Enclosure: Gouverneur Morris to Thomas Jefferson, 17 August 1792
[Enclosure]
Gouverneur Morris to Thomas Jefferson24
Paris 17. August 1792.
Dear Sir,
If I have not hitherto mentioned the Application made to me by the foreign Officers who have certificates whereof the interest is payable in this City, it has not been for want of sufficient cause, but because I did daily hope to have received some news on that subject.25 Many have spoken to me, written to me, and called upon me. I have given to all the general assurances that justice would be done, that I would transmit their claims and the like. I now enclose a letter from the polish Envoy relative to the claims of Brigadier General Koskiusko,26 and I have told the Count d’Oraczewski that I daily expect dispatches from you on this subject. I did this because General du Portail27 told me that he has information from Colonel. Ternant28 that these claims are all honorably provided for. In the uncertainty as to what may have been done, I feel it my Duty to bring the matter to your recollection, persuaded that you will do every thing which may be proper on the occasion.
24. Extract, letterpress copy, Thomas Jefferson Papers, Library of Congress.
25. For H’s instructions to Morris on the payment of foreign officers who had served in the American Revolution, see H to Morris, September 13, 1792.
26. This letter, signed by “L. Anc. D’Oraczewski, Ambassador and Minister Plenipotentiary of Poland,” was dated August 15, 1792, and stated that “General Kosciusko, a native of Poland, who has served in America, to whom you yourself have rendered the justice of saying that he is a man of distinguished talents, has a promise from the treasury of the United States for a sum of £66,314 18s. 9d. which is equal to $12,280 49/90 of the current money in America” (, Foreign Relations, I, 335). Thaddeus Kosciuszko had come to the United States from Poland during the American Revolution and had served as a lieutenant colonel with Pulaski’s Legion.
27. During the American Revolution, Louis Le Bèque Du Portail had commanded a corps of engineers. He had been made a major general in 1781.
28. Jean Baptiste de Ternant, the French Minister to the United States, had served as a lieutenant colonel with Pulaski’s Legion during the American Revolution.