City of Lights
July 1776. The Seine shone under a summer moon, its ripples hiding secrets as Silas Deane stepped onto the cobblestones of Place Louis XV. He looked back to see if he was being followed. Not this time. The Connecticut merchant-turned-diplomat, Deane’s role was crucial to the young rebellion—securing badly needed aid from France. Although not a polished diplomat, the Yankee trader, a skilled negotiator, was up against a city full of spies and schemers. He would have to wage a secret war for America’s survival, with betrayal waiting at every turn. Though only a passing figure in my novel, The Reluctant Spy, it’s important to understand Deane’s role, as he set the stage for much that followed.
Young Yankee
Who would have thought a young Connecticut Yankee would be drawn into the world of global espionage? Silas Deane was born in Groton in 1737. Fortunate enough to attend Yale, he eschewed the typical graduate’s career as a cleric, schoolmaster, or lawyer. Connecticut’s access to the sea and its favorable rivers made it a hub of trade, and Dean earned a fortune in trading timber and rum. As with all of his class and status, Deane was drawn into politics as the colonies slid toward revolution and was a stalwart member of the Continental Congress. His talent got him named America’s first envoy to France during the early days of the struggle. America needed everything: money, supplies, weapons, and munitions. And America needed them quickly. Armed only with a letter of introduction and a seasoned dealmaker’s grit, he sailed off on this desperate venture in March 1776.
Covert Envoy
Aware of the intrigue awaiting him (the canny Benjamin Franklin likely briefed him), he posed as a merchant in a modest apartment in a quiet part of Paris, not Versailles. From there, he undertook the daunting task of convincing France to throw in with the Americans, at a time when British General William Howe was unleashing a sea and land campaign that would drive the Americans from New York and the Jerseys. Neutral France would prove a hard nut to crack, officially. His task was complicated by the fact that the spy services of both France and Britain were watching this obscure American.
Rodrigue y Hortalez, Et Cie
Dean hit pay dirt when French Foreign Minister Charles Gravier, Comte de Vergennes, connected Deane with a pesky clockmaker and renowned playwright, Pierre-Augustin Caron de Beaumarchais. Beaumarchais secretly approached Vergennes about taking action to aid the Americans' struggle, but Vergennes would not risk British ire—at least not yet.
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The roguish Beaumarchais had set up a front company, Rodrigue y Hortalez, a Spanish company, to smuggle goods to America. Dean jumped at the opportunity, negotiating the transfer of 200 cannons, 25,000 uniforms, and ammunition that kept the Continental Army alive through 1777. Ships slipped from Le Havre to American ports, their cargoes disguised as commercial goods. Each shipment was fraught with danger, as French ports swarmed with British spies, spreading gold to detect evidence of French perfidy. Exposure, being caught in flagrante delicto, could cause Vergennes to close the operation, leaving the American cause in mortal peril.
Insider Threat
But the threat, as usual, was from within. Edward Bancroft, a former pupil of Deane, became his secretary, privy to all aspects of the operation and everything else Deane was up to. The problem was that Bancroft was a British agent who clandestinely fed information to the British embassy, ensuring details would arrive on King George’s ministers’ desks within days.
Enter Big Ben
The Cause was looking weak, very weak, in late 1776, and the need for a formal alliance was growing increasingly separate. The Continental Congress decided to up the ante by sending a former American representative in London to help Deane. Benjamin Franklin was not just another envoy—he was possibly the most renowned man of the era and soon eclipsed Deane, who was more of a back-office operator. Franklin would soon take the lead in dealings with the French.
Talent Scout
But Deane was doing much more than kibbitzing with the aristocracy. He actively recruited talent for the Cause, sending large numbers of experienced (sometimes, not so) officers to serve in the Continental Army. Among them were the Marquis de Lafayette, Baron De Kalb, Casimir Pulaski, Baron von Steuben, Thomas Conway, and Philippe du Coudray. The latter brought heat on Deane when he ticked off Congress with demands for money and rank, and Conway would be controversial in many ways. Still, they did provide a shot of Vitamin B-12 in the butt of an Army struggling for experienced leaders. Deane also helped John Paul Jones, arranging the initial French support for Jones’s first raids in European waters.
Another Enemy Within
When an American planter and scion of the aristocratic Lee family of Virginia entered the scene, clouds darkened over Deane. Newly arrived diplomat Arthur Lee distrusted Deane, accusing him of profiteering from supply contracts. Lee’s suspicions had some merit; Deane’s merchant instincts did lead him to dabble in stocks, blurring public duty and private gain. These accusations, though unproven, were a blight on his record. When the American victory at Saratoga in October 1777 made a formal alliance just a matter of time, Deane’s welcome had worn out. Congress took Lee’s allegations seriously and recalled the man whose efforts kept the Cause alive in its darkest hours.
Not Sunny in Philadelphia
When Deane arrived at the nation's capital in 1778, he was unprepared for the deluge. He had anticipated praise, but instead faced a grilling from Congress over his accounts. Unprepared, with incomplete records, he faltered. It worsened for him in 1781 when his private letters, expressing doubts about America’s chances and urging peace with Britain, were published.
Branded a traitor, Deane fled to Europe, living in exile in London and Ghent. Who stole them? Some point to Bancroft, but Lee cannot be ruled out. Deane’s final years were grim. In 1789, he died suddenly aboard a ship bound for America, possibly from poisoning. It was not until the 19th century that documents exonerated Deane from the charges against him, but by then his grim legacy was sealed in the minds of most Americans.
Grim Legacy?
Deane, thrust into the shadowy world of diplomacy and skullduggery, did quite well until inside forces, a spy and an implacable political foe, undid him. Yet the record is clear. The canny businessman initiated the supply chain that would feed the Cause, recruited (mostly) good talent, and set the stage for Franklin, Adams, Jay, and others to complete the work of making Paris a second front in the war against Britain. Bancroft’s treachery, Lee’s vendetta, and Congress’s ingratitude crushed his legacy, but Deane’s work in Paris kept the American Revolution alive. As he stood by the Seine in 1776, gazing at a city that could make or break a nation, he could not foresee the cost—only that freedom demanded it.
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