From Benjamin Franklin to Charles-Guillaume-Frédéric Dumas, 4 May 1781
To Charles-Guillaume-Frédéric Dumas
Copy: Library of Congress; transcript: National Archives
Passy, May 4. 1781.
Dear Sir,
It is so long since I heard from you,1 that I begin to fear you are ill. Pray write to me, and let me know the State of your Health.
I inclose Morgan’s Acct. of his Engagement with Tarleton. If he has not already received it, it may be agreable to our Friend the Gazetteer of Leiden.2
Everything goes well here, and I am ever, Your Affectionate Friend & humble Servant
(signed) B. Franklin
Mr. Dumas.
1. Dumas had last written on March 29: XXXIV, 498.
2. For the last several years Dumas had been providing American news to Jean Luzac, publisher of the Gaz. de Leyde: XXIII, 461. The May 8 issue of that journal (sup.) carried a French translation of Gen. Daniel Morgan’s Jan. 19 letter to the president of Congress reporting his victory at Cowpens two days earlier. The translation is an abridgement; for the full letter see James Graham, The Life of General Daniel Morgan … (New York, 1859), pp. 467–70. BF had received the letter from John Jay: BF to Jay, May 5, below.