Bordeaux, May 23d. 1778—
Dear Sir,
I wrote you immediately upon hereing of your safe arival at Brest, after your successful cruise which give me infinite satisfaction to here.—I have been here ever since I come from Nantes and two months of the time very sick with a Fever, which has prevented me from proceeding upon my travels—I am now perfectly recovered and shall set out for Paris the beginning of the next month—Your affair at Whitehaven & Scotland has been variously represented by Letters as well as in the English papers, if you have time and will take the trouble I shou’d be glad to have a consise acct. of yr. Cruise, &c. direct for me at Bordeaux to the care of Mr. Bonfeild Agent here1 This is an exceeding agreable place I wish you cou’d come here before you leave Europe Capt. Tucker of the Boston Frigate fell down the River to Day and will sail immediately. There are two American young Gentlemen2 here who wishes to enter into the service under you, I am sure they will please you in every respect, one in the Navy, and the other in the Marine service is what they want to be There are a number of Vessells from America coming in here every Week, Trade will soon flurish again to our distress’d Country I hope; the last Accounts I have had from Home were Dated the 10th. of March; they then expected an Army of Twenty Thousand Men out from England this spring, and Congress prepared accordingly to receive them, by augmenting our Army to more in number then we have ever had in the Field at once yet, they will be very agreably disapointed, for from the best intilligence there are not two Thousand gone out— Poor Biddle in the Randolph they say was blown up at Sea by a 64 Gun Ship I hope it is not true every acct. from the West I[n]dies mentions it—3 Capt. Mc.Neill I suppose you have heard was suspended in Boston—4 If you are agoing upon another such scheme as your last I will go with your upon certain conditions. I wish I had been with you in the last cruise, please to make my Love to Mr. Simpson and all the rest of your officers, and am [&c.]
Jno. G. Frazer
L, DLC, Peter Force Collection, John Paul Jones Papers, no. 6758. Addressed: “John Paul Jones Esqr./Commander of the/Ranger American Ship of/War now at Brest—/port—Via Paris.” Docketed: “Col. J. G. Frazer/Bordeaux [2]3 May 1778.”
1. John Bondfield, the Continental agent at Bordeaux.
2. For more on the “two American young Gentlemen,” see Frazer to Jones, 18 May, above.
3. For more on the destruction of the American frigate Randolph and the death of its captain,Nicholas Biddle, see Extract of a Letter from On Board the State Brig Notre Dame, 9 March 1778, vol. 11:576.
4. For the charges against Capt. Hector McNeill, see Continental Marine Committee to the Continental Navy Board of the Eastern Department, 30 May, above.
