Papers of John Adams, volume 16
van Staphorst, and De la Lande & Fynje
4]
We have the pleasure to advice your Excellency that the Loan is So far advanced, that all the drafts will be payed, and we hope in course of time to compleat the whole sum of 2 millions.
Mrs. de Neufville & Son have applyed to us for the payment of coupons of the loan opened at their House formerly consisting in
| 7 | coupons of | Septr. 1782 at ƒ25 |
ƒ175 — |
| 7 | dito | March 1783 | 175 — |
| ƒ350: — | |||
| postage of letters | 4:10 | ||
| ƒ354:10 — |
they had payed in that time, we take the liberty to desire your Excellency to inform us, if we have to pay the same to be charged to the acct of the United States of America.1
We have the honour to remain with great esteem / Sir / Your Excellency’s most / Humb & Obedt: Servants
Nich
s.& Jacob van Staphorst
de la Lande & fynje
RC (Adams Papers); internal address: “To his Excellency John Adams / Esqr. Hague.” Some loss of text due to a torn manuscript.
In 1781 JA sought to raise a loan for 1 million florins through the Amsterdam banking firm of Jean de Neufville & Fils. He later remembered it as an “unfortunate Enterprize,” but it was actually an abject failure. Only seven out of the thousand obligations were ever taken up by investors, and three of those were held by Jean Luzac, editor of the Gazette de Leyde (vol. 11:101–102, 159–160, 195; 13:93; 14:291).