John Paul Jones, like other distinguished men of his day, kept copies of his correspondence, preserving many of the letters he received and autograph drafts of his own private and official letters. An exhaustive examination of all the documents in the Government archives of the United States, England, France, and Russia, and of all those existing in a variety of private archives and public libraries, has brought to light an astonishing amount of new material. Unknown incidents in Jones's life have been discovered, and several persons mysteriously referred to in his correspondence and importantly connected with his career have been identified