Patriot Pirates by Robert H. Patton Page B

others a multifold return on their investment, was no less exposed. In the shadow of disaster their friendship was cemented.
    It was a remarkable collaboration of two incorrigible yet idealistic mavericks. Born into the watchmaking Caron family, the forty-four-year-old Frenchman had, like Deane, initiated his social climb by marrying a rich widow; later he added “de Beaumarchais” for noble effect. Along with self-invention he shared Deane’s romantic view of the role he might play in American independence. Deane relished his place “on the great stage of Europe” and the boost his supply deals could give the war effort; his initial sales pitch to Vergennes had included a vow that aiding America would bring forth between their countries “the most lasting, extensive, and beneficial commercial intercourse and connection that the world has ever seen.”
    Beaumarchais was no less expansive in courting America’s trust and, he hoped, its exclusive reliance upon him as its arms broker. “Look upon my house,” he wrote Congress, “as the chief of all useful operations to you in Europe, and my person as one of the most zealous partisans of your cause.”
    His characterization of himself as “useful” echoed Deane’s desire to be of “the greatest and most extensive usefulness,” and for each man the fulfillment of his wish proved a harsh blessing. Though they hoped to get rich through commissions and private ventures stemming from their government work, their devotion to American liberty was real and their belief that they were indispensable to its attainment honest if overblown. The recklessness with which they ran their operation—inflated promises, shoddy accounting—was excusable in their minds as incidental to the integrity of their intentions.
    Historians generally rate Deane as little more than a “catspaw” or “venal dupe.” His early acquisition of French military aid is judged a minor feat in light of Vergennes’s predisposition toward any plan to take Britain down, and the self-interest so much on his mind tends to blight even his nobler moments. Yet during his first months alone in France Deane was a novice gambler at a high-stakes table with very few cards to play, who somehow stayed in the game for the good of his country.
    His superiors in Congress were no help. Months went by without a word. “The want of instructions or intelligence or remittances has sunk our credit to nothing,” he anxiously wrote after spending millions of borrowed dollars on supplies for twenty-five-thousand troops. His partner, Beaumarchais, was undaunted (“this is depressing, but depression is a long way from discouragement”), but Deane agonized that French officials were getting “extremely uneasy” about the lack of positive news and financial reciprocation from America.
    Unaware of the commitments already made in its name, the Secret Committee ordered him in October to entreat the French court for further loans “sufficient to dispatch immediately very considerable quantities of stuff.” As exactly how to accomplish this without collateral, “We hope you’ll be able to influence them by one means or other.”
    Forced to find new ways of enticing suppliers, Deane relied less on Franco-American solidarity and instead fell back on his roots in market capitalism, a shift he admitted to Congress. “Politics and my business are almost inseparably connected.” His point was that mere salesmanship no longer sufficed. With zero credibility left, he had to provide instant rewards in order to attract money and materiel.
    One of his ploys originally had been suggested by Arthur Lee, the Secret Committee’s representative in London. Young and ambitious, Lee had met Beaumarchais in 1775 and conceived with him the idea of a commercial front as a means secretly to aid American fighters and get rich to boot, an idea later put into practice (to Lee’s furious envy) by Beaumarchais and Deane through Hortalez & Company.