Chapter 12. John Quincy Adams's Sliding Cipher

In December 1798, a most unique and innovative sliding cipher, devised by John Quincy Adams, then minister in Berlin, was sent by its inventor to William Vans Murray, American ambassador to The Hague. One year earlier, the XYZ Affair and further misunderstandings regarding American support for the French leaders in their struggle against the British armed forces had severed diplomatic relations between the United States and France. And soon America fought an undeclared naval war against her former ally, France. Because of President John Adams's determined crusade for peace, and also due to his skillful dealings with a war-hungry Congress, this armed struggle did not erupt into a full-scale war. The ...

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