In terms of violent behavior, the American Revolution can't hold a candle to the French Revolution. Podcast: Libert, Unit, Egalit. Early in 1774 Franklin had written from London to a friend at home that he wished Americans might know what we are and what we have. After much private groping and anguish he had discovered what he was: not a colonial American, but that new man, an American. Two revolutions, both taking place in the 18th Century, both world-changing. After the Seven Years' War, Britain found itself in about twice as much debt . Franklin faced the critical year of 1777 with the knowledge that the British fleet would pound American hopes to nothing unless France and Britain began their ordained war. A courier was on his way to Madrid, and the decision of Charles III should be known within three weeks. In August, 1774, Sir Joseph Yorke, for years the British ambassador at The Hague, wrote his superior, the Earl of Suffolk: As the contraband trade carried on between Holland and North America is so well known in England I have not thought it necessary of late to trouble your Lordship with trifling details of ships sailing from Amsterdam for the British Colonies, laden with teas, linnens, etc., But now he had something serious to report: My informations says that the Polly , Captain Benjamin Broadhurst, bound to Nantucket has shipped on board a considerable quantity of gunpowder. If Conyngham was not punished, Stormont would resign, breaking off diplomatic relations with France. The Channel Islands privateers were out in force, and the maritime war in Europe, which could no longer be closely directed from Passy, was in a state of anarchy. The Battle of Saratoga was an extensive and punishing conflict and a key victory for the Americans in the Revolutionary War. And so the man who believed that there never was a good war or a bad peace, old Dr. Benjamin Franklin, a man laden with the worlds honors who might easily have pleaded age and weariness, set out for France in his seventy-first year to secure these necessities for his country. George III, faced with plain warnings from Bancroft and Wentworth that a French alliance was pending, would not believe them. Since France and Spain were not responding to the offer of a trade alliance, he raised his sights and proposed what amounted to a military one. The only source for salt during the war was the Turks Islands beds at the tail of the Bahama chain, long a Bermudian monopoly. French ships engaged British vessels almost immediately after Britain declared war on France in March of 1778. He was lulled by the specious truce with Francebut how would he feel if Captain Wickes captured a royal packet carrying the royal mails? Wentworth recruited Bancroft into the service and supervised his work in Paris closely, never quite sure of his loyalty to England. America could fight only her own sort of war on the seas, and this had started before Lexington and would continue long after Yorktown. To formalize the colonial complaints against Parliament. Robert Morris alcoholic half brother Thomas had just been appointed by Congress as its commercial agent for all of France. The United States, far from asking something for herself, was in reality advancing Bourbon interests and fighting their war. Compared to the antics of the French Revolution, the infamous Tea Party in Boston was like the sisters at the convent sneaking into the dorm of the rival convent and shorting their sheets. He was also making them a gift of 375,000 livres. In the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, France supports U.S. engagement in the peace process. The French Revolution was a momentous historical event that set enduring patterns for modern revolutionary movements and for much of modern politics in general. Deane and Beaumarchais were already fast friends, working in harmony to load the Hortalez fleet with war supplies. Even respected modern historians will repeat some of Arthur Lees calumnies about Franklin and Deane, Jonathan Williams, and William Carmichael, though they have been disproved over and over since their creation in a sick mind. Vergennes sent an agent, Achard de Bonvouloir, to Philadelphia to sound out Franklin about the prospects of a separation from England and a successful war. 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. He only succeeded in quarreling with them both, and when he tried to see Vergennes, he was quite properly snubbed. Q. They all hated and feared Britain as the newly dominant nation of Europe. By a natural process the activities of the mission were divided. By early 1775 the British embassy in France estimated that war supplies worth 32,000,000 livres (about $6,000,000) had been shipped from that kingdom to the colonies. His, Privateers could accomplish wonders, but they could not fight the great British ships of the line. French involvement in the American Revolutionary War of 1775-1783 began in 1776 when the Kingdom of France secretly shipped supplies to the Continental Army of the Thirteen Colonies when it was established in June 1775. B.) According to Doniol, Franklin dealt through Sieur Montaudoin of Nantes, a great shipping merchant, and the savant Dr. Jacques Barbeu-Dubourg. 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. He was evidently buying arms and setting up a smuggling base in the Low Countries. By September Congress lamentable trade embargo would include the West Indies, and no more mainland produce would be sent Bermuda, which meant a galloping famine. America needed French aid of every sort: ships, supplies, loans, to begin with. American victory over the British in the Battle of Saratoga convinced the French that the Americans were committed to independence and worthy partners to a formal alliance. Vergennes promptly granted the requested interview. By the middle of July Vergennes had made up his mind to ask the King for armed intervention. The French Revolution was influenced by the experiences and systems of other nations. But his eventual victory depended on two essentials which only Europe could provide: military supplies of all sorts and a powerful navy. In order to bring the reluctant enemies to blows he had to influence chiefly two men: George III, who was just as set against a French war as he was adamant in the American conflict, and Vergennes, the mentor of a young and inexperienced king. Discovering that point at which the common interests of France and the United States diverged would be a delicate task, and also an enjoyable one since he was matching wits with Franklin. During Franklins years in London he had watched the old power pattern repeat itself. A growing fleet of American privateers had already brought prizes into the various French ports, and a system had been perfected for their disposal. Copyright 1949-2022 American Heritage Publishing Co. All Rights Reserved. The man who believed there was never a good war or a bad peace was about to use all his powers to sweep the Bourbon nations into the War of Independence. A young girl began having strange fits. To license content, please contact licenses [at] americanheritage.com. He contributed a million livres to the colonies war chest and his uncle, Charles III of Spain, followed suit. The story goes that he was rushing to play the stock market, and no doubt he was. "Rear alliance"), aiming at allying with countries situated on the opposite side or "in the back" of an adversary, in order to open a second front encircling the adversary and thus re . Richardson (Bancrofts tiny, curiously contorted script was almost feminine). British Debt. In his contract Bancroft agreed to a long list of particulars. He did extremely well in these successive careers, and now at forty held a position of high honor. The new physiocratic school had its followers on both sides of the Atlantic. He was never suspected by anybody but Arthur Lee, who suspected everybody but his own secretaries, who were almost invariably British agents. After Lees visit he proffered no more aid and listened to Floridablanca. Schooled in the Caribbean trade, he was ready for the ticklish work of running arms from Europe before the war began, and displayed such gifts for evading British snoopers in a highly spectacular way that their reports on Conyngham had the quality of a picaresque saga. Whatever disaster happened in 1777, he wanted to build a friendship between the French and American peoples which would last for many generations, and he calmly laid the foundations of that friendship in his own daily associations. That night boats brought his cannon and powder and a number of French seamen, and the Dunkirk Pirate was on his way. He and his friend the Marquis de Bouille, the new governor of Martinique, had a privateer fleet with American masters and French and Spanish crews which was making itself felt in the Caribbean. Most of the supply was still down in the Caribbean, but the fact remains that there must have been more powder on the continent than the various colonies and the merchants were willing to release to Congress. But if she should declare war on France, we conceive that by the united force of France, Spain, and America, she will lose all her possessions in the West Indies, much the greatest part of that commerce which has rendered her so opulent, and be reduced to that state of weakness and humiliation which she has, by her perfidy, her insolence, and her cruelty both in the east and the west, so justly merited.. The first diplomatic exchange between the United States and a foreign power was highly personal: Franklin and Vergennes sizing each other up. All this was excruciating, since Lee had trumpeted in letters home that he had the ministry and Hortalez in his pocket. The two men had been on fairly close terms in Congress, where Deane had sat from the first day as a delegate from Connecticut. He gave Franklins courier a verbal message: due to Mr. Lees unflagging labors with the French embassy in London, Versailles had been persuaded to send goods worth 200,000 (Hortalez had said 25,000) to the Caribbean as an outright gift. Ferreiro, Larrie D. Brothers at Arms: American Independence and the Men of France & Spain Who Saved It. 1783. But the harm had been done. To forestall a truce with Britain, the ministers had stipulated that the United States must make no peace that surrendered her independence. Accordingly, the Doctor held his peace. He had made Saratoga possible. The British drive through the Jerseys threatened Philadelphia, and in December Congress evacuated to Baltimore, where it remained until February. These were led by Libertadores - like Simn . When Deane left Philadelphia on his mission to France, Franklin suggested that Edward Bancroft would be a useful consultant on European affairs, and so it proved. People he loved and admired had far too much influence on him. He was free for a time to be the scientist, finding in nature a fidelity to laws beyond the reach of human meddling. Too much depended on Franklin. The Passy household was complete when the wise and enchanting Edward Bancroft arrived to act as general secretary of the mission. A disguised British vessel at Dunkirk had alerted the warships, and as soon as the Revenge was in the open sea she was chased by several British frigates, sloops of war, and cutters. By then Congress had set up two secret committees on both of which Franklin was extremely busy. After the scheme had been put into effect they explained the mechanism to their committee: For though the fitting out [of an American vessel in a French port] may be covered and concealed by various pretenses, so at least to be winked at by the Government here yet the bringing in of prizes by a vessel so fitted out is so notorious an act, and so contrary to treaties, that if suffered must cause an immediate war.. Nearing France, Dr. Franklin changed the captains orders. He spent much of the latter half of 1776 in Paris as mentor to the inexperienced American, and the close friendship thus begun lasted as long as Deane lived. These crucial French contributions exemplify the global character of the . It caused many French nobles and clergy to move to the newly independent United States. 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 small matter was to be Conynghams capture of another British packet, this time the one plying to Holland. Franklin found that the American stock had lately plunged to its lowest point. But the accident was symbolic: Hortalez & Company had suffered a. During the Revolution this tiny island was the clearinghouse for American trade with the Caribbean and Europe, including Britain. One traditional characteristic of the French diplomacy of alliances has been the "Alliance de revers" (i.e. Before Deane and Wentworth met, he sent word to Passy that France would after all not wait for word from Spain but would conclude the alliance independently, on one condition: that no separate peace be made with England. 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. was a war only between the French and the Native Americans. The alliance of France with the American Patriots started on February 6, 1778, when the King of France signed a treaty with Benjamin Franklin, one of the Founding Fathers of the United States. 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. A photograph of Edouard de Laboulaye from the Galerie Contemporaine collection. This kept him out of personal debates and increased his potential. 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. He waited until the, Beaumarchais was with the three commissioners when the official messenger arrived. Carmichael wrote a strong-action letter to William Bingham on Martinique, mincing no words as to the policy being carried out in France: I think your situation of singular consequence to bring on a war so necessary to assure our independence, and which the weak system of this court seems studiously to avoid. All George III had to offer his erring children, who would of course return to colonial status, was the repeal of the obnoxious acts since 1763, which had precipitated the war. Vergennes had answered, Nous ne d sirons pas la guerre, mais nous ne la craignons pas. In sending on this encouraging word to Congress, Franklin added his own hopes about the Franco-British war: When all are ready for it, a small matter may suddenly bring it on.. The Reprisal was carrying a cargo of indigo worth 3,000 which was intended to pay the early expenses of the Paris mission. Arthur Lee, who would have ruined the secret project if he had been in Paris to interfere with it, was busy elsewhere. Though the mail vessel was lightly armed she gave Wickes some trouble, and one of his seamen was killed and a lieutenant wounded. They were based on the Plan of 1776, drafted chiefly by Franklin, and they laid down his cherished, and essentially modern, principles of free trade and settled the wholly new problem of how a republic should conduct its relations with a kingdom. That was its only point; Vergennes would soon learn of this long interview with the British representative, and he might be worried if Franklin neglected to tell him anything about it. The celebrated dramatist Pierre Augustin Caron de Beaumarchais now cast himself in his own best role, which he played without applause. Franklins hosts were the merchants Pliarne and Penet, who had little standing in Nantes, but who may have been subsidized by Vergennes. When Stormont appeared at Versailles Vergennes assured him that the Reprisal and her prizes had been ordered to leave French waters within 24 hours. Lord Stormont, the British ambassador, had been sputtering at Vergennes for two years about the shipping of contraband from French ports, and now he raised such a storm that the minister had to forbid the sailing of one Hortalez vessel after the other. The romantic era of secret aid was finished; there would be no more subsidies and loans from Versailles, and his company was already in financial straits. As a fellow commissioner, Deanes prodigious energies and devotion to Franklin would help to pull them both through the stormy year ahead. Pliarne and Penet undertook to sell the indigo, meanwhile giving Franklin a small cash advanceand that was about the last the mission got of the indigo money. A number of ill-advised financial maneuvers in the late 1700s worsened the financial situation of the already cash-strapped French government. Then and then only did he dissolve his company, which had spent over 42,000,000 livres, mostly for America, and most of it never paid back. It was a fine moment for his debut. Now he hurried his preparations, and Captain Wickes was ordered to make all speed to Nantes, and to avoid action if possible. He would not believe reports which meant bad news for England, or fully credit those which came from spies whose personal lives this virtuous burgher disapproved. No charge was made against Deane, but for two years Congress kept him in Philadelphia at its pleasure while the press vilified him. Late in May Captain Wickes made a cruise quite around Ireland in company with two other captains and captured eighteen small vessels. At the same time he yearned to be a statesman like Franklin. (The third captain of that cruise was staying behind to take out one of the new American frigates built at Nantes.) For all his enjoyment of high life and high-level intrigue, he was a seismograph about social upheavals and an intellectual who understood their necessity. During the summer Congress became alarmed at the massing of French warships in the Caribbean and sent young William Bingham to find out whether this mobilization portended action against the United States. Similar to MORE He had come to the point where he must drop his perilous but always enjoyable collaboration with Franklin and play for France alone. Resentful over the loss of its North American empire after the French and Indian War, France welcomed the opportunity to undermine Britain's position in the New World. The American Revolution of 1775-1789, which concluded as the revolution in France was unfolding, was perhaps the most significant. The American Influence of the Enlightenment Philosophy on the French Revolution. His Amphitrite and Mercure were already home, having delivered their supplies at Portsmouthgunpowder and blankets and clothing, sixty cannon, and 12,000 stand of arms. Meanwhile, Grard warned, the negotiations must be kept secret. But the, In a few swift parries Franklin suggested what his technique of dealing with the ministry would be. 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. The King was progressing from the swaddling clothes of a dominant mother to the strait jacket of his manic seizures, and even in his long periods of sanity his balance was precarious. Little Benny Bache would be put in school to learn French, and Temple Franklin would act as his grandfathers unpaid secretary. Spain had ceased her royal aids to America. 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 went on with suggestions for arming vessels in Martinique and manning them with French seamen, which must have amused Bingham, who was already busy at this very work. What event launched the beginning of witchcraft accusations in Salem. They might refit in the island ports, stock up their magazines, cruise the Caribbean, and bring their prizes in to St. Pierre for judgment in Mr. Binghams court of admiralty. Here are five ways the French helped Americans win their freedom. Nothing came of these appeals, and meanwhile Franklin and Deane had been working at a highly secret project which might prove more effective in precipitating a Franco-British war. He radiated reassurance like one of his own stoves; the warmth and charm of his personality masked his Merlin powers. Whether this was one of the patriotic conspiracies for which he risked his life that year scarcely matters, for the contraband traffic would have gone merrily on if Benjamin Franklin had never existed. A disguised British vessel at Dunkirk had alerted the warships, and as soon as the, By the middle of July Vergennes had made up his mind to ask the King for armed intervention. A first fleet under the orders of the Admiral d'Estaing was dispatched to . Congress demanded impossibilities of him: a huge loan which France could not afford, French battleships and seamen, and the prompt entrance of the Bourbons into the war.