His attack on Franklin and his nephew, Jonathan Williams, was a very serious one, and was published in a pamphlet, entitled “Observations on Certain Commercial Transactions in France Laid Before Congress.” Williams was one of Franklin’s Boston nephews who turned up in Paris poor and without employment. Franklin was always taking care of his relatives with government positions, and he gave this one the position of naval agent at Nantes. He had charge of the purchase of supplies for American men-of-war, sold the prizes that were brought in, and also bought and shipped arms and ammunition. It was a large business involving the handling of enormous sums of money, and there is no doubt that there were opportunities in it for making a fortune. Under the modern spoils system it would be regarded as a precious plum which a political party would be justified in making almost any sacrifices to secure.
Franklin and Deane seem to have let Williams manage this department pretty much as he pleased, and, as has been already shown, Lee had some ground for suspecting that Deane was privately interested with Williams in the sale of prizes. Williams certainly expended large sums on Deane’s orders alone, and he was continually calling for more money from the commissioners’ bankers. Lee demanded that there should be no more orders signed by Deane alone, and that Williams should send in his accounts; and, notwithstanding Lee’s naturally captious and suspicious disposition, he was perfectly right in this.
Deane and Williams kept demanding more money, and Lee asked Franklin to stop it, which he not only refused to do, but wrote a letter to his nephew justifying him in everything:
“Passy, Dec. 22, 1777.
"Dear Nephew:
“I received yours of the 16th and am concerned as well as you at the difference between Messrs. Deane and Lee, but cannot help it. You need, however, be under no concern as to your orders being only from Mr. Deane. As you have always acted uprightly and ably for the public service, you would be justified if you had no orders at all. But as he generally consulted with me and had my approbation in the orders he gave, and I know they were for the best and aimed at the public good, I hereby certify you that I approve and join in those you received from him and desire you to proceed in the execution of the same.”
Williams at last sent in his accounts, and Lee went over them, marking some items “manifestly unjust,” others “plainly exorbitant,” and others “altogether unsatisfactory for want of names, dates, or receipts.” He refused to approve the accounts, sent them to Congress, and asked Williams to produce his vouchers. The vouchers, Lee tells us, were never produced. He asked for them again and again, but there was always some excuse, and he charges that Williams had in his possession a hundred thousand livres more than was accounted for. Finally, John Adams, who had come out to supersede Deane, joined with Franklin in giving Williams an order on the bankers for the balance claimed by him; but the order expressly stated that it was not to be understood as an approval of his accounts, for which he must be responsible to Congress. Franklin appointed certain persons to audit the accounts, but at a time, Lee says, when they were on the point of sailing for America, and therefore could not act. Adams seems to have been convinced that Williams was not all that could be desired, and he and Franklin soon dismissed him from his office, again reminding him that this was not to be considered as an approval of his accounts.
Lee’s charge against Franklin was that he had connived at the acts of his nephew and done everything possible to shield him and enable him to get possession of the balance of money he claimed. Readers must draw their own conclusions, for the matter was never officially investigated. It would have been unwise for Congress to inaugurate a public scandal at a time when the country was struggling for existence, needed all the moral and financial support it could obtain from Europe, and as yet saw no end to the Revolution.
One more point must be noticed. Lee commented with much sarcasm on the sudden prosperity of Jonathan Williams. He had been clerk to a sugar-baker in England, and was supposed to be without means; but as naval agent he soon began to call himself a merchant, and when waiting on the commissioners charged five Louis d’ors a day for the loss of his time. Lee, according to some of his letters, had been trying for some time to have a certain John Lloyd, of South Carolina, appointed in the place of Williams; and I shall quote part of one of these letters, which shows why Lee wanted Williams’s place for one of his friends.
“My brother and myself have conceived that as the public allowance to the commercial agent is very liberal and the situation necessarily must recommend considerable business, the person appointed might with the most fair and conscientious discharge of his duty to the public make his own fortune.” (Life of Arthur Lee, vol. ii. p. 144.)
He did not succeed in having Lloyd appointed, but he and his brother William secured the position for a friend of theirs called Schweighauser, on the dismissal of Williams, and this Schweighauser appointed a nephew of the Lees as one of his assistants.
It should be said that although Lee and Izard were constantly hinting at evil practices by Franklin, and sometimes directly stigmatized him as the “father of corruption” and deeply involved in the most disreputable schemes, they never produced any proof that he had enriched himself or was directly engaged in anything discreditable. There seems to be no doubt that certain people were making money under cover of the loose way in which affairs were managed. Franklin must have known of this, as well as Adams and the other commissioners, but neither he nor they were enriched by it. Lee’s pamphlet goes no farther than to say that Franklin had shielded his nephew. John Adams, it may be observed, assisted in this shielding, if it can with justice be so called, for he signed with Franklin the order allowing the money to be paid to Williams on condition that it should not be considered an approval of his accounts. Adams afterwards described very concisely the situation, and how he, with the others, was compelled to connive at peculations under the absurd system.