[Translation.]
Mr. Geofroy to Mr. Seward
Legation of France to the United
States,
Washington,
March 2, 1864.
Sir: A Frenchman, Mr. Cauvet, has addressed the
department for foreign affairs at Paris, for the purpose of obtaining
the liberation of his son, arbitrarily incorporated, as it would seem,
in the federal army. M. Drouyn de l’Huys, in transmitting to me the
extract annexed, from a letter, in which Mr. Cauvet, the son, states to
his family the circumstances under which he was constrained to do
military service, charges me to point out the fact to your excellency,
when asking you to have the goodness to give such orders that Mr. Cauvet
be stricken from the rolls and set free. According to the paper annexed,
this Frenchman was, on the 23d December last, at Morris island, South
Carolina, V. H. V.
Accept, sir, the assurance of my high consideration, the chargé
d’affaires of France,
Hon. William H. Seward, &c., &c., &c.
[Translation.]
Mr. Cauvet to M. Drouyn de l’Huys
Morris Island,
December 28, 1863.
I am going to tell you something that will not give you much
pleasure. I would tell you that I had hardly received your letter,
when I settled my account at the house where I was, and came back to
New York, where I staid some days, awaiting a vessel on which to
return to France, but meanwhile persons came looking for me, and
telling me I was a soldier, and that I must go, because my name had
been given at the hotel where I was staying without my knowing
anything about it, and told me that the chance had fallen on me.
There were two of us in this situation, and we were told we could
not be obliged to become soldiers, but We had no person to take care
of us, and meantime we were taken to an island in the neighborhood,
and gradually, a month afterwards, we were off the city of
Charleston, thoroughly enrolled in the regiment, and at the end of
some days were carrying on our backs the knapsack and musket.
A. CAUVET. 3d Regiment V. H. V., Morris
Island, S. C.
