B. FRANKLIN.
TO MAJOR WILLIAM JACKSON.
Passy, July 6th, 1781.
Sir,
I received and answered two of your expresses yesterday morning, and in the evening I received a third letter from you, all dated the 2d instant.
In this last you tell me, "that I must be sensible I cannot have the disposal of the money, as it was obtained without either my knowledge or concurrence, by Colonel Laurens, appointed special Minister for that purpose." I do not desire to diminish the merit of Colonel Laurens. I believe he would have been glad, if it had been in his power to have procured ten times the sum; and that no application or industry on his part for that purpose would have been wanting. But I cannot let this injurious assertion of yours pass, without expressing my surprise, that you, who were always with that gentleman, should be so totally ignorant of that transaction. The six millions, of which he took with him two and a half, of which one and a half were sent to Holland, and of which more than the remainder is ordered in stores from hence, was a free gift from the King's goodness (not a loan to be repaid with interest,) and was obtained by my application, long before Colonel Laurens's arrival.
I had also given in a list of the stores to be provided, though on his coming I cheerfully gave up the further prosecution of that business into his hands, as he was better acquainted with the particular wants of the army, than I could be, and it was one of the purposes of his appointment.
Thus no part of the affair was done without my "knowledge and concurrence," except the sending a million and a half of the specie to Holland. This was indeed a secret to me. I had heard of that sum's being ready there to embark, but I always till lately understood it to be a part of the Dutch loan, which I am about to mention, or I should certainly have opposed that operation. What Colonel Laurens really obtained, and a great service I hope it will prove, was a loan upon interest of ten millions, to be borrowed on the credit of this Court in Holland. I have not heard, that this loan has yet produced anything, and, therefore, I do not know that a single livre exists, or has existed in Europe, of his procuring for the States. On the contrary, he and you have drawn from me considerable sums, as necessary for your expenses, and he left me near forty thousand livres to pay for the Alliance, and, moreover, engaged me in a debt in Holland, which I understood might amount to about fifteen thousand pounds sterling, and which you contrived to make fifty thousand pounds.
When I mentioned to him the difficulty I should find to pay the drafts, he said, you have the remainder of the six millions. He gave me no account of the dispositions he had made, and it is but lately I have learnt that there is no remainder. To gratify you, and to get that ship out, which could not have stirred without me, I have engaged for the vast sum abovementioned, which I am sure I shall be much distressed to pay, and therefore have not deserved at your hands the affront you are advised to menace me with.