July 31st. 1779.
Dear Sir
Since I wrote you last1 I have recd. a Duplicate of all the papers which I have mentioned therein to you as having been sent by yr. Brother Ar[thu]r. I found also in the 2d Packet some that were not in the first. I have kept [what] will enable me to subserve his H[onor] except a few that you will be so [good] as to return when you have either [co]pied or extracted what you wish [to] retain. I think the Originals are more essential for me than for you just at this Juncture. I shall be careful of them as your family property. I kept also the duplic. of July 27 directed to FLL.2
I have also this day recd. many Packets Via Boston with only two Le[tters] for you, both which I send. I remember well you got the Letter Arendt left behind at Miller’s, I forwarded it afterwards. As to William’s there is no Propriety in consulting Congress about the publication. You will act your own Judgement & that of your Friends in Virginia. I think Ar[thu]r has said more than Willm. has. I need not add that Arthr. says Things well.
I cannot but regret more & more that you, Francis & SA3 are not here, now, furnished thus at every Point. I am worn down with writing in addition to the vexatio[us at]tendance on the Debates in Chesnut [Street]4 but I hope to be able to g[ive] an analytical & chronological concise View of the diabolical Lies & intentional Assassination of which Deane was flagrantly guilty on the 5th of Decr. last. I have by me a similar State of the Matter to that which I sent you to be forwarded by Post on Tuesday to SA unless the Express goes sooner: so that Mr A will have it in his Power to destroy totally in Massachusetts, by little judicious Specs, as he used to phraze News Paper writing, all the Prejudices which may happen to have been raised there by yr. innuenda Man. Mr A. thanks me in a Letter of the 195 for something of the Kind but I really have forgot what it was I sent early enough for an Answer already.
Not a single Line to the Comtee from BF6 though large Packets are come from him, old News Papers Intelligence sent him from Ports from Week to Week &c. &c. There is a very long Letter to me expressly to me with an interdiction of the Public, tho it is wholly on a Topic concerning the Public-the Impropriety of 3 at one Court - Complimentary of Deane and shewing that Holland is ripe to receive him. But the Oddity of all is that it is dated July 22d. 1778 forwarded by J Williams Nantes Feb 25 1779. [It] is in Answr. to mine of May 15 1778. He say much indeed upon the good Principles which were the basis of the 11th & 12th Articles; reducible however to this one point which he plainly expresses, vizt that Duties on Exports are Pickpocket Arts and too mean to be practiced even in the Line of Retaliation.7
I can only add a word or two on home matters for I am really faint for want of Sleep.
Fishy. in no case to be given up. States to enter into no Treaty of Comce. without unan[imous] consent unless free Exercise is stipulated [in] regard to that matter; and to resent w[ith] the whole force of the Union any Moles[tation].8 These Determinations springly from the Unanimously declared opinion that it is essential to the Welfare of all these U.S! that the citizens thereof shd. enjoy the free unmolested common Rights of Fishery. We must be satisfied with tacit assurance of Indepcy.9
Good night, my dear Sir.
Lee Family PapersUniversity of Virginia Archives
1 See Lovell to Lee, July 17, 1779.
2 That is, Francis Lightfoot Lee.
3 Samuel Adams.
4 An allusion to Congress which met in the State House on Chestnut Street.
5 Samuel Adams’ July 19 letter to Lovell has not been found.
6 Benjamin Franklin.
7 On the subject of Franklin’s July 22, 1778, letter, see Lovell to Samuel Adams, August 3, and to Franklin, August 6, 1779.
8 "Molestation" had become a critical word in the settlement of the dispute over access to the fisheries, when Congress on July 29 agreed that "if after a treaty of peace with Great Britain, she shall molest the citizens or inhabitants of any of the United States in taking fish on the banks and places described in the Resolution passed the 22d day of July, instant, such molestation . . . shall be a common cause of the said states; and the force of the union be exerted to obtain redress." JCC, 14:896 - 97.
9 Lovell wrote the following tongue-in-cheek warning in the margin beside this last paragraph: "dead secret unless you get it from the Weathercocks or otherwise."