The Forgotten Commissioner

Sir William Mildmay and the Anglo-French Commission of 1750-1755
The Anglo-French Commission's failure to ratify the 1748 treaty of Aix-la-Chappelle was to have far-reaching consequences for the futures of Britain, France, the American colonies and India. The letters of Sir William Mildmay provide first-hand insights into 18th-century diplomacy.
Sir William Mildmay, a London lawyer, had a reputation for prudence and frugality that secured a position on the Anglo-French Commission in Paris. The Commission’s ongoing negotiations and failure to both ratify the 1748 Treaty of Aix-la-Chappelle and resolve longstanding differences were to have far-reaching consequences for the futures of Britain, France, Canada, the American colonies, and India.

The contents of William Mildmay’s letters, his private commission journal, and his official commission reports provide remarkable first-hand insight into the tortuous process of eighteenth-century diplomacy. Mildmay’s notes also raise the fascinating possibility that, in the early summer of 1752, a successful end of the treaty negotiations might have been possible, thus preventing or delaying the Seven Years’ War. Given the importance of the resulting conflagration for Britain and its Empire, Mildmay’s detailed descriptions of the commission’s work is a remarkable and unique chronicle of a crucial episode British and French diplomacy.

Enid Robbie’s Forgotten Commissioner resurrects the uncertainties, personalities, infighting, and political double-dealing behind the Anglo-French Commission through an examination of one of its quietest but most dedicated participants. As Robbie weaves Mildmay’s personal fortunes through the larger diplomatic negotiations, the reader understands that politics and diplomacy were life and death professions, not just for nations, but for individual careers.

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