Benjamin Franklin Papers

Joshua Johnson to the American Commissioners, 2 October 1777

Joshua Johnson7 to the American Commissioners

ALS: American Philosophical Society

Paris 2d October 1777.

Gentlemen

I propose to fit out two or three Vessells on my return to England and send to Lisbon, to Load with Salt which I purpose to send from thence to some one of the United Colonies in America. I therefore humbly solicit your Pasports to protect the said Vessells from being Captured by the American Cruizers and to enable me with more security to throw in supplies to my distrest Country; Your concurrence with this request will oblige Sirs Your most Obedient Humble Servant

Joshua Johnson

To the Honourable the Commissioners of the United States of America.

Notation: Jos. Johnson Paris 2. Oct. 77

[Note numbering follows the Franklin Papers source.]

7See above, XXIV, 209 n. He wrote this letter while he was on an exploratory trip to France. A month later he was back in London, asking his brother Thomas, Governor of Maryland and a member of the committee of secret correspondence, for appointment as Thomas Morris’ replacement or as the agent for Maryland: Stevens, Facsimiles, III, no. 295, p. 3. He did secure the latter post the following spring, and settled in Nantes. See below, Thomas Johnson to BF, April 3, 1778; Kathryn Sullivan, Maryland and France 1774–1789 (Philadelphia, 1936), p. 53. Nothing, as far as we know, came of the scheme he outlines here.

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