For some time I have suspected that the Vatican archives might contain some archival trace of Macintosh’s visit to Rome in 1790/91, and of his dealings with Pope Pius VI and his cardinal secretary of state, Francesco Saverio de Zelada. There is, of course, a significant gap between suspicion and certainty, particularly when it comes to an archival collection that is difficult to make sense of, or plan to consult, at a distance. More than once I have lingered on the website of the Archivio Apostolico Vaticano, and wondered about the slightly intimidating access requirements (necessitating a letter of recommendation, proof of academic credentials, etc., etc.) and the difficulty of knowing what they actually hold, in the absence of an externally accessible catalogue.

A considerable amount of work has been done by scholars in recent decades—particularly those working from the mid 1980s on the University of Michigan’s Vatican Archives Project—to develop catalogues and guides to the more than 85 linear kilometres of material that comprise the Vatican archives. Such work has led to the publication of Vatican Archives: An Inventory and Guide to the Historical Documents of the Holy See (1998), under the editorship of Francis X. Blouin, Jr., and other more thematically focused catalogues, like the multi-volume La rivoluzione francese (1787-1799). Repertorio delle fonti archivistiche e delle fonti a stampa conservate in Italia e nella Città del Vaticano, which is available for free on the website of the Direzione generale Archivi.

While such sources make it easier to visualise the organisation of the archive, and to develop a sense of where relevant information might be found, it is still somewhat confusing and intimidating for a first-time user such as myself. I was fortunate, therefore, to benefit recently from a conversation with the University of Kent historian Ambrogio A. Caiani, who has worked extensively in the Vatican archives, most particularly in researching his 2021 book, To Kidnap a Pope: Napoleon and Pius VII. Hearing about Ambrogio’s first-hand experience was extremely useful from a practical point of view and also reignited my eagerness to pursue Macintosh’s archival trail to the Eternal City.

Following my meeting with Ambrogio, I returned to my familiar haunt of Google Books to try a series of new searches in the hope that I might find a definitive link between Macintosh and the Vatican archives. Although I have searched for Macintosh (in various forms of orthography) thousands of times over the years, the algorithm that presents Google Book search results is not particularly intuitive and often won’t return specific results for Macintosh unless paired with another relevant search term, such as a date or a name. To my great surprise and satisfaction, I was able to find Macintosh in the Vatican archives (or at least catalogued in vol. 1 of La rivoluzione francese, by searching for his name (as “Mac Intosh”) alongside the phrase “segretario di stato”. This is not the first time that a search result has only come up when paired with some other term; I learned about Macintosh’s role as a counterrevolutionary spy in Switzerland only when searching for him along with the word “Berne”.

I was delighted to find this reference, reproduced above, even if it is only to a handful of letters sent from Macintosh to Zelada in 1791, as it provides reassurance that an eventual trip to Rome will pay dividends. I strongly suspect that there is other material from, or about, Macintosh yet to be identified, both at the Vatican archives and at the Archivio di Stato di Roma, but it is nice to know where to begin. As ever with this project, the more I look, the more there is to see.