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To the Comte de Vergennes
Docno: PJA08d255
Recipient: Vergennes, Charles Gravier, Comte de
Date: 1780-02-25
This is a summary of a document and does not contain a transcription. If it is available elsewhere in this digital edition, a page number link will be provided below in the paragraph beginning "Printed."
[dateline] Paris, 25 February 1780.
Replying to Vergennes' letter of the 24th (calendared above), John Adams expressed his appreciation for his upcoming presentation at the French court. He also agreed to avoid publicizing his peace commission before its announcement in the “Gazette,” to submit any announcement that he might seek to have published in the Dutch papers, and to keep secret his commission to negotiate an Anglo-American commercial treaty. This is the last complete letter included in JA's Autobiography.
printed
:
JA, Diary and Autobiography
, 4:253–254.
From Edmé Jacques Genet
Docno: PJA08d256
Recipient: JA
Date: 1780-02-25
[dateline] Versailles feby. 25. 1780
[salute] Monsieur
Je ne manquerai point de rendre compte a monseigneur le Comte de Vergennes de la lettre dont vous venés de m'honorer.1
Je vais écrire aussi à Ostende pour qu'on vous fasse venir Sous mon couvert deux gazettes les plus renommées dans chaque parti. Suivant moi c'est dans celui de l'Opposition le General advertiser imprimé par W. Parker—et dans celui du Ministere le Morning post. Ce sont les deux que je demanderai et je vous les ferai passer régulierement. En attendant je vous en prêterai des miennes quand je le pourrai. Je joins ici le general advertiser du 17. Vous me le renverrés à votre loisir. Je vous ferai connoitre les votres quand ils viendront pour qu'ils vous restent.
Oserois je vous demander des nouvelles de Mr. votre fils, et S'il est revenu avec vous. Le mien part dans huit jours pour l'allemagne.2 Je vous prie de faire agréer mes hommages à Mr. Francis Dana.
Vous êtes vous Souvenu de moi pour les nouvelles constitutions que je n'avois pas pû me procurer. Si vous n'avés pas eu le terns de les recueillir, etant resté fort peu en Amérique, cela vous est encore possible par vos amis et je vous en Serai obligé.
J'ai l'honeur d'etre avec un inviolable attachement Monsieur Votre très humble et très obéissant serviteur
[signed] Genet
Edmé Jacques Genet to John Adams: A Translation
Docno: PJA08d257
Recipient: JA
Date: 1780-02-25
[dateline] Versailles, 25 February 1780
[salute] Sir
I will not fail to inform the Count Vergennes of the letter with which you have honored me.1
I will also write to Ostend to ask them to send, under my name, two gazettes, the most influential in each party. To my mind they are, for the Opposition, the General Advertiser, published by W. Parker—and
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for the Ministry, the Morning Post. These are the two that I will request and forward to you regularly. In the meantime, I will lend you some of my own copies when I can. I am enclosing the General Advertiser of the 17th, which you can return at your convenience. I will inform you when your own copies are sent so that you may keep them.
Dare I ask you for news of your son and whether he returned with you? My own leaves for Germany in eight days.2 Please give my regards to Mr. Francis Dana.
Did you remember my request for copies of the new constitutions I was unable to obtain? If you did not have time to gather them, being only briefly in America, you might still do so through your friends, and I would be grateful to you.
I have the honor to be, with an unshakable attachment, sir, your very humble and very obedient servant
[signed] Genet
RC
Adams Papers
; docketed by John Thaxter: “Mr. Genet 25th. Feby. 1780 ansd. 26th Feby. 1780.”
1. Of 24 Feb. (above).
2. Edmond Charles Genet, later first minister from the French Republic to the United States and known then as “Citizen Genet.” In 1780 he was 17 years old and, after studying at Geissen and Berlin and serving on the staff of the French ambassador at Vienna, became head of the foreign ministry's translation bureau upon his father's death in 1781 (
DAB
).
Cite web page as: Founding Families: Digital Editions of the Papers of the Winthrops and the Adamses, ed.C. James Taylor. Boston: Massachusetts Historical Society, 2007.
http://www.masshist.org/ff/
http://www.masshist.org/ff/