Benjamin Franklin / A Picture of the Struggles of Our Infant Nation One Hundred Years Ago

by John S. C. Abbott

France hated England. That haughty government had long been the most unpopular on the globe. England had made great conquests from France, and was rich, intelligent and powerful beyond any other nation. Prosperity had given her arrogance, and she had placed her heel upon her humiliated neighbors. There was not a court in Europe which would not have rejoiced to see England humbled. The despotic court of France, and the most haughty nobles, were ready to encounter any perils which held out a reasonable hope that England might be weakened. Thus the sympathies of all France were united in favor of America.

And now the hour had come. By aiding the Americans, who had boldly declared their independence, they might not only deprive England of those colonies whose trade was already invaluable to England, and which were rapidly increasing in population, wealth and power, but also they might awaken such gratitude in the bosoms of Americans, that the trade of the new nation would be mainly transferred to France.

Thus the court and the nobles, intent upon this object, did not hesitate to aid in the establishment of those principles of liberty, fraternity and equality in America, which eventually whelmed in ruin the palaces and the castles of France.

It was deemed important to conceal, as long as possible, from the British government the sympathy and aid which France was about to manifest for the Americans. Arthur Lee reported that an agent of the French government had promised to send from Holland, two thousand pounds worth of military stores. They were to be forwarded to one of the French West India islands, ostensibly for the service of those islands. The governor was, however, instructed to surrender them to a secret agent of the American Congress. The plan failed. I have not space to record all the various stratagems which were devised to aid the Americans, while the movement was carefully concealed from the vigilant eyes of the English.

Franklin, with nobility of soul which should command the love of every American, as one of his last deeds before he left his country perhaps never to return, collected all the money he could command, about twelve thousand dollars, and loaned it to the government, whose treasury was utterly impoverished. In those dark days, even that small sum was of essential aid. In one of the last of Franklin’s letters, before he sailed, he wrote,

“As to our public affairs, I hope our people will keep up their courage. I have no doubt of their finally succeeding by the blessing of God; nor have I any doubt that so good a cause will fail of that blessing. It is computed that we have already taken a million sterling from the enemy. They must soon be sick of their piratical project.”

Franklin embarked in the Reprisal, a rapid sailing sloop of war of sixteen guns. He took with him his grandson, William Temple Franklin, son of the Tory governor, then a very handsome boy of eighteen, and Benjamin Franklin Bache, eldest son of his daughter, a lad of seven years. William Temple Franklin adhered firmly to the political views of his grandfather. Dr. Franklin intended to place Benjamin in a school in Paris.

Tory spies were watching every movement of Congress. This mission to France was kept a profound secret. Had the British government known that Benjamin Franklin was about to cross the ocean, almost every ship in the British navy would have been sent in chase of him. On the 26th of October, 1776, he left Philadelphia, every precaution having been adopted to keep his departure a secret. The vessel was at anchor at Marcus Hook, in the Delaware, three miles beyond Chester.

Fierce gales drove them rapidly across the Atlantic. Captain Wickes had received instructions to avoid fighting, if possible. He was to devote all his energies to transporting his precious passenger as rapidly as possible, from shore to shore. They were often chased by cruisers. The vessel was small, and Franklin, in his old age, was sadly cramped by his narrow accommodations. He says that of all his eight voyages this was the most distressing. When near the coast of France they captured an English brig, with a cargo of lumber and wine. On the afternoon of the same day, they took another brig, loaded with brandy and flax seed. England was almost delirious with rage, in finding that the Americans were bearing away their prizes from the channel itself, thus bidding proud defiance to those frigates and fortresses of Great Britain which had overawed the world.