1. Pickering first wrote “1796,” but the “6” later was struck out and replaced by a “7,” written underneath. Likewise, the letter’s docket originally had “12 Jan. 1796,” before a “7” was written over the “6” in the year. The letter’s contents clearly place it in 1797.

2. An undated address to GW from the Pennsylvania Senate, signed by speaker Robert Hare and docketed “Jany 12. 1797,” reads: “Your late Address to the people of the United States, Whilst it awakens every sentiment of gratitude, deeply affects our feelings with regret.

“The friendly counsel you have offered to your fellow citizens, to induce them to adhere stedfastly, to their present union; to repress the Spirit of party; to cherish religion, knowledge and public credit; and to maintain a dispassionate and impartial, ‘tho amicable disposition, towards foreign nations, meets with our warmest approbation. In your forcible exposition of the dangers, which will result to their freedom, safety and prosperity from a dereliction of those salutary maxims, we recognize that just dicernment of the real interest of our country, and that firm adherence to the principles of true patriotism, which have always distinguished your public conduct. Your fellow citizens sensible that with your measures their dearest interests were intimately connected, have regarded them with anxious attention; they have beheld you, under the auspices of divine providence, leading their armies to victory, and guiding their councils to prosperity and peace; nor has the close[s]t examination of your conduct produced any other effect, than to Strengthen their reliance on your wisdom and Virtue.

“The various testimonials of attachment which you have received from the people of the United States, must have fully convinced you, that your affectionate sensations towards them, which are so feelingly expressed in your address, are reciprocated by correspondent sentiments, on their part. The signal instance of steady approbation, with which they have Supported your administration, and the Success which has attended it, have exhibited to the world a striking proof, that the most effectual method of securing the confidence, and accomplishing the welfare, of an enlightened nation, is, to pursue, with undeviating firmness, a policy founded on the purest integrity.

“The Satisfaction we have derived from your Salutary communications is greatly alloyed by the information which has accompani⟨e⟩d them, that we are so soon, to be deprived of those faithful services, from which such important benefits have resulted to this in common with the other states. We are, at the same time, compelled to assent to the justice of your claim to that repose, in the evening of your days, which has so long been sacrificed to the voice and interest of your country.

“You will carry with you into retirement the solid enjoyment arising from the applause of your grateful country, and the consciousness of a life devoted to virtue and public utility. In addition to these sources of happiness, may you long enjoy the blessings of health; may you largely partake of that national felicity, to the establishment of which you have so eminently contributed; and may your successors in office, be influenced by your example, in their efforts to promote the peace, safety, and dignity of the United States” (DS, DLC:GW; LB, DLC:GW).

The Pennsylvania Senate’s address was written in response to GW’s Farewell Address (see Farewell Address, 19 Sept. 1796, and the accompanying editorial note). For more on the reception of the latter document, see Reactions to the Farewell Address, 30 Sept. 1796–27 Jan. 1797.

On 20 Dec. 1796, the Pennsylvania Senate had passed a resolution to appoint a committee “to prepare … an address to the President of the United States, expressive of our sentiments with regard to his past conduct, and the sensations of regret with which we contemplate his intended retirement from office.” The Senate committee drafted the address to GW by 30 December. After undergoing revision, the address was approved on 10 Jan. 1797. On 12 Jan., the Senate “proceeded to the residence of the President,” where Hare delivered the address to GW, who transmitted his reply later that day (Pa. Senate Journal, 6 Dec. 1796–29 Aug. 1797 description begins Journal of the Senate of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. Commencing on Tuesday, the Sixth Day of December, in the Year of Our Lord One Thousand Seven Hundred and Ninety-Six, and of the Independence of the United States of America the Twenty-First. Philadelphia, 179[7]. description ends , 40, 43–44, 55, 59, 61, 65–69).

The enclosed undated draft of GW’s reply to the Pennsylvania Senate, in Pickering’s writing, reads: “I receive with great pleasure the expressions of your approbation of my public services. The general marks of satisfaction, and the various testimonies of select and discerning bodies of men among my fellow-citizens, respecting my public conduct, while they have stimulated my exertions to be useful to my country, the sole object of all my aims & wishes, have also enforced the justness of your remark, That the most effectual method of securing the confidence and accomplishing the welfare of an enlightened nation, is to pursue, with undeviating firmness, a policy founded in pure integrity. And I shall be pardoned when I add, that conscious integrity has been my unceasing support; and while it gave me confidence in the measures I pursued, the belief of it, by acquiring to me the confidence of my fellow-citizens, ensured the success which they have had. This consciousness will accompany me in my retirement: without it, public applauses could be viewed only as proofs of public error, and felt as the upbraidings of personal demerit. In this retirement, to behold the national felicity; will be largely to partake in it and if with this felicity I enjoy health, which you kindly wish me, my hopes in this world will be consummated” (Df, DLC:GW; LB, DLC:GW). The reply was read before the state senate on this date (see Pa. Senate Journal, 6 Dec. 1796–29 Aug. 1797 description begins Journal of the Senate of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. Commencing on Tuesday, the Sixth Day of December, in the Year of Our Lord One Thousand Seven Hundred and Ninety-Six, and of the Independence of the United States of America the Twenty-First. Philadelphia, 179[7]. description ends , 69).

3. Pickering had been drafting a lengthy letter to Charles Cotesworth Pinckney, U.S. minister to France, which aimed to refute the claims made by then-French minister Pierre-Auguste Adet in his letters to Pickering of 27 Oct. and 15 Nov. 1796. The final version of Pickering’s statement to Pinckney was submitted to Congress on 19 Jan. (see GW to Alexander Hamilton, 2 Nov. 1796, and n.2 to that document; GW to Hamilton, 3 Nov., and n.1 to that document; Hamilton to GW, 19 Nov., and n.5 to that document; GW to Hamilton, 21 Nov., and n.9; and GW to the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives, 19 Jan. 1797, and n.4 to that document).

4. In his letter of 15 Nov. 1796, Adet had advised Pickering of the suspension of his duties as French minister to the United States (see Hamilton to GW, 19 Nov. 1796, n.6).

5. Pickering may have considered preparing a draft of GW’s 19 Jan. letter to Congress, which transmitted Pickering’s memorial to Pinckney, though no draft of that document has been found.

6. Attorney General Charles Lee’s suggested revisions to Pickering’s letter to Pinckney have not been identified. No opinions on the matter from Treasury Secretary Oliver Wolcott, Jr., or Secretary of War James McHenry have been identified. For GW’s recommendations for the content of Pickering’s rebuttal, see GW to Pickering, 9 January. Alexander Hamilton and others also had suggested content for the lengthy letter to Pinckney (see Hamilton to GW, 19 Nov. 1796, n.5).

“Mr Taylor” refers to George Taylor, Jr., the chief clerk at the State Department.