De Grasse a Yorktown
Baltimore, MD: The Johns Hopkins Press, 1931. Presumed First Edition, First printing thus. Hardcover. xv, [1], 363, [5] pages. Illustrations. Footnotes. Appendices. Boards weak. Binding shaken. Some pages have darkened. Corners of boards worn. Text in French. From Les Editions Internationales, Paris, 1931. This was printed for the Institute Francais de Washington. James Brown Scott, J.U.D. (June 3, 1866 – June 25, 1943) was an American authority on international law. Following his return to the United States, Scott practiced law at Los Angeles, California from 1894 to 1899. He founded the law school at the University of Southern California, and was its dean, though his participation in the Spanish–American War interrupted that role. He was dean of the college of law at the University of Illinois (1899–1903), professor of law at Columbia, and professor of law at George Washington University (1905–06). In 1907 he was expert on international law to the United States delegation at the Second Hague Peace Conference. He also served on a State Department commission which made recommendations to Congress on the reform of United States nationality law, which would result in the Expatriation Act of 1907. In 1909 Professor Scott lectured at Johns Hopkins. He served as secretary of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, and wrote several works on the Hague Conferences of 1899 and 1907 (1908, 1909, 1915). Besides serving as editor in chief of the American Journal of International Law and as editor of the American Case Book, and writing numerous articles on international law and the peace movement. François Joseph Paul, Comte de Grasse, Marquis of Grasse-Tilly SMOM (13 September 1722 – 11 January 1788) was a career French officer who achieved the rank of admiral. At the age of eleven (1734), de Grasse entered the Order of Saint John as a page of the Grand Master. He served as an ensign on the galleys in battles against the Turks and the Moors. In 1740 at the age of 17, he formally entered the French Navy. He participated in French naval action in India during the Seven Years War. He was intermittently stationed in Calcutta (now Kolkata), India, from the 1760s to 1781. Following Britain's victory over the French in the Seven Years War, Grasse helped rebuild the French navy in the years after the Treaty of Paris (1763). In 1775, the American War of Independence broke out when American colonists rebelled against British rule. France supplied the colonists with covert aid, but remained officially neutral until 1778. The Treaty of Alliance (1778) established the Franco-American alliance, and France entered the war on behalf of the rebels and against Great Britain.
As a commander of a division, Comte de Grasse served under Louis Guillouet, comte d'Orvilliers at the First Battle of Ushant from July 23 to 27, 1778. The battle, fought off Brittany, was indecisive. In 1779, he joined the fleet of Count d'Estaing in the Caribbean as commander of a squadron; they were operating to counter the Royal Navy of Britain. He contributed to the capture of Grenada that year, and took part in the three actions fought by Guichen against Admiral Rodney in the Battle of Martinique (1780). Grasse was promoted to lieutenant-general of the Navy (equivalent to vice-admiral) in March 1781, and was successful in defeating Admiral Samuel Hood and taking Tobago. Grasse responded to Washington and Rochambeau's Expédition Particulière when they appealed for his aid in 1781, setting sail with 3,000 troops from Saint-Domingue, where the French Caribbean fleet was based. Grasse landed the French reinforcements in Virginia. Immediately afterward he decisively defeated the British fleet in the Battle of the Chesapeake in September 1781. He drew away the British forces and blockaded the coast until Lord Cornwallis surrendered at Yorktown, ensuring the independence of the new United States of America. After this action, de Grasse returned with his fleet to the Caribbean. In April 1782, Admiral de Grasse was defeated and taken prisoner by Admiral Rodney at the Battle of the Saintes. He initially sailed with the British fleet to Port Royal, Jamaica but after a period of only around one week was permitted to leave on the first convoy to England. In August he was granted an audience with King George III and was re-presented with his own sword, surrendered to Rodney at The Saintes. He was taken to London for a time. While there, he briefly took part in the negotiations that laid the foundations for the Peace of Paris (1783), which brought the American Revolutionary War to an end. It also realigned control of some of the Caribbean islands. On his return to France in 1784, he blamed his captains for the defeat. A court martial exonerated all of his captains, effectively ending his naval career. Condition: fair to good / No dust jacket present.
Keywords: Revolutionary War, Admiral de Grasse, Battle of the Chesapeake, Herbert Hoover, Lafayette, Yorktown, Rochambeau, Cornwallis
[Book #2120]
Price: $75.00