To Benjamin Franklin from ——— Berthérand de Fleury, 2 December 1777
From ——— Berthérand de Fleury3
ALS: American Philosophical Society
de Paris ce 2. xbre. 1777.
L’inquiéttude ou je suis, Monsieur, du sort d’un de mes Parens, actuellement au service des Américains, me force à vous demander un moment d’audiance j’espere que vous ne me refuserez pas; votre jour, votre heure, soyez seur de mon exactitude a m’y rendre. J’ay l’honneur d’etre avec les sentimens qui vous sont dus Monsieur Votre trés humble obeissante servante
Berthérand De Fleury
A l’hotel de la force Ruë des Balets4
3. We know little about her. She wrote BF twice again, on the 10th and the 23rd: APS. The first acknowledged a note from him, now lost, that gave her news of François-Louis Teissèdre or Tesseidre de Fleury, who had accompanied Du Coudray and distinguished himself in the Philadelphia campaign (Bodinier, Dictionnaire under Teissèdre; Lasseray, Les Français, II, 425–33). BF apparently took him to be her husband, which he was not; she was anxious about some one else. In her third note she explained that this was her relative and friend, Du Coudray; were the rumors true that were circulating about him?
4. A puzzling address, for the great hôtel housed bureaux of the farmers general; it was later converted into a prison famous during the Revolution. Hillairet, Rues de Paris, II, 358.