Four Years of Magical Thinking

Book Review:  A Great Improvisation, by Stacy Schiff

Yet another trip across the Atlantic was the last thing Benjamin Franklin wanted to do--in midwinter, no less.  Having retired from the printing business years earlier, Franklin had dedicated himself to civic, scientific, and political pursuits.  As a one-man booster club, he had been instrumental in paving and lighting the streets of Philadelphia, founding her hospital, establishing her library, police force, fire brigade, sanitation department, and militia.  No one in the colonies could rival his administrative experience. Two years of formal schooling stood behind these accomplishments; algebra was not something Franklin had ever studied in school, where he had failed arithmetic--twice.  He never went to college, and made up for it by founding the University of Pennsylvania.

Because America's three-man envoy to France was failing to attract money to finance the Continental Army, Franklin, who was beloved in France, was sent there secretly to make France an ally in America's war for independence.  The trip was so secret that none of the three American commissioners were aware of Franklin's Atlantic crossing.   For seventy-year-old Ben Franklin the journey was pure misery. For about a month he bounced around inside a small wooden cubby, about the size of a small closet.  The weather was terrible and the food was worse.  He arrived in France so malnouirshed that painful boils covered much of his body.  To hide the sores on his head, and keep from scratching them, he wore a fur cap.

Eighteenth-century Paris was a particularly foul place to visit, its streets were filthy, muddy, and smelly, as if all of Europe's sewers flowed into Paris' network of narrow city streets.  The ragged poor were everywhere, as well as sleeping drunks lying in gutters and alleyways. This, while the wealthy elite dressed in jewels and fine clothing, were being chauffeured about it in high style, and dined sumptuously in the finest restaurants of Paris.  For a man of Franklin's thrift and civic-mindedness this surely rankled. But he didn't breathe a word of criticism.

He set up residency in a luxury hotel, outside Paris, in Passy. (Passy was a rural area then located about three miles outside of Paris. Its appeal was that it was situated on a lofty bank ot the River Seine, and was known for its expansive gardens, beautiful parks, and numerous chateaux).

Paris, and much of Northern France, was rife with spies, rumors and intrigue.  In such a place keeping a secret was well nigh impossible. Aware of the pitfalls, Franklin refrained from sending letters through the normal chanels, but relied exclusively on secret carriers.

As the most famous man in all of Europe, and a celebrity in France, everyone wanted to see him, especially the ladies of Paris, who found the American irresistible.  They even began wearing hats that resembled his fur cap. Franklin took it all in stride, with good humor and his usual wit.  While the world around him carried on as if it were some freaky masquerade ball, Franklin merely shrugged and took it all with good humor. Nothing, it seemed, could faze him.

Franklin's policy was to speak ill of no man, "but to speak the good I know of everybody." Such an attitude would work miracles for ambassador Franklin, spearheading America's war effort in France.  No matter how obnoxious or objectionable, Franklin treated everyone with dignity, respect and warmth.

How popular was Benjamin Franklin? He was so popular that many of the French posted his picture on a wall inside their homes.  Indeed, creating an image of Franklin was something of a cottage Industry in France, with his likeness being reproduced in drawings, paintings, and ceramic figurines.

Franklin met with his befuddled American colleagues, and the King's prickly courtiers, and began navigating his way among the Parisian elite.  Everywhere he was confronted with archaic rules of behavior, and general ennui. Everyone in Paris, seemed to have a title, and would offer their opinion, even to the point of volunteering to serve in Washington's beleaguered army, with some even claiming they could be a better general than George Washington himself (as the General had yet to win a decisive battle).  To any one as bright as Franklin, the people he had to deal with were surely insufferable as well as downright daffy.  But being the consummate chess player, he breathed not a word as to what he really thought, or of how tedious he found their insane ideas.  Franklin handled it all with grace and charm, while amusing himself in marathon games of chess.  To him it was all one big a chess game anyway, that he set his mind on winning.  The object was to convince King Louis VI--a monarch, mind you (in his mid-twenties) -- to sponsor the American war effort to defeat the English, and create an American republic.  It was, in fact, mission impossible, made possible only because France would delight in embarrassing England, and damaging the English economy at the same time.

Franklin had the right mindset for such a mission, but would need mountains of patience to achieve it.  As with George Washington in the field, it was not a matter of winning but of surviving.  That it would take four years, Franklin had no way of knowing.  As he was wont to say, America need not win on the battlefield, but merely to outlast the English.

Neither France nor America had a navy, so it was incumbent upon Franklin to convince France to create one. It took a number of meetings over several years, but France began building a fleet of war ships. Four years later, when Franklin returned home, France not only had a navy but was prepared to use it on the coastal waters of North America.

Shipping war matériel from France to Aerica, was problematic, as British frigates were intent on searching every French sailing vessel they spotted on the high seas (indeed, they would have loved sinking the ship that brought Franklin to France, had they known he was making the Atlantic crossing).  In the end, the British missed more French ships bearing arms, than they could possibly capture.  By the time of the battle of Yorktown, Washington's army was clothed in French attire, and armed with French rifles, gunpowder, and canons.  Indeed, half of the Continental Army was comprised of French soldiers, while the blockade of Yorktown was comprised of the French Navy.  However, the mastermind of the battle was the supreme opportunist, George Washington.

The author makes the point that Franklin's intervention in French diplomacy was the greatest gamble of his life.  Perhaps it was, but so was George Washington's generalship of the Continental Army.  Without question, both men were counting on the other to prevail.  That they did so is among the miracles of the America Revolution  Truly, these were four years of magical thinking.

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