Quote · The Rest Is History
684. Franklin: Revenge of the American Genius (Part 2)
Where this was said
Ambassador to France: Fur Cap, Voltaire, and the Alliance That Won the War
At 1:05:10 · chapter starts 57:00
In October 1776, three months after signing the Declaration of Independence, the 70-year-old Franklin boarded the American sloop of war the Reprisal and crossed the Atlantic in rough winter conditions — conditions he said 'almost demolished him' — to serve as America's first ambassador to a foreign power [1] — Tom Holland "While battles raged in America, Franklin arrived at Versailles wearing a frontiersman's fur cap among powdered wigs and played every Enligh…" 59:20 . He spent 9 years in France, and his diplomatic method was as theatrical as it was brilliant: he wore a frontiersman's fur cap at the court of Versailles, played simultaneously on Rousseau's cult of the primitive and Voltaire's celebration of reason, wept alongside Voltaire at the Académie Royale, and cultivated Parisian salons with the same calculated charm he had deployed in London drawing rooms. At the critical meeting with Voltaire, the two men embraced and were compared by observers to Solon meeting Sophocles. Edmund Burke condemned Franklin's Paris sojourn as 'a foul and dishonorable flight'; Tom argues it was one of the most consequential diplomatic missions in history. When he finally signed the Treaty of Alliance with France, Franklin chose to wear the same blue Manchester velvet coat he had worn when humiliated at the Cockpit, telling those who asked that he wore it 'to give it a little revenge.' Historian Edmund Morgan called the eventual 1783 Treaty of Paris the greatest diplomatic victory the United States has ever achieved.
Franklin served as America's first ambassador to a foreign power, spending 9 years in France where he secured French military and financial backing for American independence.
While battles raged in America, Franklin arrived at Versailles wearing a frontiersman's fur cap among powdered wigs and played every Enlightenment fantasy the French intellectual class had about the New World. This was not vanity — it was strategy. The French military alliance he secured proved decisive in winning American independence.
Franklin deliberately wore the same blue Manchester velvet coat at the signing of the Treaty of Alliance with France that he had worn when humiliated before the British Privy Council, saying he wore it 'to give it a little revenge'.
The historian Edmund Morgan described the 1783 Treaty of Paris, led by Franklin, as the greatest diplomatic victory the United States has ever achieved.
