CORRESPONDENCE.

Franklin, Lee, and Adams to Vergennes.*

PASSY, January 1, 1779. SIR: Some late proceedings of the enemy have induced us to submit a few observations to your excellency's superior light and judgment.

His Britannic Majesty's commissioners, in their manifesto of the 3d of October, have denounced "a change in the whole nature and future conduct of the war;" they have declared "that the policy as well as the benevolence of Great Britain has thus far checked the extremes of war," when they tended "to distress the people and desolate the country;" that the whole contest is changed; that the laws of self-preservation must now direct the conduct of Great Britain; that these laws will direct her to render the United States of as little avail as possible to France if they are to become an accession to her, and by every means in her power to destroy the new connnection contrived for her ruin. Motions have been made and supported by the wisest men in both Houses of Parliament to address the king to disavow these clauses; but these motions have been rejected by majorities in both Houses, so that the manifesto stands avowed by the three branches of the legisla ture.

Ministers of state made in Parliament a question concerning the meaning of this manifesto, but no man who reads it and knows the history of their past conduct in this war can doubt its import. There is to be a "change in the nature and conduct of the war." A change for the worse must be horrible indeed! They have already burned the beautiful towns of Charlestown, Falmouth, Norfolk, Kingston, Bedford, Egg Harbor, and German Flats, besides innumerable single buildings and smaller clusters of houses wherever their armies have marched. It is true they left Boston and Philadelphia unhurt; but in all probability

* MSS. Dep. of State; 1 Sparks' Dip. Rev. Corr., 366, with verbal changes; 7 John Adams' Works, 72.

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it was merely the dread of a superior army that in these cases restrained their hands, not to mention that burning these towns would have been the ruin of the few secret friends they have still left, of whom there are more in those towns than in all America besides. They have not, indeed, murdered upon the spot every woman and child that fell in their way, nor have they in all cases refused quarter to the soldiers that at times have fallen into their power, though they have in many. They have also done their utmost in seducing negroes and Indians to commit inhuman barbarities upon the inhabitants, sparing neither age, sex, nor character. Although they have not in all cases refused quarter to soldiers and sailors, they have done what is worse than refusing quarter-they have thrust their prisoners into such dungeons, loaded them with such irons, and exposed them to such lingering torments of cold, hunger, and disease, as have destroyed greater numbers than they could have had an opportunity of murdering if they had made it a rule to give no quarter. Many others they have compelled by force to serve and fight on board their ships against fathers, brothers, friends, and countrymen-a destiny to every sensible mind more terrible than death

itself.

It is therefore difficult to apprehend what they mean by a change in the conduct of the war; yet there seems to be no room to doubt that they mean to threaten something more cruel, greater extremes of war, measures that shall distress the people and lay waste the country more than anything they have yet done. The object of the war is now entirely changed. Heretofore their massacres and conflagrations were to divide us and reclaim us to Great Britain. Now, despairing of that end, and perceiving that we shall be faithful to our treaties, their principle is by destroying us to make us useless to France. This principle ought to be held in abhorrence not only by all Christians, but by all civilized nations. If it is once admitted that powers at war have a right to do whatever will weaken or terrify an enemy, it is not possible to foresee where it will end. It would be possible to burn the great cities of Europe. The savages who torture their prisoners do it to make themselves terrible. In fine, all the horrors of the barbarous ages may be introduced and justified.

The cruelties of our enemies have heretofore more than once exasperated the minds of the people so much as to excite apprehensions that they would proceed to retaliation, which, if once commenced, might be carried to extremities; to prevent which the Congress issued an address exhorting to forbearance and a further trial by examples of generosity and lenity to recall their enemies to the practice of humanity amidst the calamities of war. In consequence of which neither the Congress nor any of the States apart have ever exercised or authorized the exer. cise of the right of retaliation. But now that commissioners, vested with the authority of the nation, have avowed such principles and published such threats, the Congress have, by a resolution of the 30th of

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October, solemnly and unanimously declared that they will retaliate. Whatever may be the pretenses of the enemy, it is the manifest drift of their policy to disgust the people of America with their new alliance, by attempting to convince them that, instead of shielding them from distress, it has accumulated additional calamities upon them.

Nothing, certainly, can more become a great and amiable character than to disappoint their purpose, stop the progress of their cruelties, and vindicate the rights of humanity, which are so much injured by this manifesto. We therefore beg leave to suggest to your excellency's consideration whether it would not be advisable for his majesty to interfere, by some declaration to the court of London and to the world, bearing the royal testimony against this barbarous mode of war, and giving assurances that he will join the United States in retaliation, if Great Britain, by putting her threats in execution, should make it necessary. There is another measure, however, more effectual to control their designs and to bring the war to a speedy conclusion; that of sending a powerful fleet, sufficient to secure a naval superiority over them in the American seas. Such a naval force, acting in concert with the armies of the United States, would, in all human probability, take and destroy the whole British power in that part of the world. It would put their wealth and West Indian commerce into the power of France, and reduce them to the necessity of suing for peace. Upon their present naval superiority in those seas depend not only the dominion and rich commerce of their islands, but the supply of their fleets and armies with provisions and every necessary. They have nearly four hundred transports constantly employed in the service of their fleet and army in America, passing from New York and Rhode Island to England, Ireland, Nova Scotia, and their West India Islands, and if any one link in this chain was struck off, if their supplies from any one of these places should be interrupted, their forces could not subsist. Great numbers of these vessels would necessarily fall into the hands of the French fleet and go as prizes to a sure market in the United States. Great numbers of seamen, too, would become prisoners, a loss that England can not repair. It is conceived that it would be impossible for Great Britain to send a very great fleet after the French into those seas. Their men-of-war now in Europe are too old, too rotten, too ill manned, and their masts and yards are of too bad materials to endure such a navigation. The impossibility of their obtaining provisions, artists, and materials in that country, which would be easy to the French, makes it still clearer that they can not send a great additional force, and the fear of Spain's interfering with her powerful navy would restrain them. Whereas France has nothing to fear in Europe from them, as the number and excellence of their armies are an ample security against the feeble land forces of Great Britain.

This naval superiority would open such commerce between the United States and the French West India Islands as would enable our people