1. Louis Ernst, Duke of Brunswick-Wolfenbüttel, was commander-in-chief of the Dutch army, while his brother, Ferdinand, was a former Prussian field marshall, the victorious commander at the Battle of Minden in 1758. The Duke’s family probably believed that he remained attached to Austria, as opposed to Prussia, because of prior service as an Austrian field marshall. Their displeasure with the Duke is understandable in view of Ferdinand’s allegiance to Prussia and the fact that one of the Duke’s sisters was the wife of Frederick the Great and another the wife of Frederick’s brother Charles (Alice Clare Carter, The Dutch Republic in Europe in the Seven Years War, London, 1971, p. 27–28; Hoefer, Nouv. biog. générale description begins J. C. F. Hoefer, ed., Nouvelle biographie générale depuis les temps les plus reculés jusqu’ à nos jours, Paris, 1852–1866; 46 vols. description ends ).

This and the following paragraph were paraphrased and included in JA’s second letter of 3 April to the president of Congress (No. 33, calendared, below).

2. John De Witt, grand pensionary from 1654 to 1672, had been assassinated when he lost popular support in the face of a humiliating defeat by the armies of Britain and France (Rowen, Princes of Orange description begins Herbert H. Rowen, The Princes of Orange: The Stadholders in the Dutch Republic, Cambridge, Eng., 1988. description ends , p. 126–130).

3. Adm. Lodewijk van Bylandt was acquitted on 7 April (Edler, Dutch Republic and the American Revolution description begins Friedrich Edler, The Dutch Republic and the American Revolution, Baltimore, 1911. description ends , p. 132, note 3).

4. At this point in the Letterbook the following passage was canceled: “I agree with you in Opinion that the Americans on this side the Ocean, Feel and Reason differently from Our Countrymen on the other side; for the first, viz their difference of feeling is natural and therefore easily accounted for, but their Reasoning or thinking differently is a misfortune to be lamented, as it has already been the cause of great Mischiefs to our Country and may possibly occasion many more. I suppose it is no secret in America. I am sure it ought not to be one to Congress, that our Enemies had determined to treat with us, allowing Independence for the basis, which determination were prevented from being carried into effect; by the speedy advise they got of the Dessensions rising in, and against Congress in the latter end of 1778.”

5. In the winter of 1709–1710, negotiations to end the War of the Spanish Succession were held at Geertruidenberg in the Netherlands. The talks were finally broken off in the summer of 1710, partly because the Dutch representatives insisted on terms unacceptable to France. In 1713, faced with the withdrawal of its British ally, without whom it would be unable to continue the war, the Netherlands was forced to accede to the treaties of Utrecht, containing terms far less favorable than those that could have been obtained at Geertruidenberg in 1710 (George Edmundson, History of Holland, Cambridge, England, 1922, p. 293–297).

6. In January, William Fullarton, a Scotsman and member of Parliament, submitted a plan to the cabinet for a privateering expedition (mentioned by Lee in the final paragraph of this letter and further described in his letter of 9 April, below) against the Spanish colonies on the western coast of South Amer­ica by way of the Cape of Good Hope and India. When he and a friend, Thomas Mackenzie Humberston, received commissions as lieutenant colonels to raise regiments for the expedition, Fullarton was immediately attacked by Lord Shelburne in the House of Lords as unqualified to hold such a command. This resulted in a duel on 22 March in which Shelburne was wounded. The expedition was finally approved in August, but as an undertaking by the government, rather than a private enterprise. The outbreak of war with the Netherlands, however, caused the force to be diverted for service, first at the Cape of Good Hope and then in India (Namier and Brooke, House of Commons description begins Lewis Namier and John Brooke, eds., House of Commons, 1754–1790, London, 1964; 3 vols. description ends , 2:475; Mackesy, War for America description begins Piers Mackesy, The War for America, 1775–1783, Cambridge, 1965. description ends , p. 373, 380).

At this point in the Letterbook the following passage was canceled: “I apprehend with you, the chief dependence is on Sir Edward Newenham relative to Irish affairs for which reason it may be proper to inform you that his understanding is not rated very high by his Party, who adopt their plans before he is in the Secret. I presume you regularly receive the English Gazettes therefore it will be unnecessary to mention what I may chance to see in them, and in my retirement, I can’t often expect to get frequent particular intelligence, but when anything material comes to my knowledge, you may be assured of my communicating it to you immediately: however I should suppose, that a few hundred pounds sterling per annum properly laid out, might command all the intelligence you would wish to have.”

Lee’s reference is to Sir Edward Newenham, a member of the Irish Parliament who favored parliamentary reform (DNB description begins Leslie Stephen and Sidney Lee, eds., The Dictionary of National Biography, New York and London, 1885–1900; 63 vols. plus supplements. description ends ). Newenham may have been mentioned by another of Lee’s correspondents and when Lee realized his mistake he canceled the passage.

7. Lee was speaking of William Fullarton’s plan (see note 6), but that proposal had been preceded by another put forth by Sir John Dalrymple, baron of the Scottish Exchequer. It too proposed to attack the Spanish colonies from the west, across the Pacific, but was abandoned when the government took over Fullarton’s plan as its own (Mackesy, War for America description begins Piers Mackesy, The War for America, 1775–1783, Cambridge, 1965. description ends , p. 373). JA made a verbatim transcription of this paragraph and enclosed it in his letter to Gabriel de Sartine of 4 April (Arch. de la Marine, Paris, Campagnes B4, vol. 182). For Sartine’s replies, see Thomas Digges’ letter of 28 March, note 3 (above).