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George Washington's Received Transcripts of a Most Biting Exchange Between Patriot Lord Stirling and Benjamin Franklin’s Loyalist Son and Governor of New Jersey - An Amazing Discovery of a Long Lost Exchange, Apparently Preserved by Jared Sparks
George Washington's Received Transcripts of a Most Biting Exchange Between Patriot Lord Stirling and Benjamin Franklin’s Loyalist Son and Governor of New Jersey - An Amazing Discovery of a Long Lost Exchange, Apparently Preserved by Jared Sparks
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George Washington's Received Transcripts of a Most Biting Exchange Between Patriot Lord Stirling and Benjamin Franklin’s Loyalist Son and Governor of New Jersey - An Amazing Discovery of a Long Lost Exchange, Apparently Preserved by Jared Sparks

 

“I have never been in your Company since the present Occasion occurred, since the Rejection of the most humble Dutiful and respectful Petitions to the Throne has been known in America, Since the Battles of Lexington and Bunkershill; Since the wanton and Cruel Destruction of Charles Town and since the design of the ministry to bring Indiscriminate ruin on the Colonies on this Continent has been publickly avowed.”—Lord Stirling to Governor Franklin.

 

This correspondence, masked in the forms of genteel correspondence but evident in its meaning, details the division into patriot and loyalist between important leaders in colonial New Jersey.

 

[GEORGE WASHINGTON Copies of three letters between New Jersey Governor William Franklin and Lord Stirling, September 1775, forwarded to George Washington in October 1775. With note “J. Sparks 12650-A” at bottom of page 4. 4 pp., 8.25" x 13.5". Expected folds and some tears at folds. Loss at bottom of third page affects a few words on three lines. Tape repairs discolor some text, but text is legible.

 

Excerpts

Lord Stirling to William Franklin, September 14, 1775, Basking Ridge, New Jersey:

“Mr Pettit Informs me that ‘he has it in Command from your Excellency to acquaint me, that it is a matter of Publick Report that I have accepted a Commission from the Provincial Congress of New Jersey appointing me a Colonel of a Regiment of Militia in the County of Somerset and that your Excellency requires an answer from me, whether I have or have not accepted such a Commission.’ I must acknowledge Sir that the stile and manner in which this enquiry is made a good deal surprises me, especially as I have ever been used to experience from your Excellency a Behavior becoming a Gentleman in your Exalted Station; that you could think of Commanding your Clerk to correspond with me, on so delicate a subject or to catechize me in so Peremptory a manner equally astonishes me; However I will Indulge your Excellencys Curiosity. I have lately been Informed that the good people of this Country have unanimously chosen me a Colonel of Militia, that the provincial Congress of this Province have approved of the Choice of the people and have Issued a Commission accordingly which I have received. This mark of the Confidence of the people among whom I reside repose in me, is one of the most Satisfactory and I think honourable Events that I have ever experienced; at a time when their Dearest Rights are Invaded, to call me forth to take so Important a part in their defence, cannot but rouse the most grateful feelings of a man who ever has been a friend to the Liberties of mankind; accepting this Commission and in Serving my Country faithfully I cannot doubt of having your Excellencys highest approbation, especially when I recollect your frequent publick as well as private Declarations that the rights of the people and the Perogatives of the Crown were equally Dear to you and equally your Duty as well as Inclination to preserve.”

 

William Franklin to Lord Sterling, September 15, 1775, Perth Amboy, New Jersey:

“Your Lordships answer to the question proposed to you, I shall lay before the Council this afternoon. Whether or not your conduct in accepting the Commission has my approbation can I think appear but of little consequence to your Lordship, as you intimate that it has met with the approbation of your own Conscience, and as you never thought proper to Consult with me either directly or Indirectly before you took so extraordinary a Step. It is true as you say I have repeatedly declared publickly and privately ‘That the rights of the people and the Perogatives of the Crown were equally dear to me, and equally my duty and Inclination to preserve’ nor can any motive be Sufficient to Induce me to sacrifice one at the Shrine of the other. Your Lordship will not however pretend to say that it is not the sole Perogative of the Crown to grant millitary Commissions in the Province, or that it is not your as well as my duty to prevent any Infringements of that Perogative as far as may be in your power and Signify your Disapprobation of such Infringement whenever it may be necessary. Cases sometimes happen wherein some men may think it their duty so far to fly in the face of Perogative as to accept of Commissions from a power Set up in Opposition to it. But I have not yet met with any person who makes the least pretensions to Honour or Honesty, but what readily allows that a man can not act Consistently with either unless he previously resign any Commission or Trust which he holds by virtue of that Perrogative he had determined to act in Defiance of. This has been the Conduct of not only such men as General Lee, But of many of the Inferior Offices of militia in this and the neighbouring Colonies. It was this Consideration, and an unwillingness to Entertain any Idea the least Derogatory to your Lordships Honour, which Induced me to Suspend my belief of the Report you have now thought proper to authenticate.”

“P.S.... it Seems that ‘the most grateful feelings of a man’ happened to be ‘rouzed’ in your Lordship, and you were of Course Anxious to Convince ‘the Good people of the Country’ that their ‘confidence’ in you was not misplaced, some proofs of this I will allow to be the more necessary, as your Lordships ‘frequent publick as well as private Declarations’ that a man ought to be Damned who would take up arms against his Sovereign on the present Occasion might happen to be recollected. But, my Lord, was there no other means left in your power which might have a chance of effecting your desired purpose, But disrespect Treatment of a Governor? Tho’ the present Crisis might promise Success in such an expedient, was there no danger that your mutilation of Mr Pettits Letter might be Discovered, and Consequently that all good people would consider such conduct as an Instance of Contemptible meanness and Dishonesty, although you Lordship might think it one of the most Satisfactory ‘and Honourable Events of your Life.’”

 

Lord Stirling to William Franklin, September 26, 1775, Basking Ridge, New Jersey:

“I shall not at present say anything further in answer to your Excellencys Letter as it would probably Involve us in a Long Epistolary dispute upon a Subject which is already Sufficiently understood by the generality of mankind. I cannot so easily pass over the postscript....”

“Surprise, astonishment, Mutilation, Contemptible Meanness and Dishonesty are all Jumbled together in a most violent agitation and for what? because as you say, I have committed the Heinous sin of leaving out the words, Farther and in Council in quoting Mr Pettits Letter.”

“Your Excellency next Intimates that I have made Frequent ‘Publick as well as Private Declarations’ that a man ought to be Damned who would take up arms against his Sovereign on the present Occasion. Your Excellency can not assert this of your own knowledge, for I have never been in your Company since the present Occasion occurred, since the Rejection of the most humble Dutiful and respectful Petitions to the Throne has been known in America, Since the Battles of Lexington and Bunkershill; Since the wanton and Cruel Destruction of Charles Town and since the design of the ministry to bring Indiscriminate ruin on the Colonies on this Continent has been publickly avowed. I have not had the Honour of seeing your Excellency, and therefore I may without Offence to you, Sir, say that he assertion so far as it relates to the present Occasion is false. To retort the rest of this extraordinary postscript would be descending to the Language of a Certain place in the Environs of the Tower of London, with which I am but little acquainted. I shall only observe that Gentlemen who feel themselves Intrenched in such Exalted offices as that of Governour of a Province should be extremely Cautious how they make use of bad language either in speaking or writing. The world is very Censorious, and will be raising suspicions to their disadvantage, on this very occasion there may be some who will suspect that this postscript (as well as part of the Letter) would not have been framed in the stile it is, had we been in any other province than New Jersey.”

 

By the fall of 1775, Benjamin Franklin’s son William Franklin had been Royal Governor of the Province of New Jersey for more than a dozen years. He was a reasonably popular governor who avoided quarrels with the provincial assembly, and he presided over the twelve-member Provincial Council, the upper house of the legislature. The members of the Provincial Council were appointed by and served at the pleasure of the British Crown. William Alexander, Lord Stirling, of Basking Ridge, had served as a member of the Provincial Council since 1761.

 

On October 2, 1775, Lord Stirling wrote to George Washington: “The province I live in, has lately Called me forth in a Military Caracter; on this occasion I am Severely Attacked by Govr Franklin, on account of my being a Counsellor, several letters have passed between us on this Occasion, of which I will send you Copies by the first good oppertunity for your Amusement, I am afraid he has brought himself into a disagreable Scrape by his [untoward forwardness.”

 

Three months later, in January 1776, William Franklin wrote a letter to Lord Dartmouth, the recently resigned British Secretary of State for the Colonies, in which Franklin said, “your Lordship will perceive that the Assembly had it in their intentions to petition His Majesty again on the subject of the present unhappy disputes; but after the draft of an address was prepared, which would probably have passed the House, a Committee of the General Congress at Philadelphia came in great haste to Burlington...they harangued the House for about an hour on the subject, and persuaded them to drop their design.”  Franklin also informed Lord Dartmouth that “I have suspended William Alexander, Esqr (claiming to be, and commonlly called Earl of Stirling) from the Council, until His Majesty’s Pleasure shall be known.” The next day, Lord Stirling intercepted the letter and forwarded it to the Continental Congress at Philadelphia. He also ordered the New Jersey militia to place Governor Franklin under house arrest at his Perth Amboy home.

 

Franklin spent the next two years under arrest in Connecticut before being exchanged and leading a loyalist spy network out of New York City. Stirling became one of Washington’s trusted lieutenants and died at his headquarters after the fighting ended but before the Treaty of Paris was signed and ratified.

 

The note on this manuscript by Jared Sparks (1789-1866) at the bottom of page 4 identifies it as the copy made for George Washington and promised in Lord Stirling’s letter of October 2, 1775. In the 1830s, Sparks compiled a twelve-volume Writings of George Washington, for which he received unprecedented access to Washington’s papers.

 

 

William Alexander, Earl of Stirling (1726-1783) was born in New York City and became a lawyer. In 1747, he married Sarah Livingston of the powerful Livingston family of New York. After his father died, Alexander laid claim to the vacant title of Earl of Stirling. He traveled to Scotland to assert his claim, and in 1759, a Scottish court agreed. He won fame for his service in the French and Indian War. At the beginning of the Revolutionary War, Lord Stirling served as a colonel in a New Jersey regiment of colonial militia. The Continental Congress appointed him a brigadier general in the Continental Army in 1776. Praised by both General George Washington and the British for his audacity and courage at the Battle of Long Island, he was taken prisoner but exchanged a few months later and promoted to the rank of major general. Lord Stirling was one of Washington’s most capable and trusted generals. Washington left him in charge of the Continental Army during the winter of 1778-1779, while Washington met with Congress in Philadelphia. When Washington traveled south with most of the army in 1781, he left Lord Stirling in command of Continental troops in New York.  Stirling died at his headquarters in January 1783, after the preliminary Treaty of Paris effectively ended fighting in the Revolutionary War but long before it was finally signed and ratified.

 

William Franklin (1731-1813) was born in Philadelphia and was the acknowledged illegitimate son of Benjamin Franklin. The elder Franklin and his common-law wife Deborah Read raised William, who joined a company of Pennsylvania troops in King George’s War in 1746 and 1747.  He traveled with his father to London several times and completed his law education in England, where he was admitted to the bar. In 1762, he married Elizabeth Downes in London, and they moved in 1763 to the New Jersey colony, of which William Franklin had been appointed Royal Governor. When Benjamin Franklin took up the patriot cause, he tried to convince his son to join him, but William Franklin refused, and they never reconciled. William Franklin served as Royal Governor of New Jersey until January 1776, when colonial militiamen under the command of Lord Stirling placed him under house arrest. In June 1776, the Provincial Congress of New Jersey declared him an enemy to American liberties, took him into custody, and jailed him in Connecticut for two years. After discovering that he was aiding loyalists, authorities placed him in solitary confinement at Litchfield, Connecticut, for eight months. He was released in a prisoner exchange in 1778, and he moved to British-held New York City. There, he became the leader of the loyalists, led an unofficial spy network, and raised loyalist forces to fight the patriots. In 1782, he left New York for the United Kingdom, where he became a spokesman for the loyalist community in London.

 

 

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