The French and Rochambeau Have Arrived: From the Seat of the Continental Congress, Foreign Affairs Committee Leader James Lovell Informs General Benjamin Lincoln of the Arrival of the French Fleet in Rhode Island

“‘Ships were seen which answered private signals on the 10th and are doubtless now in port Providence’ 10 o’clock morning of 11th, received three days ago.”

 

He laments Lincoln’s position after the surrender of his army at Charleston and the slow pace of prisoner exchange

James Lovell served in the Congress during the six years that were critical to the American Revolution. He was particularly important as a long term member of the Committee of Foreign Correspondence and of Secret Correspondence. He signed the Articles of Confederation, endorsing them for Massachusetts on July 9, 1778. After his term in Congress, Lovell returned to teaching, but continued to hold various political offices. He was collector of taxes in Massachusetts from 1784 to 1788 and Customs Officer of Boston in 1778 and 1789.

Benjamin Lincoln was a major general in the Continental Army during the Revolutionary War. Lincoln, who was for a time Washington’s second in command, fought at the Battles of Saratoga (sustaining a wound shortly afterward) and contributed to John Burgoyne’s surrender of the British army there. In 1780, he oversaw the largest American surrender of the war at Charleston.

After the surrender, Congress created a Court of Enquiry to investigate the conduct of Lincoln to determine to what extent, if any, it resulted in this disastrous mass surrender.

On May 4, 1778, the alliance between France and the new United States of America became effective. The Americans had high hopes for this venture, but those hopes were initially dashed. The French sent a fleet under Admiral d’Estaing in the summer of 1778; but after failing to encounter the British in the Chesapeake Bay and making unsuccessful moves at New York and Newport, it abandoned the offensive. However, the French were determined to play a role in the outcome of the American War and planned to send a significant number of troops and ships for the next campaign.

Count Rochambeau was appointed to command of the army that was destined to support the Americans, and on May 2, 1780, he sailed for the U.S. Washington eagerly anticipated the active intervention of the French. He planned a joint Franco-American late- summer campaign against British-held New York, and in expectation of his ally’s arrival, set about making sure that all of his preparations were complete. This was one of the most anticipated events of the war.

On July 10, 1780, a French fleet of seven ships of the line and four frigates under Admiral Chevalier de Ternay, along with thirty-six transport vessels carrying about 6,000 French soldiers commanded by Rochambeau and their supplies, arrived off of Newport, Rhode Island.

Autograph letter signed, to Benjamin Lincoln, July 19, 1780. “Dear sir, your letter of July 5th to the Delegates of Mass. and that of the 7th to me came duly on. I am sorry that there is any delay as to the Court of Enquiry and more so that you are not quite certain of a speedy exchange.

“I have complied with your request as to the Taylor’s Bill but the Cutler must find me out. I shall not seek him; the Negro who was to be my informant had left the family before your letter reached me. You may ‘honestly’ pay Mrs. L. what I have advanced for you to Stilly agreeably to the receipt inclosed.

“We are as to news from Rhode Island as we were from Charleston. ‘Ships were seen which answered private signals on the 10th and are doubtless now in port Providence’ 10 o’clock morning of 11th, received three days ago. We shall know in a fortnight whether the French fleet is arrived or not.”

The intelligence was in fact correct. And a year later, Benjamin Lincoln, as Washington’s 2nd in commander, received the surrender of the British forces under the command of Cornwallis at Yorktown, an event made possible only by the news he received in this letter.