. He also sent his respects to BF: Adams Papers, XVI, 522–4.
4. Gilbert-Bon Perrot de Chezelles served as directeur between 1783 and 1786. He had forwarded another memoir to BF on April 12, 1783: XXXIX, 106 (where we reproduced the spelling given in the Almanach royal); Michel Bruguière, “Une Source meconnue d’histoire économique et sociale: le bureau de correspondance générale au XVIIIe siècle,” Jour. des savants, CLXVII (1982), 104; Annales Bourbonnaises, VI (1892), 221.
5. The duc de Penthièvre.
6. In another, very brief note, undated and possibly written in September, Chabaud announces that he will depart for St.-Domingue on the twenty-first, unless BF tells him to stay longer. BF used the remainder of the sheet to make a series of arithmetical calculations.