Chester 8 o’clock, Thursday Evg. [27 May 1779]
My dear sir,
On my way here I met with Mr. Serjeant,1 of whom I enquired touching the proof he had mentioned of Deanes having communicated the intended Treaty to Wharton2 in London some days before its conclusion. The Witness is, it seems, Surgeon to Proctors Regiment, now on its way to Pittsburg. This Man was the Bearer of the letters to Wharton, and his evidence is I think very conclusive. I assure you Sir I am in this case not influenced in the least by motives of personal resentment, the thorough conviction I have of the public good that will result from fixing on Mr. Deane the guilt that I am satisfied he has practised, influences me solely. It is impossible that justice can be done, either to the community, or to Individuals, unless this man be properly understood. And certainly nothing more is necessary to accomplish this than to proceed with serious determination to the enquiry and collect the evidence written and oral that this country abundantly furnishes. The establishment of his criminality will at once prevent him from imposing on the public to its future injury, and do justice to the characters he has traduced by charging them with crimes committed by himself. This evidence may easily be had from Pittsburg.3 Sr. James Jay & Capt. Nicholson are in Philadelphia. Mr.
Diggs will attend when called on. These, with the papers you have, shew enormity sufficient to place Mr. Deane in the light he ought to be seen in. I should not have troubled you Sir with so long a letter on so foul a subject, if I were not perfectly satisfied of your attachment to the cause of justice and general good, your dislike of public defaulters and your desire to protect and defend the virtuous Servants of the United States. I understand by Mr. Sergeant that Mr. Secretary Thomson has been long acquainted with Dr. Kendals evidence,4 and having concealed it, and acted the part he has done renders him as unfit to be the Secretary of Congress as any other W-h-e5 in Philadelphia. I shall continue to entertain the very agreeable hopes of being honored with your company in your way Southward. Your route is thro Baltimore, cross Potomac at Hoes, and from Mr. Hoe you will get exact directions to my house.
I am, with most affectionate esteem dear Sir your most obedient and obliged servant,
Richard Henry Lee
Receiver’s copy, William Gilmore Simms Collection deposit (1973), Massachusetts Historical Society.
Printed in James Curtis Ballagh, The Letters of Richard Henry Lee, Volume 2, 1779 - 1794, pp. 58 - 59. A transcript is in the Laurens, Correspondence, Long Island Historical Society. Addressed: "Honorable Henry Laurens Esqr. in Chesnut Street near the State House, Philadelphia." Endorsed by Laurens: "Richd. Henry Lee Esqr. 27th May 1779. Recd. 29th. Answd 1st June."
1 Jonathan Dickinson Sergeant, who had been a member of Congress from New Jersey in 1776 - 77.
2 Probably Samuel Wharton, Pennsylvania merchant and land speculator, who had gone to England in 1769 to seek validation of the "Indiana grants," but who remained to press the claims of the Walpole Company for a new colony, to be called "Vandalia." In 1779 he went to Paris to discuss with Benjamin Franklin the possibility of obtaining congressional recognition of the claim. After returning to the United States, Wharton served as a delegate to Congress in 1782 - 83. DAB.
3 For further information on this "evidence," see Lee’s 3 January 1778 [i.e., 1779], letter to Francis Lightfoot Lee in Lee, Letters (Ballagh), 1:373 - 76; and Richard Henry’s August 1779 letters to the editor of the Pennsylvania Packet, ibid., 2:108 - 12, 125 - 30, 132 - 42. See also Arthur Lee’s April 26, 1779, letter to Congress, PCC, item 102, 3:20 - 21, and Wharton, Diplomatic Correspondence, 3:136 - 37.
4 Probably Dr. Joseph Kendall, a surgeon of the Pennsylvania Regiment of Artillery and later a physician and surgeon aboard the ship America. See Joseph Kendall to Congress, 12 May 1784, PCC, item 41, 5:41 - 42, and JCC, 27:407.
5 Despite the confusion of how Lee placed his dashes, he was doubtless suggesting that Charles Thomson was no more to be trusted than a common whore.
6 This is Lee’s last letter as a delegate until he returned to Congress in November 1784. Embittered by the direction the Deane-Lee controversy had taken, the personal attacks upon his reputation, and the strength of opponents in Congress, Lee had resigned his seat as a delegate and was en route to Virginia. Lee’s hatred of Deane and his congressional supporters and his concern over congressional affairs, however, did not abate in the months thereafter. From Chantilly he maintained a heavy correspondence with colleagues in Congress notably Henry Laurens, Samuel Adams, William Whipple, James Searle, James Lovell, and Nathaniel Scudder and contributed four articles to the Pennsylania Packet under the name "Rowland" in which he assailed the Deane faction and defended himself and his brothers. For these letters and articles, see Lee, Letters (Ballagh), 2:59 - 167. For his resignation at this time and an analysis of his congressional career, see Lee to the Virginia Assembly, 4 May 1779; and Paul C. Bowers, "Richard Henry Lee and the Continental Congress, 1774 - 1779," (Ph.D. diss., Duke University, 1965).