I have the honor etc.29
The second testimonial is addressed to the “Baron de Viomenil”:
Hdqr. Newburg 23, March
I could not let Col. Gouvion (to whom I pray your civilities and they cannot be bestowed on a more worthy man), depart without bearing with him this testimony of my remembrance of a corps, to whom gratitude, and every other consideration—public and private has bound me—
GEORGE WASHINGTON30
In a final letter to his chief, Gouvion says,
Sir At the moment of leaving this country where I had the honour of serving for seven years under your command, I beg your Excellency’s leave to express to you how grateful I am for all the favours which you have been pleased to bestow upon me. Although the part I acted in this happy and glorious revolution was but small, I shall always take pride in remembering that I was an American officer. the testimonies I have of the satisfaction your Excellency had of my services will in every time be dear to me. they were my only wish and I feel very happy in having obtained them.
May your Excellency experience from his country a gratitude so well deserved, but which can never be equal to the unparalleled toils, labours and cares you have sustained to save it, may you for a long while see its inhabitants enjoy . . happiness and prosperity.31
REPORT OF A COMMITTEE ON A MILITARY PEACE ARRANGEMENT
Congress accepted on October 23, 1783, Duportail’s September 30 memorial entitled “Report of a Committee on a Military Peace Arrangement”:
The Committee are of opinion that the principles laid down by Major General Du Portail, Chief Engineer, in the Memorial annexed to this report, so far as they respect merely the article of fortifications are in general sound and just; and that it will be expedient for Congress, as soon as they have determined upon the Corps of Engineers to instruct the head of that Corps to make a survey of the points proper to be fortified and to digest a plan, proportioned to the Military establishment of the United States, to be laid before Congress for their consideration.
A committee consisting of Hugh Williamson, William Ellery, and Samuel Osgood considered General Duportail’s request of October 29, 1783, for some immediate payment for himself and other officers belonging to the Corps of Engineers whose accounts had not been settled as Congress had authorized on October 10. The pay they received for a considerable time was in depreciated money and very unequal to their actual expenses. Some of them depended on remittances from their friends in France for their support, while others less fortunate contracted considerable debts in America. Their situation was such that they did not have the means of subsisting in America nor of returning to France unless some part of the money due them was paid.
There is no response from Paymaster Pierce to Williamson’s query in the Papers of the Continental Congress, but the committee recommended payment on January 21, 1784. The motion was adopted the following day, and Congress passed the following resolution:
Resolved, That the superintendant of finance take order for paying to the foreign officers of the late corps of engineers, and to the foreign officers lately belonging to the legionary corps, commanded by Brigadier-General Armand, also to Major Seconde, Captain Beaulieu, late of General Pulaski’s corps, and to Captain Ponthiere, late aid to the Baron Steuben, such sums on account of their pay as may be necessary to relieve them from their present embarrassments, and enable those in America to return to their native country and that he take such measures for facilitating the payment of the balances which may remain due to them as may comport with the condition of the finances of the U.S.32
Duportail’s last letter to General Washington was sent from Paris on December 24, 1783:
Dear General i arrived here ten days ago from london; i landed at plymouth, traveled through England about three hundred miles and stayed at london five days; i intended to stay sometime longer but was prevented by different news i heard from here—your excellency will not be surprised of that tour of mine after the american war it was certainly curious to see england & to observe the effect of their misfortunes the alterations it ought to produce in their government and so for those reasons i propose to return there in two months hence there is now in that city and throughout the country another cause of fermentation. it is the affair of the east indies. as you receive probably the english papers i thinck it superfluous to give your excellency any account of it—but i will be satisfied with saying to you that after all that i heard of the situation of their affairs in that part of the world, it is a great pity that France has made peace with england so for one year more and probably they were irrecoverably lost there. it is what i imagined while in america—i cannot give you any interesting news from this place. pleasure, diversions are the first objects which strike the attention here and the person arriving should thinck that there are no other affairs in paris. to know that it is not so requires some stay so as i cannot give you anything interesting in politics i am almost tempted to give you something in the physical way but i suppose this same ship will carry you from every one or your correspondents great particulars about the merveille of the time. your excellency conceives that i am speaking of the air baloon the most extraordinary discovery ever made but in that very matter i am yet pretty ignorant; i had not yet time since i am here of penetrating into all the proceedings. Chv. de Chastillux to whom i delivered your letter
