From Antoine Salvator
ALS: American Philosophical Society; copy: Archives du Ministère
des affaires étrangères
<Cadiz, June 16, 1778, in French: The fleet that left Havana on
February 8 has not yet arrived, and such a delay is unheard
of. No one knows where the ships are, though we are assured
without proof that we shall see them before the end of the
month. If they had encountered a storm they would not all
have been lost, and survivors would have spread the news. A
letter from Havana raises suspicion and fear; it tells of a brigantine
that sailed with the fleet as far as the Bahama channel
and, two days after parting company, saw eight English ships
of the line. One of them gave her chase, but she escaped to
Curaçao and sent the news to Havana. She was chased as an
American, it was thought at the time; but ships arriving from
Havana report no storm, and worry grows. An English squadron
would scarcely have been on the same course as the fleet
without designs on it. Our ships, it will soon be thought, are
either at Jamaica or at the bottom of the sea.>
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