Papers of John Adams, volume 13
1782-06-05
Just a Line, by our venerable Friend, President Laurens, with whom your Communions will be sweet.2 Pray let me know if Mr Jay is coming to Paris, or come. The last Victory of Rodney, to whom Heaven grants them to shew that it dispizes them, has restored the national Delirium, in all its Effervescence. We shall have no Peace I suppose, in Consequence. War then! War? Yet I sigh for Peace as much, as a Dutchman.
Yours &
JA was at The Hague on 5 June, making it likely that he gave this letter to Henry Laurens when Laurens paid him a “very short Visit” when he passed through The Hague on his journey from Amsterdam to Le Vigan in southern France (to Benjamin Franklin, 13 June, below).
Opposite this sentence in the left margin is the following notation by Jenings: “NB. Very the most bitter I recal Hy L Candour Ed J. 1783.” Jenings refers to his dispute with Henry Laurens over several anonymous letters that sought to sow dissension among the peace commissions and that Laurens believed Jenings had written. For the letters and the dispute, see the letter from Monitor, 20 May, and note 1, above. Laurens later recalled that he immediately suspected Jenings, but when Laurens visited him, they apparently got along well because Laurens wrote to Edward Bridgen on 11 June that “I have received much Satisfaction from a short acquaintance of three days, and promise myself much more hereafter by Correspondence—Our Ideas on American Affairs are in Unison” (Laurens, Papers
, 15:528–529). But see also Laurens' 25 Aug. letter to JA, below.