Inequality of Rights. He raided in the North Sea and the Baltic; he sailed around England and then around Ireland, everywhere taking prizes. Spain had ceased her royal aids to America. The prevention of anarchy and civil unrest. He made for the English Channel, where he took four small merchantmen, which he sent to Lorient under prize masters. France and Great Britain were cutthroat enemies. Just a year after independence was declared the Americans lost Fort Ticonderoga to Burgoyne, and on September 26 Howe entered Philadelphia. The first British protests were made to the French ambassador, Noailles, who blandly replied that in a great nation there are many turbulent spirits eager to run after adventures. He did not attempt to have his turbulent compatriots released from prison. If he had written the true story of his life as a drama no audience would have believed it. Naval affairs were stagnant; the privateers attracted all the able seamen. Following hard on the American Revolution (1776-83), the sweeping aside of the French feudal order demonstrated the irresistible rise of freedom and enlightenment. Franklin had no doubt guessed, when the courier returned from Europe in September with news of tremendous shipments of arms by Monsieur Hortalez, that the real name of this mysterious friend was France. When they arrived at Martinique, the Americans were so cordially received that Bingham settled down as resident agent for Congress. The chief results of the mission were the snuffing out of Prussia as a potential ally, and the theft of Lees papers by a professional burglar hired by the British ambassador. Q. Stormont subsided; England needed time too. His friend Sieur Montaudoin bought a great Dutch ship and named it, Silas Deane was invaluable. It was February, and the ominous shift in the ministry from the friendly Grimaldi to the hostile Floridablanca was taking place. It caused many French nobles and clergy to move to the newly independent United States. He had made Saratoga possible. He contributed a million livres to the colonies war chest and his uncle, Charles III of Spain, followed suit. In France, however, this separation of function was impossible. Since Charles III had already contributed a million livres to Hortalez & Company, and allowed New Orleans to become an American privateer base, he may well have thought that he had done his share. This well-connected young man had been sent direct from Congress to buy two ships to serve as packets for the mission. On the same day he wrote Richard Henry Lee: My idea of adapting characters and places is this: Dr. Franklin to Vienna, as the first, most respectable, and quiet; Mr. Deane to Holland; and the alderman [William] to Berlin. This long-range program was necessary, but it did not change the fact that the lumbering and inefficient British war machine had at last got itself oiled and repaired for a heavy assault upon the United States. The fact that he was a genius, and a genius of such multiple gifts that he might easily inspire alarm or jealousy in others, had early taught him the art of using screens and disguises. He added, Take care that America and the West Indies dont glide through our fingers.. Which French foreign minister and supporter of American independence convinced the French king to form an alliance with the Patriots? These prospects were bleak enough in December, 1775, but Franklin sent Bonvouloir back with such a rosy report that they immediately improved. Between 1778 and 1782 the French provided supplies, arms and ammunition, uniforms, and, most importantly, troops and naval support to the beleaguered Continental Army. By April American privateers had taken so many British seamen prisoner that the British fleet was not half manned, and Stormont hinted to Vergennes that peace could not last much longer if France continued to arm the United States. At once, on March 17, the commissioners sent memoirs to the French and Spanish ministries urging a triple war against Britain and her ally Portugal. He was the dark personality of the family: a paranoid constantly haunted by the most fantastic suspicions of the people around him; a captious, hypercritical man who never married or made a simple friendship; a man with inflated notions of his own Tightness and genius who suffered tortures of jealousy of anybody above him. When Franklin came to the signing . The British drive through the Jerseys threatened Philadelphia, and in December Congress evacuated to Baltimore, where it remained until February. That night boats brought his cannon and powder and a number of French seamen, and the Dunkirk Pirate was on his way. His jealousy of Franklin, which grew into a nightmare for Americans on two continents, had begun in 1770 when Massachusetts appointed Franklin its agent in England, and Lee his inactive deputy to replace him if he left England or if he died. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1975. However, Deane had already made a magnificent contribution to the Revolution in helping France to help America. Many of the vessels loading up in French ports with arms for Washington were the private ventures of merchants whom Deane had inspired with confidence. The prize crew of five Americans and sixteen Frenchmen were put in prison, and the prize master was forced to confess that Conyngham had made other captures. People heavily associate the French Revolution with the American Revolution, due to the many general similarities. He helped Beaumarchais buy and fit out eight ships, prudently scattered in various ports: the Amphitrite, Mercure, Flammand, Mre Bobie, Seine, Thrse, Amelia , and Marie Catherine . They all hated and feared Britain as the newly dominant nation of Europe. The Americans' victory over the British may have been one of the greatest catalysts for the French Revolution. Soon Franklin and Deane had a group of young men busy in the various ports, helping merchantmen and privateers speed on their way, informing them of shifts in French regulations and dangerous areas patrolled by British warships, recruiting French seamen to fill out depleted ships companies, finding masters for ships and ships for masters. That switched him to the Caribbean trade. Masonry was powerful in France and all-powerful in Nantes, and for perhaps a generation its exporters had been sending American brothers, along with bills of lading and business papers, sheaves of French Masonic literature in exchange for similar pamphlets from the colonies. In mid-November George III, who had no intention of starting a war with France, decided it would be useful to know the Spanish plans and sent Paul Wentworth to Paris to find out how Charles III stood. After France entered on February 6th, 1778 in the American Revolutionary War, the British naval force - master of the seas - and French fleet confronted each other from the beginning. The exhibit traces the American naval effort in its three components: the Continental Navy, state navies, and privateers. The historian Henri Doniol, who edited the secret French archives of the period, claimed that Franklin did more than coach the Whigs; that he in fact started an international gunrunning ring by quiet negotiations with certain arms manufacturers and exporters in England, Holland, and France. Bancroft was still the mission confidant at Passy; certain Americans who sat at Deanes dinner table reported on ship movements to the British secret service, and Captain Joseph Hynson, who happened to be Lambert Wickess stepbrother, stole an entire pouch of dispatches intended for Congress, which contained all the secret correspondence between the mission and the French ministry for the last eight months. The French support NATO modernization efforts and are leading contributors to the NATO Response Force. On July 23 he wrote a memoir to Louis XVI declaring that the moment had come when France must resolve either to abandon America or to aid her courageously and effectively. He urged a closer alliance to prevent a reunion of Britain and America. It was a fine moment for his debut. Their poison letter campaign was reinforced by the arrival of Ralph Izard, a southern planter and rancid snob. In order to make the war effective he reminded Vergennes of things Vergennes could do for the Bourbon cause: release the Hortalez ships, foster the American trade, and lend Congress money. The winter of Valley Forge was beginning, and its bleakness was in the comfortable house at Passy too. This was amazing enough; France had broken through the limits of her ostensible neutrality and was allowing Martinique to become a base of war against Britain. He had a large family and expensive tastes, and needed and loved money. Now she was acknowledged as a nation in her own right, a nation whose treaties protected her commerce on the seas and her growing space on land, a rising people for whose friendship Britain and France must compete. Nobody could find the prizes, which had been sold. At the first hint of this the Doctor tendered his resignation, which to his relief was not accepted. After the Seven Years' War, Britain found itself in about twice as much debt . George Washington was appointed commander of the Continental Army in 1775. It was a long time before this contract with the Farmers General could be satisfied, since few ships could now run the British blockade of the American seaboard. As soon as Arthur Lee arrived from London the three commissioners wrote Vergennes announcing their appointment to negotiate a treaty of amity and commerce with France. The French Revolution also influenced U.S. politics, as pro- and anti- Revolutionary factions sought to . No doubt the colonies hoarded local supplies for their own defense, and the merchants hoarded their stocks for higher prices. All this was excruciating, since Lee had trumpeted in letters home that he had the ministry and Hortalez in his pocket. A few days later Louis XVI made the United States a loan of 2,000,000 livres. France, wretchedly poor at the bottom of its society and jaded and apprehensive at the top, was rushing towards its own revolution, and the violent emotions which would ruin the French Revolution were tripped off in wild demonstrations of welcome. The requested battleships were not forthcoming; it was explained that France needed every unit of her Navy for her own purposes, which of course meant her expected war with Britain. From 1790 to 1794, the revolutionaries grew increasingly radical. He insisted on holding the conferences on Spanish soil at Vitoria; he wrote an ungracious memoir to Grimaldi and crossed the border. There was no mention of payment. The American Revolution and the French Alliance. Knowing George III as he did, Franklin realized the importance of insulting him while all Europe looked on. At last America would hear of the third Lee brother, hitherto a cipher, as its savior in Europe. By this process of elastic diplomacy the amenities were preserved while both sides gained time for war preparations and spared their exchequers the drain of active hostilities. In the interval, quite unsuspected by his compatriots, he did high-level work for Eden. It is true that these countries, and to some extent Spain, had for some time been shipping out contraband for America, mostly through their Caribbean islands. However, Franklin was a wizard at intrigue, and many secrets lie with him in the Christ Church burying ground. And Spanish concurrence in the alliance must be won. To the citizens of Nantes the alliance was not merely a commercial bond, but a blend of credos and enthusiasms which they shared with their friends overseas. Bancroft was a supreme spy, but he preserved a curious code of his own, almost a code of honor, about what he would or would not do. Question 5. Here are five ways the French helped Americans win their freedom. Short as it was, the crossing was a godsend. His key man for American contacts was Paul Wentworth of New Hampshire, who before the war had been the London agent for that colony and after the war was elected a trustee of Dartmouth College, to which he had presented scientific apparatus. Morris was as stubborn as George III about refusing to believe bad news, but when he was finally convinced of his mistake he was full of contrition. Franklin soon warned Congress not to enlarge its connections with this questionable pair. Now he hurried his preparations, and Captain Wickes was ordered to make all speed to Nantes, and to avoid action if possible. Instead of using direct pressure he used leverage. E . One traditional characteristic of the French diplomacy of alliances has been the "Alliance de revers" (i.e. Like Great Britain, France had a young king. Now he must placate Stormont. He supported his private investment in the American future by using his fleet of a dozen ships for Caribbean trade on the return voyage to France, and this sugar trade brought him profits to invest in more goods for America. At the moment, Nantes was all Frankliniste . He was evidently buying arms and setting up a smuggling base in the Low Countries. He closeted himself with Silas Deane, who had now been in France for six months on a dual mission for the two secret committees and had a tremendous budget of news. The court of France, he wrote, is the great wheel that moves them all and he added that of all posts he preferred Paris for himself. George III was uneasy about both Americans because they gambled wildly in stocks and kept mistresses. The French Revolution was one of the most senseless . Lord North relayed the meticulous royal commands to the secret service, whose active head during the war was William Eden, a genius at directing espionage. Wentworth did not give up, and in a conference the next day he offered America a few more concessions, purely on his own authority. It encouraged the French to adopt the government system of popular sovereignty. This rule was so thoroughly disobeyed that great shipping houses like Willing & Morris of Philadelphia kept factors, or at least correspondents, all over Europe and the Caribbean to take care of their trade. Conyngham shook them off and began the most spectacular cruise of the war. But Franklin and Deane knew what to expect from Arthur Lee. After this momentous decision of December 17, Deanes meeting with Wentworth was a decided anticlimax. By late June the captain and his men were released from jail, and the, But in mid-July Conyngham took his unharmed cutter out to sea and anchored at a safe rendezvous. He had reached an impasse: France would not help America unless America showed promise of winning her war, and America could not win without French help. The Revolution precipitated a series of European wars, forcing the United States to articulate a clear policy of neutrality in order to avoid being embroiled in these European conflicts. The Revenge was owned half by Congress and half by Hodge and David Conyngham, a wealthy cousin of the captains who was on a business trip to Europe. The joint conquest was proposed of Canada, the Floridas, and the British West Indies. As for the Reprisal , anchored at Lorient, she suddenly sprang a leak, and international usage allowed a ship in distress harbor privileges until she was fit to sail. Franklin, bobbing a thermometer over the Reprisal s rail to take the temperatures of the Gulf Stream, could think about the life of the sea, this western Atlantic and warm Caribbean which nature had chosen as the home for the new race of Americans. She had stolen Hollands priority on the seas and had swept France from the American continent and the best part of her fisheries. As the American who best understood both sides of the Atlantic, Franklin had carried much of that burden, and for a long time to come would carry all the responsibility for getting maximum aid from the neutral powers without compromising the future of the new republic. Shipping was at a premium; in the last year the price of vessels had tripled. He was the mutant of a new species. Bancroft was in a balky mood but finally gave the desired information: Spain was not ready for a war with England. Captain Wickes, who had been one of the picked men of Morris trading fleet, was chosen for the voyage. Apprehensive as he was about Britain, Vergennes risked war to release Captain Wickes and Captain Henry Johnson, who had sailed in company with him on the Irish cruise, from their long protective arrest in port. Since this ruined Arthur Lees flattering picture of himself as Americas first envoy to Madrid, he was enraged. Long before it got into feeble action, eleven of the colonies had started their own navies, and several of them commissioned their own privateer fleets. They sent eight of them to France and got back safely. The currency had fallen to half its value. They asked that frigates be sent over by August to cruise against Englands Baltic trade and attack the British Isles. The involvement of France in the American War of Independence (1775-1783) was not only significant in the progress of the war itself but also as a critical moment for France. It happened that Franklin and Morris were the only members of the Committee of Secret Correspondence in town when the courier arrived, and they resolved to keep the news to themselves. Athur Lees mission to Spain had done nothing to warm her heart to America. That formality over, Vergennes was ready for his great move. While a gifted and expert secret agent can develop a second personality which keeps him from making slips, in Bancrofts case this doubling of self may have reflected a profound split in the psyche. Franklin immediately got to work at this dismal situation. Arthur Lee knew he was being kept out of important conferences, and yet within a few months he was writing friends that he alone had negotiated the French alliance, though Franklin and Deane tried to take credit for the work. At Passy Bancroft was a loved and trusted figure, and Vergennes so admired him that after the war he sent Bancroft on a highly confidential mission to Ireland. He demanded every favor under heaven and even wrote Frederick (who refused to receive him) a preposterous letter, in effect telling him how he could run his kingdom better. The Doctor, instead of staying with the Montaudoins, allowed himself to be captured by people he disliked. This must not happen again. He helped Beaumarchais buy and fit out eight ships, prudently scattered in various ports: the, Amphitrite, Mercure, Flammand, Mre Bobie, Seine, Thrse, Amelia, Delays which were not the fault of Deane and Beaumarchais held up most of the fleet for months after lading.