That we would owe to...
The new year, 1778, was a time of transition in the Revolutionary War because of Britain's inability to win in the northern colonies and because of the increasing part played by France. The French foreign minister, the Comte de Vergennes, eager to settle an old score with Britain, convinced his royal master Louis XVI to permit France to funnel secret aid to the patriots in 1776 and 1777. That aid took the form of the government's handing over munitions, arms, and clothing to the playwright Caron de Beaumarchais and his fake "Hortalez and Company," which in turn arranged with Benjamin Franklin and other patriot commissioners in Paris to have them shipped across the Atlantic.
[link|http://www.americanrevwar.homestead.com/files/OTHER.HTM|http://www.americanr...m/files/OTHER.HTM]
HTH.
