Papers of John Adams, volume 16
of a Conversation with the Comte de Vergennes
r.15. 17841
The American Ministers plenipotentiary exhibited officially to the Count de Vergennes Minister and Secretary of State having the Department of foreign Affairs, the Commission of the United States in Congress assembled authorizing them to negotiate & conclude a supplementary Treaty between the United States and His Most Christian Majesty—a Copy whereof was left with the Count, who informed them, in substance as follows, “that he should always be ready to enter on negotiations, & receive propositions which might be of mutual advantage and tend to cement the Union & encrease the harmony which prevailed between the two nations.”—
MS in David Humphreys’ hand (PCC, No. 116, f. 32–33).
The commissioners referred to the meeting with Vergennes in their 11 Nov. letter to the president of Congress, below. But the meeting was likely between JA, Thomas Jefferson, 325 and Vergennes because, as JA noted in a 9 Sept. letter to Elbridge Gerry, above, Benjamin Franklin was afflicted with the “Stone” and “never goes to Versailles or to Paris, as he can not ride in a Carriage.”