Franklin’s Gift to Catherine II

https://scfh.ru/en/papers/franklin-s-gift-to-catherine-ii/ 

 

In the fall of 1779, disturbing news came to St Petersburg from Irkutsk General Governor F. N. Klichka that “unidentified” foreign vessels had been spotted near the Chukotka shore. Those were the ships of James Cook’s third expedition (1776—1780) returning from the Hawaii after the death of their captain. The Russian court took this information gravely, which was not surprising: at the will of history, Russia was to confront the most powerful seafaring nation of that time, England

 

But politics is politics. Relations with England cooled down, which was especially noticeable against the background of the warming up that occurred between Russia and France after the death of Louis XV. These events urged Catherine the Great to make the well-known Declaration on Military Neutrality, as early as on February 27 (March 9) 1780, which, in fact, opened for the USA the way to real independence. The Declaration meant so much for the young nation of “thirteen American states” that some time later the forth USA President James Madison called it the “American doctrine” and emphasized that the initiative Russian government had taken made an “epoch in the history of maritime law”.

Of remarkable importance for the American continent was Russia’s participation in other negotiations that lasted from the early 1780s to the Versailles Congress of 1783. Let us remind you that during the Congress the first global repartition of the world among the great powers took place.