1To Thomas Jefferson from Richard Henry Lee, 3 May 1779 (Jefferson Papers)
Always attentive to your commands, I have obtained here, and now inclose you the song and the receipt you desired. I once had both of them at home, but they are mislaid among a mass of papers, so that I could find neither previous to my leaving Chantilly, or your request would then have been complied with. I hope you have received the pamphlet I sent you some weeks ago entitled “Observations...
2To Thomas Jefferson from Richard Henry Lee, 1 December 1779 (Jefferson Papers)
Falmouth [ Stafford co., Va. ] 1 Dec. 1779 . Quotes a letter just received from a member of Congress in Philadelphia stating that “a capital embarkation” from New York is afoot and will undoubtedly proceed to the south, perhaps to Virginia. This is precisely what Lee has long apprehended. RC ( DLC ); 2 p.; printed in R. H. Lee, Letters , ii , 167–8.
3To Thomas Jefferson from Richard Henry Lee, 16 June 1778 (Jefferson Papers)
I thank you for your favor of the 5th which I received yesterday. It is the only satisfactory account I have received of the proceedings of our Assembly. The enemy have made many insidious attempts upon us lately, not in the military way, they seem tired of that, but in the way of negotiation. Their first, was by industriously circulating the bills of pacification as they call them, before...
4To Thomas Jefferson from Richard Henry Lee, 16 May 1785 (Jefferson Papers)
I thank you for your obliging congratulation on my appointment to the Chair of Congress, and I do with particular pleasure return my congratulation on your sole appointment as Minister of the United States to so eminently respectable a Court as that of his most Christian Majesty. My ill state of health, added to the business and the ceremonies of my Office, has hitherto prevented me from...
5To Thomas Jefferson from Richard Henry Lee, 3 November 1776 (Jefferson Papers)
As I have received no answer to the letter I wrote you by the Express from Congress I conclude it has miscarried. I heared with much regret that you had declined both the voyage, and your seat in Congress. No Man feels more deeply than I do, the love of, and the loss of, private enjoyments; but let attention to these be universal, and we are gone, beyond redemption lost in the deep perdition...
6To Thomas Jefferson from Richard Henry Lee, 22 May 1779 (Jefferson Papers)
I have paid due attention to your favor of April the 21st., and I believe there would have been no difficulty in obtaining what is desired for Baron de Geismar had not the enemy created the difficulties that do exist. They absolutely refuse to admit partial exchanges, and they have lately proposed such unfair terms for general exchange that nothing can be done in either of these ways. They...
7To Thomas Jefferson from Richard Henry Lee, 6 September 1779 (Jefferson Papers)
The Chevalier D’Anmour who will have the honor of delivering you this letter, having been lately appointed Consul of France for this State, as he before was for Maryland, comes now to pay his respects to you. I have had the pleasure of being acquainted with this gentleman since early in the year 1777 and I have found in him the same unshaken attachment to our cause in times of its great...
8To Thomas Jefferson from Richard Henry Lee, 5 October 1778 (Jefferson Papers)
A few days past, since the last post left us, Mr. Harvey presented me your favor of August the 30th, to which this is an answer; and which I shall direct to Williamsburg upon a supposition that the Assembly has called you there by the time the letter can reach that place. The hand bill you have seen was certainly written by Mauduit, and circulated under the auspices of administration. It was...
9To Thomas Jefferson from Richard Henry Lee, 9 April 1781 (Jefferson Papers)
Mr. Whitlock found me with the Militia on the Shore of Potomac where we had a very warm engagement with a party of the enemy, about 90 men, who landed from two Brigs, a Schooner, and a smaller Vessel under a very heavy cannonade from the Vessels of War. The affair ended by the enemy being forced to reembark with some haste. The loss on our part not any, but there is some reason to suppose that...
10To Thomas Jefferson from Richard Henry Lee, 20 September 1779 (Jefferson Papers)
I have the honor of inclosing you a letter that Mr. Mazzie formerly sent to me, and which having been mislaid among a number of papers, prevented me from returning to him so soon as he desired. It is at his request that I send it to you. I find by a letter that I received from Philadelphia by the last post, that some person has been representing a part of my letter to you by Mr. Ford in a...
11To Thomas Jefferson from Richard Henry Lee, 29 April 1777 (Jefferson Papers)
If I were to consider punctilio more than the suggestions of friendship, I should expect an answer to some of the letters I have written you, before I dispatched another. But I ever hated ceremonies, and shall not commence ceremony with you. I wish it were in my power to give you any very interesting news, but alas, the slow assembling of an Army prevents any attempt from us upon the enemy,...
12To Thomas Jefferson from Richard Henry Lee, 2 May 1778 (Jefferson Papers)
We are this moment made acquainted by the War Office that an Express was immediately to depart for Virginia, and I take the opportunity of enclosing by him the last papers, which contain all our news, except it be a report that seems not illy founded, that Genl. Amhers[t] and Adml. Keppel are arrived at Philadelphia as commissioners from the King and Parliament of G. B. to carry into execution...
13To Thomas Jefferson from Richard Henry Lee, 8 July 1779 (Jefferson Papers)
Chantilly, 8 July 1779 . Acknowledges TJ’s letter of 17 June. “Every good Whig will wish success to a governor whose principles of action are not the incentives of whim, or the suggestions of partiality; but who is influenced by motives of sound whiggism, which I take to be those of genuine philanthropy‥‥ In Virginia we have properly two frontiers, one bordered by a wilderness, the other by a...
14To Thomas Jefferson from Richard Henry Lee, 23 September 1779 (Jefferson Papers)
Chantilly, 23 Sep. 1779 . This letter to be delivered by Messrs. Loyauté and Le Maire. The latter is in unfortunate circumstances. All his private effects are detained on board the ship on which he arrived until the state ratifies the bargain with the house he represents for stores he brought over. His accounts should be quickly settled. Virginia is now well supplied with artillery but lacks...
15To Thomas Jefferson from Richard Henry Lee, 15 March 1779 (Jefferson Papers)
I have not been unmindful of the small commission you gave me to procure the song and receipt for you. I once had these, but they are mislaid so that I could not find them when I returned home, from Williamsburg, or they should have been sent from thence. I have here applied to Mr. Peters for the one, and to Mrs. Shippen for the other and I have hopes of getting them both. I send you herewith...
16To Thomas Jefferson from Richard Henry Lee, 12 August 1779 (Jefferson Papers)
Menokin, 12 Aug. 1779 . Arrival from France at Lee’s house of Hezekiah Ford, late secretary to Arthur Lee. The writer has advised Ford not to go on to Congress but to ask a hearing on charges against him before the Virginia Council. Developments in the dispute between Arthur Lee and Silas Deane. If Congress does not publish Arthur Lee’s vindication, then the writer will. Franklin’s hypocrisy....
17To Thomas Jefferson from Richard Henry Lee, 11 May 1778 (Jefferson Papers)
We have once more ventured into the field of composition as the inclosed Address will shew you. And I have the pleasure to acquaint you that Congress have unanimously ratified the Treaties with France, and directed the ratifications to be presented for exchange in due season. The inclosed pamphlet I t[ake to] be a production of Dr. Franklin. It is well written, and was published first in...
18To Thomas Jefferson from Richard Henry Lee, 20 May 1777 (Jefferson Papers)
We are this moment informed here, that some evil disposed people (no doubt hired for the purpose) have industriously propagated among the N. Carolina Troops, and among the recruits of Virginia in the upper parts, that the plague rages in our Army . In consequence of which, it is said, the recruiting business stops, and desertions are frequent. There never was a more infamous and groundless...
19To Thomas Jefferson from Richard Henry Lee, 7 February 1780 (Jefferson Papers)
Chantilly, 7 Feb. 1780 . Acknowledges letter and enclosures of 2 Jan. Intends to go into next Assembly and will early procure lodgings in Richmond. Hopes the southern news is true. A letter from Arthur Lee of 28 Sep. brings news of naval fighting in European waters. Arthur Lee may not be able to leave Europe because he stands pledged for 300,000 livres which he has no means of paying. RC ( DLC...
20To Thomas Jefferson from Richard Henry Lee, 13 April 1781 (Jefferson Papers)
Since I had the honor of writing to you by the Express that brot the acts of assembly , one ship and a brig additional to the enemies force on the day of our rencontre with them, have joined and all proceeded together up to Alexandria. We have heared of their passing by the mouth of Occaquon. Being thus reinforced, it is not improbable, that in resentment for what happened here on the 9th....
21To Thomas Jefferson from Richard Henry Lee, 27 September 1776 (Jefferson Papers)
I should have written to you before now if I had not been uncertain about finding you at home, as the distance was great, and the meeting of our Assembly approaching. All the material events that have happened since you left us are to be found related pretty faithfully in the public papers, which I suppose are regularly conveyed to you. The plan of foreign treaty is just finished, and...
22To Thomas Jefferson from Richard Henry Lee, 23 June 1778 (Jefferson Papers)
The inclosed Gazette will shew you the progress, and perhaps the end for some time, of our negotiation with the British Commissioners. They, with their whole Army have abandoned Philadelphia, and our Troops are in possession of that City. The enemy are pushing thro Jersey for South Amboy, and in their front is Gen. Maxwell with a brigade of Continentals and the Jersey Militia. They have...
23To Thomas Jefferson from Richard Henry Lee, 13 October 1779 (Jefferson Papers)
I am very much obliged to you for your favor of the 28 of September and for the trouble you took in writing a copy of the letter I wrote to you by Mr. Ford . I was well apprized that nothing in it which is mine could be made an ill use of, but to remedy this, something not mine, and not in the letter, is substituted for the purpose of misrepresentation. As thus—that “R. H. Lee had written to...
24To Thomas Jefferson from Richard Henry Lee, 10 May 1781 (Jefferson Papers)
A letter from Gen. Weedon of the 10th. instant giving us reason to expect the enemies army presently in this quarter, has been the subject of consideration in a council of our Militia Officers, and it has called our attention closely to the singularity of our situation, which exposes us an easy prey to such a force as lately visited James river. This has produced the inclosed determination,...
25To Thomas Jefferson from Richard Henry Lee, 20 July 1778 (Jefferson Papers)
The condition of our affairs is much changed since last I had the pleasure of writing to you, as by the favor of his Most Christian Majesty we now are become Masters of the Sea, on our own Coast at least. Ten days ago arrived in the Delaware a french Squadron commanded by Count D’Esteing consisting of 12 sail of the Line and 4 frigates, having of Seamen and land Troops 11,000 Men on board....
26To Thomas Jefferson from Richard Henry Lee, 29 October 1785 (Jefferson Papers)
My ill state of health having compelled me to look for benefit from the medical springs lately discovered in the vicinity of Philadelphia, I there received the letter that you did me the honor to write me on the 12th. of July. But tho Mr. Houdon arrived there with Dr. Franklin when I was in the city, the former of these gentlemen did not deliver your letter to me but it found me thro the...
27To Thomas Jefferson from Richard Henry Lee, 27 March 1781 (Jefferson Papers)
I have had an opportunity of conversing with the worthy Baron at this place, and he communicates to me a plan of joining his force with Gen. Greene, or so to cooperate with him as to render a junction of the British force with Cornwallis difficult if not impossible. The Barons plan appears to me to be one of those Master strokes which are productive of great effects, but which if neglected lay...
28[To Thomas Jefferson from Richard Henry Lee, 9 April 1781] (Jefferson Papers)
[ Chantilly, 9 Apr. 1781 . American Art Association sale catalogue, 11–12 Nov. 1937 (Willets et al. sale), lot 273 (a 1-page A.L.S., with postscript on address leaf): “Mr. Whitlock found me with the Militia on the Shore of Potomac where we had a very warm engagement with a party of the enemy, about 90 men, who landed from two Brigs, a Schooner, and a smaller Vessel under a very heavy cannonade...
29To Thomas Jefferson from Richard Henry Lee, 10 August 1778 (Jefferson Papers)
I agree entirely with you concerning the importance of the confederation, and have never failed to press it. Ten States have ratified—Jersey, Delaware, and Maryland have not, and one of them, Maryland, has adjourned until November, so that the new Congress under the Confederation cannot meet this year at the time proposed by the Confederacy. The inclosed paper contains all the news we have,...
30To Thomas Jefferson from Richard Henry Lee, 3 May 1778 (Jefferson Papers)
Having detained the Express that he might carry you the news that we heard was on its way from France, I am furnished with an opportunity of congratulating you on the important event of a Treaty of Commerce, and one of Alliance and Amity, having been signed at Paris on the 6th of February last, between France and these United States. Having been as particular as we could on this subject in the...
31To Thomas Jefferson from Richard Henry Lee, 25 August 1777 (Jefferson Papers)
It will not perhaps be disagreeable to you in your retirement, sometimes to hear the events of war, and how in other respects we proceed in the arduous business we are engaged in. Since the loss of Ticonderoga (into the cause of which, and the conduct of the commanding Officers, Congress have ordered inquiry to be made) and Gen. Burgoynes speedy march to Fort Edward, our affairs in that...
32To Thomas Jefferson from Richard Henry Lee, 21 July 1776 (Jefferson Papers)
I thank you much for your favor and its inclosures by this post, and I wish sincerely, as well for the honor of Congress, as for that of the States, that the Manuscript had not been mangled as it is. It is wonderful, and passing pitiful, that the rage of change should be so unhappily applied. However the Thing is in its nature so good, that no Cookery can spoil the Dish for the palates of...