Episode 40: How Dare You Not Answer My Letter

Your Most Obedient & Humble Servant
Episode 40 - “How Dare You Not Answer My Letter”
Published on June 27, 2023

Note: This transcript was generated by Otter.ai with light human correction

Kathryn Gehred 
Hello, and welcome to Your Most Obedient and Humbled Servant. This is the women's history podcast where we feature 18th and early 19th century women's letters that don't get as much attention as we think they should. I'm your host, Kathryn Gehred. This week, I'm very excited to introduce Nancy debt. Nancy and I used to work together and she is actually one of the people who inspired me to do this podcast because she was one of the few people that found these letters as funny as I'd hit. So we'd be sitting in the break room talking about Thomas Jefferson's grandchildren giving each other potatoes. So glad that she's finally able to come on. This is Nancy steps, Education Programs Manager at James Monroe's Highland. Hello, Nancy.
 
Nancy Stetz
Hello, Katie. I'm so glad to be here tonight. It was always good to find a kindred spirit that found historic letters as entertaining as you and I did.
 
Kathryn Gehred 
Tell me a little bit about your work at Highland.
 
Nancy Stetz 
I am education programs manager. I have been there for a little over eight years. And so it's involving hiring and training guides, our public programs, tour reservations, it's a nice mix of things. Sometimes it's just setting up chairs. It's you know, we're a small team are small and mighty team was our director likes to say it we're right next door to Monticello.
 
Kathryn Gehred 
Yeah, right down the road. For my listeners who might need a refresher. Could you give a sort of quick introduction to admin row?
 
Nancy Stetz 
Yes, I can. So James Monroe was our fifth president from 1817 to 1825. He had entered the Revolutionary War at age 18. He crossed the Delaware with Washington's troops and almost died at the Battle of Trenton and then just got involved in politics, which led him eventually all the way to the office of president. Eliza Monroe. Hey, his daughter, whose letter we'll be talking about today would have grown up hearing you know, a lot of those stories from early America that very much became part of her identity, being the daughter of James Monroe, which we'll certainly talk about.
 
Kathryn Gehred 
I always forget that he crossed the Delaware that's so cool.
 
Nancy Stetz 
And then was kind of erroneously painted in the boat with Washington and the very famous Washington Crossing the Delaware painting, symbolic painting. We know they actually crossed at different times,
 
Kathryn Gehred 
Still counts.
 
Nancy Stetz 
Yeah.
 
Kathryn Gehred  
This is a letter from James Monroe's daughter, who I was not familiar with at all before you sent me this letter. So I was very excited when I received this one. Tell me a little bit about her.
 
Nancy Stetz 
Eliza was definitely a character, someone that definitely I would say had a strong personality. He was she's born Gosh, uh, her parents get married in February of 1786. And she's born in December 1786. So really, she's born about 10 months after they get married. So she's really with them for the almost entirety of their marriage and is along for the ride for a lot of very interesting events in early American history. I will say one thing about Eliza that probably really deeply imprinted her with being a diplomat's daughter, Monroe will end up going to France, twice, once for Washington than again, for Jefferson. He was also administered to England and Spain. Eliza by the time she's 20 years old, she spent nearly eight years of her life in Europe and very interesting connections there, I think probably felt, you know, somewhat worldly. She was very well educated. When Maria went to France for the first time under George Washington. He put Eliza in this school for girls run by Madame Kim pan, and she had been a lady in waiting for Marie Antoinette, also the sister of citizens Genet, who I'm sure you know, from your work with the Washington papers. Right away, Eliza is kind of like in the mix with all the kind of interesting personalities in Paris. And to kind of set the scene for when she first gets to Europe. When the Monroe's get to France in 1794, it was early August and Robespierre had just been executed like three days before they got to Paris. It would have been certainly a rather dramatic time to you know, become a American in Paris. Eliza would have certainly you know, heard a lot of these stories I'm sure she seemed to have kind of a an appreciation of drama might be a nice way to put it. I know I think that a started in these girlhood years because she Yes, she's seven years old when she first gets to Paris. That Madam campaign school she is going to make friends with another little girl there named Hortense, Hortense was the daughter of Josephine, who will later marry Napoleon and so allies Monreo and bullying stepdaughter become fast friends at our friend's the rest of their lives. And even at Highland today we have jewelry in our collection, for instance that are Thompson as gifts, you know because they stayed in touch important events analyzes life like when she got married or had a child. Eliza even named her only daughter or 10 Zia after Napoleon's stepdaughter. It's interesting because that friendship, I think, kind of made Monroe, the person Jefferson wanted to send to France to give Robert Livingston some backup help with negotiating of New Orleans, which then turned into Louisiana. Because, you know, he already had these connections through his daughter, you know, with the polyenes family, and they kept in touch like the rest of their lives. So really kind of an enduring friendship.
 
Kathryn Gehred 
What was it like for sort of watching Napoleon's rise and fall?
 
Nancy Stetz  
I think that it was probably rather emotional roller coaster. Allies, his parents are actually at Napoleon's coronation like James Elizabeth Monroe, like we're there and solid. Monroe was definitely in the camp of thinking that, you know, he was very pro French, as a soldier really felt gratitude to our branch for their assistance in the revolution. The Polian was not quite taking things where they needed to go. When Monroe was back in America, and Eliza is now you know, not in Europe anymore. Is the impression from what I've read. She's the type of person that if you were in a room with her, you always learned and heard about her time in Europe and who she knew and what she did, which I think was grading, you know, to some personalities in the in the social scene. And she got married, when she came back to America. She married a widower, George J, who was actually fairly prominent attorney that was in the Aaron Burr treason trial, one of the Prosecuting Attorneys. So he was, you know, a fairly big deal in his own weight before he ever married the daughter of Monroe. Then what's her father what seems you know, becomes Madison Secretary of State and 1811 then she starts spending more time in DC kind of helping entertain with her parents. And then once Monroe's elected with President Eliza really did a lot of entertaining in place of her mother, because Elizabeth Monroe just did not have the stamina and was having a lot of health issues at that point. And Elizabeth Monroe, Monroe's wife, she, of course, had the unfortunate order of following Dolly Madison is First Lady who, you know, is very much born for the job and very, you know, beloved, in terms of the Washington social scene, Elizabeth was just a more reserved person and her health just didn't allow her to do what Dolly had done. So in steps, Eliza with her personality of worldliness and everyone, she goes to Europe, it it was not quite as endearing as dolly, dolly. She's a person of interesting extremes. I can't say this any better than someone who knew her. And so I'm going to actually read a quote from Louisa Catherine Adams, wife of John Quincy Adams, who was writing about Eliza in her diary, and this is a good one. Louisa says, regarding Eliza, this woman is made up of so many great and little qualities, is so full of agreeable and disagreeable, so accomplished in so Ill bred, has so much sense and so little judgment. She is so proud and so mean, I scarcely ever met such a compound. I have certainly not written this in haste, as I have taken two years to decide upon her merit, but one striking trait I can pronounce, and that is her love of scandal. No reputation is safe in her hands. I never since the first moment of any acquaintance with her have never heard her speak well, of any human being.
 
Kathryn Gehred 
Oh, that is so good.
 
Nancy Stetz  
That was handpicked with you in mind. That was I thought you'd like that.
 
Kathryn Gehred 
I want to hang out with her so bad. Yeah.
 
Nancy Stetz 
And so you've got that this very, like kind of petty side of Eliza. But then she also is interestingly, really deeply compassionate person. And so like in 1811, there was this terrible Richmond, a theater fire. And apparently, she went and like cared for a number of the burn victims when she was pregnant and potentially lost the baby just due to the stress, but she was that type of person. When Monroe was President John C. Calhoun, his Secretary of War, Calhoun's wife flurry lost a baby. Eliza went and tried to kind of sit with her like three nights in a row. Monroe described Eliza as the best nurse in the world. Margaret Baird Smith, great chronicler of Washington society, she said in so she proved to be and so she's got this kind of like nurse Some materialistic side and then is also has a love of scandal. The way Louisa described her as you know, I never do such a compound. I thought that was a really good one.
 
Kathryn Gehred 
Fabulous because I found a quote about her on the Monroe papers website. Yeah, it was a little meaner though. It was somebody saying like that. He just talked and talked and talked. And I'm like, I want a second opinion. Yeah.
 
Nancy Stetz  
That's a subject LC that guides at Highland often banter around it's like, what was Eliza really? Like? Is she is she's bad as it sounds like or, you know, is there more this kind of gold interior? You know, it's it's hard to hard to see, I guess it would really just take meeting her
 
Kathryn Gehred 
complicated woman. Yes, yeah. Well, that's fabulous. I feel like I understand her a lot better now. Is there anything that you think they should know about this specific context? 
 
Nancy Stetz  
Right, before we get into this letter, the letter we're going to read tonight is when Eliza is at the very end of her life, whether she knows it or not, she will have less than a year until she dies. So this is like the final chapter in her life. And she's in France, and she's just fallen on very hard times. And so to kind of set up why is she in France, after Monroe retires from being president and 1825 allies and her husband kind of join her parents at their Oak Hill plantation in Northern Virginia. And Monroe sells Highland. He sells a number of enslaved families and kind of don't usually see him back in the Charlottesville area after he's president. With the exception of sometimes going to like meetings at the Board of Visitors at University of Virginia. He's now a Northern Virginia resident, and Eliza and her husband, George J. They're there to Monroe has about a five year retirement where he's basically trying to clear debts accrued from his political service. After about five years and 1830 in September, there is this like terrible double tragedy in the family, where allies his husband, George hay, had gone to the springs and was on his way back and died. Like very suddenly, he knew he'd been ill like to the point where he'd made a will but I don't know that they realized how drastic it was. So she doesn't get to see him before he dies. While she's, you know, processing that two days later, her mother Elizabeth Monroe also died at Oak Hill. So the family loses, you know, this very valued son in law, Eliza spouse, and then Elizabeth, know, all within a two day blow of each other. So then you've got Eliza, the older Monroe daughter and her father there in Northern Virginia at Oak Hill thinking, you know, what should we do? Once Elizabeth and George are buried, Eliza and her father decide not to stay in Virginia, they decide to move in with her younger sister, Mariah Monroe, Gouverneur, who's now married and living in New York City with her husband. And so they somewhat you know, courageously just leave everything behind in Virginia and decide they're just going to go kind of live in New York City with and be a family you know, all together again. Monroe ends up actually dying in New York City at his younger daughter's house. And so then there is Eliza probably feeling very, this would be 1831. Her father dies probably feeling just very alone in life. She lost her parents and she's very close with she lost her husband. She did not get along particularly well with her brother in law, not the closest with her sister unnecessarily. Her younger sister was about 15 years younger than her. She did have a daughter that Hortensia named after Napoleon's stepdaughter, who was married and living in Baltimore. Well, big surprise digging along with her son in law, either. She's you know, a woman mature and years and trying to figure out what's next. And so apparently, she had long wanted to go back to Europe and in another kind of gem of a Louisa Catherine Adams letter. She was writing about kind of asking this visiting count if he had talked to Eliza. And the Count Told her, he understood that Mrs. Hay was so fond of France that he believes she would do anything to get there again, but that he understood that she had an old husband who would not go now that her husband passed away she goes to France. I'm thinking this first time just because she wants to. So she goes under the early 1830s. And it seems to be more just you know, again for probably just to do something completely different. Get away from all the loss and just clear her head. While she's there. Her only daughter Hortensia died. We don't know how she found out but she comes back to America cares for the three now motherless grandchildren for a couple of years. She had three granddaughters and then there's an other kind of head butting with the son in law. She also is not getting any of her inheritance from her parents for her dad, her her brother in law, Samuel Gouverneur, she says has not given her one cent. And she's spending all her inheritance from her husband on legal fees, trying to get what is due to her. And so, probably because she feels like she has no other recourse, she takes the nuclear option and decides to go back to France a second time. And that is where we find her in this letter, where she thinks there's one kind of final favor, she can cash in on. Fabulous.
 
Kathryn Gehred 
So with that, I'm going to go ahead and read the letter. 

Eliza Monroe Hay to King Louis Philippe of France, 1839

sire,

I wrote to you in March 1838 & my letter was presented to you by general Cass, minister plinipotentiary of the united states & I have not as yet received an answer. 

Since that letter was written I have been obliged on account of my health, to take a sea voyage, & came to Paris, where I have been nine months.

My family were kind, & consoled your mother the late duchess of Orleans, which was to the best of my recollection in the year 1794 & 5. When she was separated from her children, & did not know where they were. My father & mother at great risk kept up an intercourse secretly with her through servants hired for the purpose, & recommended by count Otto, & had it been known to the chamber of deputies which was the only government that existed at the time, he would have been ordered out of paris in twenty four hours. 

I am now in distress, in ill health, & in a foreign country, & therefore appeal to your Majesty to aid me for a short time. If your majesty would allow me a few rooms on the smallest scale in one of his numerous palaces in Paris, until my affairs are settled, I should feel myself under the greatest obligations. At present I am making every effort, to get my share of my late father’s estate, James Monroe, 5th president of the United States. He left my brother in law sole executor, & he has kept the whole property in his hands, & I have not as yet received one cent; but to enable me to get what is literally due to me, almost all the little income left to me by my husband George Hay, Judge of the southern district of Virginia, is taken up in   lawyers for opinions to bring the affair before the courts of the United States. 

I regret extremely, that my mother, before her death, burnt, all her papers, which puts it out of my power to produce many letters written by your mother, the late duchess of Orleans to her, & by the lady who attended her. If your majesty would give me a private audience I could explain many things, that I do not like to put upon paper. Perhaps it is not necessary to repeat that the constitution of the united states makes no provision for the children of ex presidents & it is possible, that if your Majesty should extend his protection to me at this moment of distress, that it may be remembered by the people of america with gratitude as sustaining the daughter of one of the ancient chiefs of the republick, & by a crowned head. They will feel it, & deeply feel it.

I have been much worried to find out how I could send this letter to your Majesty.  I could not ask general Cass as my first letter presented by him had not been answered. Therefore I must trust to the first opportunity that offers. I confess that I do not wish that any eye should see the contents but yours as I am told that no letter can be presented unless read by one of your ministers. Of course, if such is the case, I must send this in the usual way but the person who has charge of it has read it.

If your Majesty cannot aid me I earnestly beg that he will send me an answer, for suspense is the most dreadful state in which the human mind can be placed. I mentioned that I had lost my only child in my first letter.

My father left his Memoires & other manuscripts, a large library, & an elegant establishment in Loudon county Virginia all of which  with 3 thousand acres Mr. Gouverneur retains. Why his works are not published no one can tell. If your majesty can aid me at the present moment it may save me from utter ruin. Living in paris in very dear house rent, & fuel is enormous, & if I could for a few months be saved from such expense I may hereafter be made happy & comfortable, & repay whatever is not tentered to me. 

And that's the end. There's no signature this appears to be a draft version of a letter. Is that your understanding?
 
Nancy Stetz 
Yes. When you first read this and notice though, I thought how a student she knows what she's doing.
 
Kathryn Gehred
I like that Eliza Monroe. Hey, she's in a tough spot. She's gone to Paris. And she's like, You know what? I'm just gonna write to the king.
 
Nancy Stetz 
He owes me
 
Kathryn Gehred 
a post some strings. I've got an in with the King of France. Oh, and something I wasn't sure how to best read this. Sure. At the beginning when she says I wrote to you in March 1838, she had originally written to I wrote to Your Majesty, and then she crossed out, Your Majesty. And just write you. As soon as I saw that, I was like, yes, yes, yes. She's like, No, I don't need to be this differential.
 
Nancy Stetz 
What Republican simplicity.
 
Kathryn Gehred  
Mr. King,
 
Nancy Stetz  
you have all the letters that I know you and I both read throughout our public history careers. This is one that kind of rises like cream to the top for me, or sense of this is what I need to do. And I'm going to
 
Kathryn Gehred
just like how dare you not answer my letter? Writing again?
 
Nancy Stetz 
Yeah, she made sure he knew he had not received a response from the first one.
 
Kathryn Gehred  
It feels like a very American letter to me and that she's like, Okay, you're the king of France. My dad was James Monroe, let's talk.
 
Nancy Stetz  
You know, this letter tells us some interesting things in terms of studying this family. This is our source of what happened to Elizabeth Monroe's letters, Allah's his mom, she had burned them. To this day, you know, the papers of James Monroe out of Mary Washington, you know, they have maybe three, it's a very small number of letters that you have Elizabeth handwriting on them. And so this is the genesis of what happened to them, you know, via Eliza. So that's a very valuable thing for us. You know, in terms of our study, in our lack of Elizabeth letters, I was looking for references in different biographies of this assistance that the family provided to the Duchess of Orleans. And I can't find that anywhere. You know, I'm sure those letters, which obviously sounded like they could have gotten in big trouble for them, you know, I'm sure they got burned. But again, that's also our source that they had done this top secret operation, sending Louis Felipe's mom these, like little notes through servants Secretly, I mean, that was that was news to me, you know, reading this letter.
 
Kathryn Gehred 
Yeah. The French Revolution is such a fascinating moment. It's so interesting. It's so crazy that this is just like part of her childhood that she just remembers this.
 
Nancy Stetz 
Yes. Yeah. So casually. I believe this was between 7094 and five. happening. Yeah. So basically, Louis Felipe's mom had been kind of in this prison for the rich, you're separated from her children. And apparently somehow, as American Minister, the Monroe's were like feeding her information about how her sons were and what they were doing. It's interesting. In Monroe's autobiography, he does write about helping to free madam Lafayette from prison and also freeing Thomas Paine from prison, which are pretty elaborate schemes. He and his wife cooked up. This was a new one, you know, to learn about this to makes me wonder, are there other things that they were secretly rigging that, you know? Just haven't turned up yet?
 
Kathryn Gehred 
Yeah, they were like the Scarlet Pimpernel of America. merican ministers over there. That's crazy. And yeah, so like, yeah, I don't doubt that. That's what happened. Totally lines up, like the timing lines up. Everything seems like this is legitimate. And again, also, it's just like, such an interesting time period. Right. So like, she was there during the revolution with there's no king. They lived through the reign of terror, Napoleon and now it's like, oh, wait, I know his mom. Is now the king of France.
 
Nancy Stetz 
Yeah, yeah. And he would have been, you know, somewhat older than her. Not like by multiple decades like Kiera would have just been like an older older adolescent to her when she was over there. Yeah, no, it's it is very interesting of like, Hey, I'm gonna pull this card of my parents helped your mom.
 
Kathryn Gehred 
I bet he does have a palace she could just fill in for a while.
 
Nancy Stetz 
Is she she's thinking like there's probably some room Nolan's in. She could occupied despite what's really tragic. We don't know whether she ever got a response or not, whether he deigned to respond whether he did and just said no, but we do know that Eliza ended up dying, you know, less than a year later. She died in January 27 of 1840, presumably at her her residence, which was 62 shops daily they in Paris, you know, died alone in Paris. And so the American console Daniel Brent, arranged for her funeral and Eliza Monroe is buried in perilous says cemetery. today. She's still there. And that's why is because she had done this kind of Hail Mary, where she went over to Europe and never came back for that second time.
 
Kathryn Gehred 
Wow. Wow. I mean, again, it takes so much guts like I think that was really, really interesting. And yeah, and talking about like, heartbreaking like I was reading this just like punching the air and then when she got to the line where she says, suspense is the most dread The state in which the human mind can be placed. I mentioned that I had lost my only child and my first letter. It seems like a non sequitur, but it's like she was writing that. And then she was like, No, there's something worse. And then she wrote it. I would guess that probably that didn't make it into the final letter. Since this is the draft version. She's sort of stream of consciousness writing that broke my heart.
 
Nancy Stetz 
She's just really at this rock bottom place where she probably just feels like she has nothing to lose. And so she's just gonna try this.
 
Kathryn Gehred 
Yeah. She talks about her brother in law, Samuel gouner. Yes. Is her take making him worse? Or was he really sort of keeping all of this money from her? Do you know his side of the story?
 
Nancy Stetz  
I do think she has an accurate depiction of him. He was supposed to publish Monroe's papers. He just kind of takes years and years and years and years and years. Not very responsible project manager will say. We just learned this as a sight through some really amazing independent research, some guides had done and they found a ship manifest and Samuel Gouverneur out of the Franklin and Armfield business sold over 30 people from Oak Hill to Louisiana for money. He was in all sorts of scandals with post office he, after Alize, his younger sister dies in 1850, he within a very brief period of time remarries to this married digs Lee, who was kind of an heiress from several prominent families that seemed to have an issue with horse racing and gambling. So yeah, I would, I would say Eliza is correct. He is not distributing the wheel as he was supposed to how frustrating. Both of them and Rose daughters really don't have the most positive life after their parents die, just due to circumstances. It's interesting that when you start digging, you're like, oh, my gosh, they're having a lot of financial difficulties. And a lot of it's all coming from the sun and loss, email Gouverneur, just from his mismanagement of money.
 
Kathryn Gehred 
The next generation after this founding generation, they do seem to be like, well, we can just print the papers of our parents and that it's gonna be our ticket out of here, right? Like, that's gonna give us so much money. That'll be fine. From what I can tell the only person that really worked with was actually Bushrod. Washington, but then that they didn't even come out till after he died. Oh, really? Yes. But it was like, everybody seemed to be like, well, we'll publish these papers, everybody, Oh, snap them up. And then it's like, they're almost never profitable, certainly editions. And it takes longer than people think. So as as a documentary editor myself, I'm always interested in how these things worked out. But with Bushrod it is when you read his letters, you can like see the dollar signs like in his eyes.
 
Nancy Stetz 
He's found his golden ticket.
 
Kathryn Gehred 
And yeah, so it took a long time for Monroe's pavers to get published. It's such a shame that her mom forgot her letters again, with these women's letters. Martha did it.
 
Nancy Stetz  
Yeah, and you know, learning that like you know, Elizabeth Monroe was like involved in the big secret letters to like the exile Dutchess. I'm like this woman had you know, she had some guts to like, you know, she's doing things that she could have really gotten in trouble, you know, for doing again through her daughter's letters. Luckily, Eliza you know, we're, we were able to find out, you know, details like that.
 
Kathryn Gehred 
I feel like there's a book somewhere about this, like this next generation after? Because there's a lot of characters. Yeah, so we just don't know much about Blue. Felipe. It seems
 
Nancy Stetz 
like he lived in America for some times as a teacher. So maybe that was part of her thinking he could be sympathetic because he had spent some time in America after the revolution. Who knows? Maybe he could identify more so because of that?
 
Kathryn Gehred 
Yeah. Oh, cuz I was trying to think I was like, would anyone have written to like, Marie Antoinette? And like King of France, like Louie the 14th being like, Hey, can I just like have a remember? I'm in trouble is part of the reason that she is treating him so much as an equal because really, they really are. Yeah, she's American. She doesn't believe in this like, The King has been chosen by God thing, but at this point in France, nobody does. It sort of showing in a small way how tenuous his grasp of the throne is to me yeah, he's just some guy who just happened speaking.
 
Nancy Stetz 
We have refined the 1838 letter that he never got or any more to this, I'll definitely fill you in
 
Kathryn Gehred
some archive and Paris has this.
 
Nancy Stetz 
I'm convinced this is gonna pop up when they out of nowhere and it is there a lot more question. As another element to Eliza. Her mother fell in a fire in the retirement years at Oak Hill and was very severely burned in whenever this happened. Monroe was like writing to that son in law the scoundrels seem to Gubin are telling you about it but it kind of like in a Don't worry. She's under the lies this care Eliza having had many cases of burns under her care before. Now I'm assuming that that was a Richmond fire but Team theater firefight, Team 11. So she ends up using that, you know, really tragic experience to also care for her mom. That was just another insider tidbit about her.
 
Kathryn Gehred
It sounds like she was a really good nurse that he mentioned that it's also kind of like a nurse like personality to be very blunt and interested in drama, but also be really good at caring for people. I feel like if we're going on nurse stereotypes, that's true. Yeah,
 
Nancy Stetz
I'd imagine if like a nurse had to give King Louie Philippe a shot, she would do it with the same ceremony that she would give it to person off the street. Probably Eliza's personality and and,
 
Kathryn Gehred 
and the fact that she got this really good education and then was able to use it. I feel like
 
Nancy Stetz
she was fluent in French. I mean, I think she would have been a very cultured person to speak with apparently, even when Monroe was president, she and her mom and sister were still getting their clothes from Paris. So that was, again very much part of their personality.
 
Kathryn Gehred 
How did you feel about the French Revolution? They're clearly helping people. They're seeing the reign of terror. He's in a
 
Nancy Stetz 
kind of awkward spot, because when he was a soldier, you know, he'd met Lofa yet he'd met Dupont. So he had a lot of friends he made during the revolution that were French and so he's this kind of like, head over heels with excitement to be in France now in the 1790s. Washington is, you know, President and wanting Monroe to keep this very hardline neutrality stance, and then there's the Jay Treaty that no one will tell him or anything about and the French are kind of like, Hey, what's this in? Monroe is kind of put in this awkward position of like, no one will tell me anything. Well, we love you. We love you all like America, love spread. And then Washington, guys Monroe is, is being too pro French, because he's trying to kind of overcompensate for their insecurities about the Jay 3d. And then Washington fired Monroe, from his post is diplomat de France. Their relationship never recovered. After that Monroe came home extremely offended. He self published this defense of his actions called a view of the conduct of the executive that's like over 400 pages sticking up for the decisions he made in France in criticizing Washington for not trusting Him and not understanding what he was trying to say. And Washington apparently got a copy of this book, and wrote in the margin, disagreeing back with Monroe's points.
 
Kathryn Gehred
It's so funny talking to Washington people and talking to the Federalist people and talking to the people who work at Democratic Republican sites because it's still to this day, the party divided lives on
 
Nancy Stetz 
Yeah, because like Jefferson and Madison are like, Do it, do it, do it like that totally, like encouraging him to so. And so, this is gonna be on top of Eliza but then human row will end up having this deja vu experience where when he's ministered to Great Britain, Jefferson fired him from that because of the treaty he didn't find satisfactory. And, you know, I was like, okay, Monroe did not come home and write a defense of his action. In criticizing Jefferson, he learned he just kind of took a stiff upper lip and came home.
 
Kathryn Gehred 
Oh, man, keep getting fired by your friends.
 
Nancy Stetz 
Yeah, exactly. Yeah, yeah, maybe it was just too awkward the thought of living next door. These are kind of the the situations Eliza is probably hearing about, you know, over the dinner table. And you know, I can I can see how you would cut a be used to this level of action and drama and ups and downs and therefore continually seek it. You know, in Washington society, the 18 teens and 20s.
 
Kathryn Gehred 
Yes. Thank you so much for coming on. This is a blast.
 
Nancy Stetz 
Thank you for having me. This was really fun to discuss this letter and get them just to get I think your podcast is great. I'm so glad that you do this.
 
Kathryn Gehred 
Any other letters you have any other these 18th century letters? Come back on. We're happy to have you. It's a plan. For my listeners, I will link to this letter in the show notes. And Nancy, if you don't mind sending me the source of some of those quotes. I'll make sure I cite them in our show notes.
 
Nancy Stetz 
Glad to they deserve to be read there. They're excellent, excellent phrasing.
 
Kathryn Gehred 
With that, thank you very much for listening, and I am as ever, your most obedient and humble servant. Thank you very much.
 
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