To Thomas Jefferson from Arthur O’Connor, 10 April 1804
From Arthur O’Connor
Au Quartier-Général de Brest
le 20 Germinal an 12 de la Republique [i.e. 10 Apr. 1804]
Sir
If I had the talent to write any thing worthy the attention of the great & good, to whom should I so readily address it, as to the Man who fills the Office of first Magistrate of the freest Nation upon earth, with the talents & integrity that have assurd him the admiration & esteem of every true Republican
Imperfect as are the few pages I have written upon the present state of Great Britain, I cannot refuse myself the pleasure of offering them for your perusal, in the hope that you may find some principles congenial to those you practice with so much benifit to America & so much consolation to the Republicans in the rest of the world
Permit me, with that Veneration & affection which your principles, talents & Virtues inspire every lover of liberty, to assure you how sincerely I wish you long life & happiness
A OConnor
RC (MoSHi); English date supplied; on printed letterhead of the armies of France, with blanks for place and date filled by O’Connor; at head of text: “Le Général de Division Ô Connor To Thomas Jefferson President of the United States of America”; endorsed by TJ as received 14 Aug. and so recorded in SJL. Enclosures: (1) Arthur O’Connor, The Present State of Great-Britain (Paris, 1804; No. 2868, inscribed by O’Connor to TJ). (2) O’Connor, État actuel de la Grande-Bretagne (Paris, 1804; No. 2851, inscribed by O’Connor to TJ).
Arthur O’Connor (1763-1852), a political writer and member of the Society of United Irishmen, was the former editor of the Dublin newspaper The Press, a primary organ of the Irish nationalist movement. Arrested for treason in 1798, he was acquitted of the charge but remained incarcerated until 1802, when he was exiled. He settled in France, where in 1804 Napoleon Bonaparte gave him the rank of général de division, charged with raising an Irish brigade. He was not attached to a command after September 1805. O’Connor later married the daughter of the marquis de Condorcet and became a French citizen in 1818 (; James McGuire and James Quinn, eds., Dictionary of Irish Biography: From the Earliest Times to the Year 2002, 9 vols. [Cambridge, 2009], 7:226-9; Georges Six, Dictionnaire biographique des généraux & amiraux français de la Révolution et de l’Empire [1792-1814], 2 vols. [Paris, 1934], 2:263; Vol. 31:165n).