To Benjamin Franklin from Mordejay Delamar, 3 January 1785
From Mordejay Delamar3
LS: National Archives; press copy of copy: American Philosophical Society
Mogador 3 Jany. 1785
Sir
Notwithstanding the grief I withold when misfortunes befalls my fellow Creatures and the Supreme Being is pleased to punish us with Prudence we must Resign to his pleasure. Also I must Acqt. you by ordr. of His Imperial Majesty of Morocco that the Brig Betsey from Philadelphia bound to Tereneffe taken on the Barbary Coast by one of his Privateers & Suspended with her Cargo. Yesterday I Receivd Letters from the Emperor whom as Addressd to my Care as his Chief Employer Captn. James Hervey4 Comandr. of sd. Brig & all the Crew with whom all Humanity & Civility is & shall be used to them till an Embassador of the United States of America does Appear. Then in Course the Brig Cargo & the whole will be Honourably Discharged. Persuadg. yourself Sr. The Gentlemn. Appointd. as such will be Shewn all honour by the Emperor and Afterwards by whom Subscribes himself to be with all Regard Your Excelencies Most Hble. & Obt. Servt.
Mordejay Delamar
To: His Excelency Dr. Franklin Ministr. Plenimenty of the United States of America
Notation: M. Delamar to B. Franklin 3d. January 1785.
3. One of the elite Jewish merchants of Mogador (Essaouira), a port established by the sultan in 1764 for European trade. Much of Delamar’s business was conducted through his brother, who lived in Amsterdam. Delamar assisted the court in diplomatic affairs and often served as a go-between in the ransoming of European captives: Daniel J. Schroeter, The Sultan’s Jew: Morocco and the Sephardi World (Stanford, 2002), pp. 17, 19–24, 170. On the same day that he wrote the present letter, Delamar wrote a similar one to Richard Harrison, the American agent at Cadiz: Giunta, Emerging Nation, II, 523–4.
4. A slip of the pen. In his letter to Harrison, mentioned in the previous note, Delamar correctly identified the captain as James Erwin.