Thomas Jefferson Papers

To Thomas Jefferson from C. W. F. Dumas, 5 June 1787

From C. W. F. Dumas

The Hague, 5 June 1787. Short’s last letter causes him to hope that TJ has returned to Paris in good health and particularly that he has recovered “la libre usage d’une main si bien faisante et si utile à la patrie et à l’humanité.” In Holland everyone lives in readiness, and in anxiety too, for a civil war. The crisis is to come this month: “Il est question de tout sauver ou de tout perdre.” Has two other dispatches to send to Congress, one from Sweden, the other for the Department of War. Will send them by the two next regular posts, and would be obliged to hear from TJ or Short whether these two and the present arrive safely.

RC (DLC); 2 p.; in French. FC (Dumas Letter Book, Rijksarchief, The Hague; photostats in DLC). Recorded in SJL as received at Paris 11 June 1787. Enclosure: Dumas to Jay, 5 June 1787, which in turn encloses a “Note” signed Feronce de Rosencrantz, dated Brunswick, 16 May 1787, concerning the forwarding of a letter notifying George Charles Frederic Hartmann, formerly of the Brunswick troops and now a resident of Virginia, to appear before 1 Feb. 1788 to establish his claim to an estate in Brunswick (both in same and both printed in Dipl. Corr., 1783–89 description begins The Diplomatic Correspondence of the United States of America, from the Signing of the Definitive Treaty of Peace … to the Adoption of the Constitution, Washington, Blair & Rives, 1837, 3 vol. description ends , iii, 577–8, though the letter to Jay is there dated 7 June, and the “Note” is dated 15 May 1787).

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