delanceyplace.com 05/24/06 - benjamin franklin's son

• 0 COMMENTS

In today's excerpt - Benjamin Franklin becomes estranged from his son William Franklin.  William had grown up close to Ben, and was his constant companion during their years together in London.  Ben had helped secure William's appointment as Royal Governor of New Jersey yet, when the Revolution started, William had remained loyal to the King, creating a rift between the two that was never repaired.  William was imprisoned during the war, released in a prisoner's exchange in 1778, and after a lengthy period with no communication between them, wrote his father in 1784 to "revive the affectionate intercourse and connexion which till the commencement of the late troubles had been the pride and happiness of my life."  Ben replied:

" 'Nothing has ever hurt me so much and affected me with such keen sensations as to find myself deserted in my old age by my only son; and not only deserted, but to find him taking up arms against me in a cause wherein my good fame, fortune and life were all at stake.

" 'You conceived, you say, that your duty to your King and regard for your country required this.  I ought not to blame you for differing in sentiment with me in public affairs.  We are men, all subject to errors.  Our opinions are not in our own power; they are formed and governed much by circumstances that are often as inexplicable as they are irresistible.  Your situation was such that few would have censured your remaining neuter, though there are natural duties which precede political ones, and cannot be extinguished by them.'

"Franklin underlined these last words ... he could forgive (friends) for their political differences with him on the issue of allegiance to the Crown; family, he could not. ... He did not accuse Loyalists as a group of waging war on him personally ... but he so accused William.   He seems not to have considered that William might have leveled an analogous accusation against him.  After all, Franklin was the rebel of the two."

[Ben and William met only once more, briefly and awkwardly, and remained estranged for the remainder of Ben's life.]