To Benjamin Franklin from Francesco Chiappe: Two Letters, 3 November 1784
From Francesco Chiappe:9 Two Letters
(I) and (II): Translations from the Italian:1 National Archives; copies: National Archives (three);2 Archives du Ministère des affaires étrangères3
I.
Marocco 3d Nov. 1784
Excellency
After having executed his Imperial Majesty’s4 commands agreeable to the enclos’d, I take the Liberty to inform your Excellency that lately a Ship of his I. M. Rais Hamet Turchi—having taken an American Vessel with a Cargo of Salt Petre and Clothing, has brought her to Lanacce, Where the Imperial Order was immediately sent to unload the said Vessel and deposit the Effects in the Royal Magazines, And the Captain and two Mariners were ordered to come to the Court, where they are soon expected;5 Your Excel. will instantly know the Intentions of the King of Marocco, Whose conduct only tends to a reciprocal Correspondence and solid Peace with the thirteen united States of America, according to what he has for a Long Time made evident.6 If in the Character I hold at this Court, I can be of any Service to a Nation so distant as the aforesaid Illustrious thirteen united States of America, I take the Freedom to make a tender of my Services for the better success, to your Excy. Whose precise orders will be always to me for a Rule assured, & unalterable in my Conduct.
After this most sincere offer on my part, I flatter myself that your Excelly. will be pleased to accept it on account of my Zeal & my activity in the nation’s affairs of which I shall give proofs in future, and in the mean time I shall not fail to give assistance to the aforesaid Captain and the two Mariners, Whose name hitherto has not come to my knowledge nor yet the number of the Ships Company— When your Excelly. favors me with an Answer, you will please to put my Letter under Cover with an Address to Moagador or to Darelbeida,7 To Messrs. Joseph & Francisco Chiappe, the which name is that of our Company in that House of Commerce in those two Harbours or Ports, advising you that in Cadiz there are not wanting Vessels for the one or the other Harbour. This is all that I have at present to inform your Excellency, and awaiting your Respectable Orders I take the Honor to declare my Self your Excellency’s most Humble Devoted & Obedt. Sert.
Franco Chiappe
Translated by Isaac Pinto nov. 16.88
II.
Marocco 3 Nov. 1784
Excellency
His Majesty the Emperour of Marocco (whom God preserve) commands me to write to your Excellency that he is in good Friendship and Peace with all the Christian Nations, But as the Americans in conformity to the Advices which they have transmitted him, have never sent any Person, and not even a Consul representative to sign the Treaties according to the Precedent of all the other Powers, His Imperial Majesty has caused the American Vessel lately taken by one of his Ships to be detained at Laracce, until some Person be sent on the part of the thirteen united States of America; And after that a Peace shall be concluded with them, the aforesaid Vessell shall be delivered up, with whatever it contains, and with the most profound respect I subscribe myself Your Excellency’s most Humble, devoted and obliged servant
Francesco Chiappe
Secretary of his I.M.
for Foreign Affairs in Barbery.
To his Excellency Benjamin Franklin Embassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of the United States of America at Paris.
9. Chiappe, a Genoan, came to Morocco with his brother Giuseppe (mentioned in the first letter) in early 1771 to open a commercial house in Mogador on behalf of a Genoese merchant. In 1781, the emperor named him director of commerce at Mogador and made him his secretary for correspondence with the nations of Europe. In October, 1784, the emperor appointed him to be his intermediary in all diplomatic relations with Christian nations: Mariano Arribas Palau, “La Actividad comercial del marqués Viale en Marruecos,” Revista de archivos, bibliotecas y museos, LXXIX (1976), 6–9; Enrico de Leone, “Mohammed ben ‘Abdallâh e le Repubbliche Marinare,” Il Veltro: rivista della civiltà italiana, VII (1963), 689–90.
1. Slightly adapted from the English translations made for Congress by Isaac Pinto in 1788. We have occasionally expanded abbreviations, corrected spellings, and altered awkward wordings.
2. The originals of these letters evidently miscarried. The commissioners learned of the incident that Chiappe here relates—the capture of an American ship by a Moroccan frigate—from “the public papers” in mid-December: American Commissioners to the President of Congress, Dec. 15, below. Chiappe sent two sets of duplicates to BF on Jan. 10, one to keep and one to forward to Congress, using William Carmichael as an intermediary. Carmichael forwarded them to BF on Feb. 27. The American commissioners had another set of copies made (the scribe is unknown) and sent them to John Jay on April 13 (National Archives).
3. In the hand of David Humphreys. JA gave these copies to Vergennes on March 20, 1785, when he consulted the minister on American relations with Morocco: Jefferson Papers, VIII, 46–8. French translations are at the Archives de la Marine, Paris.
4. Sidi Muhammad ibn Abdallah: XL, 310n.
5. On Oct. 11, the brig Betsey of Alexandria, Va., Capt. James Erwin, was captured en route from Cadiz to Teneriffe. The vessel, Capt. Erwin, and part of the crew were taken to Tangier, while the rest of the crew were carried to Larache on board the Moroccan frigate: Depositions of Richard and Samuel Harrison, Oct. 4, 1785 (National Archives); Jefferson Papers, VII, 549. In a letter similar to the present one, Chiappe notified all the foreign consuls based in Tangier: Roberts and Roberts, Thomas Barclay, p. 201.
6. The emperor explicitly opened his ports to American ships in 1777, and since 1779 he had made repeated overtures to Congress and its representatives to enter into negotiations for a treaty of amity and commerce: XL, 310–12; Jerome B. Weiner, “Foundations of U.S. Relations with Morocco and Barbary States,” Hespéris-Tamuda, XXXXI (1982–83), 163–7.
7. I.e., Casablanca.