The requester of Monsr. Tallerands oath of Allegiance to the U. States of America taken from the Book of Mathew Clarkson (Mayor of the City of Philada.)

Object Status:

Unlocated

Primary Source Reference:

Peale Museum Accessions Book, Historical Society of Pennsylvania, p. 21

Notes:

Charles-Maurice de Talleyrand-Périgord (1754-1838), Fench clergyman and official, was in the U.S. from 1794-1796 during the French Revolution. He took an oath of allegiance to Pennsylvania and the United States on 19 May 1794. A copy of the original manuscript is pictured here. For the text of the oath, see https://archive.org/details/memoirsofmatthew00hall/page/68/mode/2up See William Otis Sawtelle, "Talleyrand's Oath of Allegiance," Sprague's Journal of Maine History, vol. 12, no. 3 (1924): 147-48, also reproduced here.

In 1810 a "Moravian sister" named Catherine Fritsch visited the Peale Museum and left a record including this passage: "I read thoughtfully both of the Oaths that Talyrand made before a magistrate in Boston and Philadelphia respectively. How he is bound by them, thought I, our poor sea-captains and merchants have daily experience in fullest measure! The Oaths are hung here, framed." A. R. Beck, “Notes of a Visit to Philadelphia, Made by a Moravian Sister in 1810,” Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography 36, no. 3 (1912): 346-361 (quote on 361). No such oath taken in Boston is known.

Matthew Clarkson (1733-1800) was the mayor of Philadelphia from 1792 to 1796.

John G. Bringhurst was listed in Philadelphia directories as a druggist.