Relations between France and the United states were at a low point when John Adams became president in March 1797. President Washington, angered by the behavior of the French minister Edmond Genêt in the United States, had demanded his recall. Matters deteriorated further when France, believing the Jay Treaty signified closer ties with Britain, commenced an undeclared naval war against the United States, seizing vessels bound for England and selling them at auction. When Washington’s appointee Charles Coatsworth Pinckney arrived in Paris to replace James Monroe as minister to France, the French minister of foreign affairs refused to accept his credentials. Mary Stead Pinckney accompanied her husband to Paris, and while they awaited developments, Mary wrote to her cousin Alice DeLancey Izard describing a city she found most interesting.

Sunday evening, decr 18th I … shall leave Paris with regret. Our little society of the boulevards is very pleasing, and there is so much to engage and amuse a stranger in this vast city! The gallery of the Louvre dress’d, or even visible; & in my robe wadée, which is a most comfortable warm dress, made of silk like a close bodied great coat, and large enough to go over the other dress … Mine is puce inside and outside, trimmed with black velvet. … Me. Tallien … dresses her hair or perriwig in tiny little curls all over her head, and very low on the forehead, and passes narrow ribband in various directions over her head. This is called à la grecque. Mrs. Monroe dresses her own hair (for she told me she was tired of wigs) in the same way. The ear is quite uncovered, and the ribband goes under it, and the whole of the hind hair is crêped and curled all over the head, and is hardly lower behind than the top of the shoulder. I think it very pretty. … Mr. & Mrs. Monroe have behaved with great politeness to me, and Genl Pinckey thinks the behaviour of the former to him has been very candid. Their house is a little temple. … Mr. Monroes furniture is handsome, but as he order’d it with a view to take to America the chairs are not gilt, & do not suit the rooms. … He is going to sell his house for whatever it will fetch, which, probably, under the present appearances of things will not be more than he gave for it.

The letter is from In the Words of Women, page 325. The painting is “Books & Prints Gallery in Louvre,” (1791) by Pierre Antoine DeMachy.

When the French Revolution took a radical turn in 1793, many aristocrats fled to escape the guillotine. Comte de La Tour du Pin de Gouvernet, his wife Henriette-Lucie, and their two children journeyed to Albany, New York in 1794, at the invitation of General Philip Schuyler. They leased a farm in the area, purchased tools and animals, as well as several slaves. From Madame du Pin’s journal (on which she based her memoir begun in 1820 but not published until 1906), we learn of the life they led in reduced circumstances. She proved to be a capable farm manager. It was her intention to “fit in” as she noted in her journal.

The day that we took possession of our farm, I adopted the costume worn by the women on the neighboring places, that is to say, a skirt of blue and black striped wool, a little camisole of light brown cloth, a handkerchief of the same color, with my hair parted … and caught up with a comb. In winter I wore gray or blue woolen stockings, with moccasins or slippers of buffalo skin; in summer, cotton stockings, and shoes. I never put on a dress or a corset, except to go into the city [Albany]. Among the effects which I had brought to America were two or three riding-costumes. These I used to transform myself into a dame élégante, when I wished to pay a visit to the Schuylers or Van Rensselaers.

This from a woman who had once been a lady-in-waiting to Marie Antoinette! Life on the farm assumed a routine that, for Henriette-Lucie, was not unpleasant.

We took our déjeuner at eight o’clock, and our dinner at one o’clock. In the evening at nine ‘clock we had tea, with slices of bread, our excellent butter and some fine Stilton cheese which Monsieur Talleyrand sent us.

Look for future posts about Henriette-Lucie’s life in America.

Journal entries are from In the Words of Women, page 309. Image is on the front cover of Memoirs: Madame de la Tour du Pin Laughing and Dancing Our Way to the Precipice published in 1999.

The English historian Catherine Macaulay corresponded with many prominent Americans, both men and women, during the American Revolution. Sympathetic to their cause she was elated when the United States achieved independence and formed its own government in 1789. In keeping with her concern for liberty and human rights, she was also supportive of the French Revolution. In this letter to Samuel Adams a few months before she died Macaulay compared the two conflicts and came to a conclusion that may be a bit surprising.

[draft] March 1, 1791Sir
I cannot … forbear to communicate to you those mixed sentiments … with which the present state of affaires in Europe have filled the mind of every zealous friend to equal liberty. That wonderful Event the french Revolution fills all our thoughts and occupies the whole mind we desire its permanence and prosperity with more paternal solicitude for we look upon its firm establishment as an event which will bring after it the final emancipation of every other society in Europe from those Monarchies and aristocratic chains imposed by the violence of arms and visited on mankind by ignorance credability and craft and you will pardon me if I tell you that in my opinion notwithstanding the brilliancy of American exertions in the case of independence that the continuation of the freedom of that vast Continent equaly depends on the stability of the french Democracy. The Americans have a little too much of the leaven of their Ancestors in them.

The selection is from In the Words of Women, pages 306-07.

In 1769, Sarah Prince Gill, the wife of a Boston merchant, using the pseudonym “Sophronia,” wrote to the renowned English historian, Catharine Sawbridge Macaulay, urging her to write a history of America and offering to put her in touch with American intellectuals.

It is with Pleasure Madam, I hear of your design to treat of the settlement of these Northern Collonies. I hope you will have the aid of the most accurate Peices that give Light on the Subject. …

When I reflected on the Quallities you are endowed with for Works of this Nature, I feel regret that you are not on the Field where the history was Acted; for give me leave to say, no Person can form a full Idea of the American Spirit & Love of Liberty, but those who dwell in or visit the Clime; it is inwrought in their Frame; transpires in every breath; and beats in every Pulse. …

I would not, I hope I do not, carry my notion of Patriotism beyond the Standard of Truth, yea, of Truth confirmed by Fact. Souls there have been, Souls there are, who have Sacrificed darling Interests for their Countries Good. Even in this Age of Corruption Venality and Dissipation I am frequently the Wittness of Such a Conduct. I Glory in my Country, I Glory in Boston my native Town on this Account.—And tho the Pathetic Writings and warm Addresses of Some have been termed Enthusiastic Raphsody, high Flights of a raised Imagination &c., and the Spirited United Conduct of Others deem’d Madness and Faction, yet in my humble Opinion these are the Genuine results of a Rational Enthusiasm, a Generous Madness, and a truly Loyall Faction. What more Generous than the Merchant who depends on Commerce, stopping the resource of his own gain to procure the Liberty of his Country? What Online Pokies more Loyall than to prefer the good of the Empire to that of a Few mercenary Place-Men* Pensioners &c? What more Rational than to employ the Powers of Genius, and of Eloquence, in stating and defending the rights of Humanity?—Yes, My Dear Madam, there are among Us of Men very many, of Women not a Few animated with this Philosophy.

You Lament the want of such a spirit in “Our Sex.” I have Observed and Mourned it Also, but I find this is chiefly among our City Ladies: that it takes rise from that Levity of Manners, that dissipation of Thought, that Low Ambition of Title and Show which Characterises our Modern Women; Amusements and Pageantry have absorbed their every Care and destroyed the Noblest Feelings of the Humane Heart! When sick of Contemplating this, and Conversing with these, I turn me to those who think and Act more becoming Rationals. And many do I know who are warm Assertors and steady Friends of Liberty; Especially is this evident among the most serious religious Women of New England. … Our Ancestors wisely took care to instill the principles of Liberty into the minds of their Children, to this provident care it is owing that America hath made such a Noble stand against the inroads of Despotism, and produced such Able Defenders of her Rights.

*Place-man: one appointed by the sovereign to a remunerative public office as a reward for service or loyalty, usually a derogatory term.

Gill offered to transmit any information to Macaulay that could be of use in writing a history. “Happy shou’d I think myself if in any instance I cou’d serve the Cause, tho’ as the smallest spring in the Grand Machine.”

Gill’s letters are from In the Words of Women, pages 16-18; the portrait is at the National Gallery, London.