To George Washington from Henry Lee, c.24 January 1797
From Henry Lee
tuesday morg [Philadelphia, c.24 Jan. 1797]1
General Lee returns herewith the paper which the President was pleased to give to him last evening—He has derived great pleasure from its perusal as it presents a complete refutation of all the charges exhibited agst govt by mr adet & breathes throughout a spirit of moderation & friendship which ought to produce the happiest effects.2
AL, DLC:GW.
At this time, Lee represented Westmoreland County in the Virginia legislature, whose session ended on 27 Dec. 1796. He remained in that office until his election to Congress in 1799 (see Cynthia Miller Leonard, comp., The General Assembly of Virginia … [Richmond, 1978], 203, 205, 209, 213).
1. GW docketed this letter as “Monday 23d Jany 1797.” However, the letter’s date of “tuesday morg” suggests that Lee may have written it on 24 Jan., which fell on a Tuesday.
2. Lee returned to GW the lengthy 16 Jan. 1797 memorial written by Secretary of State Timothy Pickering to Charles Cotesworth Pinckney, U.S. minister to France. GW had recently submitted the memorial and other related papers to Congress. The memorial and accompanying papers rebutted the charges made in former French minister Pierre-Auguste Adet’s 15 Nov. 1796 letter to Pickering, which censured U.S. foreign policy toward France (see GW to the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives, 19 Jan., and notes 3 and 4).