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'^itfc tU w.4.J^e<*i oj tU u^vvtev. 
 
 T//B ATTEMPTS 
 
 To Separate the IV est 
 
 THE AMERICAN UNION 
 
 A PAPER READ BEFORE THE MISSOURI HISTORICAL SOCIETY. 
 FERRUARY 4, 1885 
 
 — BY THK — 
 
 / 
 RT. RF.V. C. F. ROBERTSON, D. D , LL. I). 
 
 Member of the American Historical Association, of the Historical Societies of Missouri 
 and Virginia, the Huguenot Society of America and the Southern Historical 
 Society; Corresponding Member of the Historical Societies of 
 Maryland, Wisconsin, New England Historic-Gene- 
 alogical Society, Kansas, Georgia, etc. 
 
 /s>* 
 
 ST. LOUIS 
 
 1885 
 
MISSOURI HISTORICAL SOCIETY. 
 
 Publication No. S. 
 
 PRESS OF W, \V. WILLIAMS, CLEVELAND, O. 
 
 
NOTE. 
 
 Below are given the editions of the works referred to in the 
 following paper: 
 
 History of the United States, by George Bancroft. lo vols. Boston, i856-'75. 
 
 History of the P'ormation of the ('onstitution of the United States, by George Bancroft. 
 2 vols. New York, 1882. 
 
 American State Papers. 38 vols. Washington, 1832. 
 
 Secret Journals of the Acts and Proceedings of Congress. 4 vols. Boston, 1821. 
 
 Writings of Washington, by Jared Sparks. 12 vols. Boston, 1837. 
 
 Works of Benjamin Franklin, by Jared Sparks. 10 vols. Boston, 1840. 
 
 Works of John Adams, edited by Chas. F. Adams. 10 vols. Boston, 1853. 
 
 Writings of Thomas Jefferson, edited by H. A.Washington. 9 vols. Washington, 1853. 
 
 Letters and Other Writings of James Madison. 4 vols. Philadelphia, r867. 
 
 Lives and Times of the Chief Justices, by Henry Flanders. Philadelphia, 1855. 
 
 Memoire Historique at Politicjue sur la Louisiane, par M. de Vergennes. Paris, 1802. 
 
 History of Louisiana, by F. X. Martin. New Orleans, 1882. 
 
 History of Louisiana — The Spanish Domination, by Chas. Gayarrd. New York, 1854. 
 
 History of Louisiana — The American Domination, by Chas.Gayarrd. New Orleans, 1885. 
 
 Histore de la Louisiane, par M. Barb(5 Marbois. Paris, 1829. 
 
 Voyage h la Louisiane, par Bauduy des Lozier^s. 3 vols. Paris, 1802. 
 
 C'reoles of Louisiana, by George W. Cable. New York, 1884. 
 
 Treaties and Conventions between the United States and Other Powers. Washington ,1871 
 
 Memoirs of My Own Times, by James Wilkinson. 3 vols. Philadelphia, 1816. 
 
 Proofs of the Corruption of Gen. James Wilkinson, by Daniel Clark. Philadelphia, 1809. 
 
 Journal and Account of the Determmation of the Boundaries of Louisiana, by Andrew 
 P^llicott. Washington, 1803. 
 
 Reports of the Trials of Col. Aaron Burr and Others, by David Robertson. 2 vols. 
 Philadelphia, 1808. 
 
 Trial of Aaron Burr for Treason. 2 vols. New York, 1875. 
 
 History of Political Parties in the State of New York, by J. D. Hanmiond. 2 vols. 
 Albany, 1842. 
 
 Memoirs of Aaron Burr, by M. L. Davis. 2 vols. New York, 1836. 
 
 History of the Discovery, etc., of the Valley of the Mississippi, by John W. Monette 
 2 vols. New York, 1846. 
 
4 NOTE. 
 
 Mississippi as a Province, Territory and State, by J. F. H. Claiborne. Jackson, 1880. 
 Historical Collections of Georgia, by George White. New York, 1855. 
 Sketches of Louisiana, by Amos Stoddard. Philadelphia, 1812. 
 History of Alabama, by A. J. Pickett. 2 vols. Charleston, 1851. 
 Annals of Tennessee, by J. G. M. Ramsey. Charleston, 1853. 
 History of the Commonwealth of Kentucky, by Mann Butler. Louisville, 1834. 
 History of Kentucky, by Wm. B. Allen. Louisville, 1872. 
 Blennerhassett Papers, by Wm. H. Saftbrd. Cincinnati, 1864. 
 Bland Papers. 2 vols. Petersburg, 1840. 
 
 Letters and Times of the Tylers, by L. G. Tyler. 2 vols. Richmond, 1884. 
 Life of Gen. William Eaton. Brookfield, 1813. 
 
 Johns Hopkins" Historical and Political Studies. Third series. Baltimore, 1885. 
 France and the United States, by Count A. de Circourt. Boston, 1877. 
 Struggle for Neutrality in America. — Address New York Historical Society, by Charles 
 Francis Adams. New York, 1871. 
 
 Mississippi Question, by William Duane. Philadelphia, 1803. 
 Transactions of the Oneida Historical Society. Utica, 1881. 
 
 It may be noted that Nogalcs, Walnut Hills, Fort Adams 
 and Vicksburg are the successive names of the same place. In 
 the same way Chickasaw Bluffs and Memphis indicate the same 
 place. The same is true of the Falls of the Ohio and Louisville. 
 
THE ATTEMPTS MADE TO SEPARATE THE WP:ST 
 FROM THE AMERICAN UNION. 
 
 The war of the Revolution was scarcely over and peace de- 
 clared before there began an effort which, in various forms, was 
 carried on for twenty years, to separate the western portion of 
 the Union from the states on the Atlantic seaboard. The first 
 attempt to divide the Union was by a line running nearly north 
 and south, and along the Alleghany mountains. The cause 
 which gave life to the movement was the vast extent of the ter- 
 ritory of the states, the little knowledge of and communication 
 at that time had between the distant parts, and the adverse in- 
 terests which were created by the difference of climate, and 
 antecedents, and previous nationality, of those now bound 
 together in the American Union. 
 
 There is considerable ignorance now, even on the part of well 
 informed persons, as to the condition of the several parts of 
 the country, with all our facilities of travel and communication. 
 It is not strange that this should be much greater when few 
 could ever go far from their own firesides, when newspapers 
 were rare, and high rates of postage made frequent communi- 
 cation impossible. As resulting from this, the provincial stamp 
 set upon the several sections, by reason of climate, and soil, 
 and occupation, would be more fixed, and antagonisms more 
 emphatic than now, when all judgments and tastes are modified 
 by a ready and constant attrition of the most distant parts upon 
 each other. 
 
 It could not well be otherwise than that regions so distant 
 and dissimilar, and in- so many matters opposed in interest, 
 should find it difficult to pass from the condition of separate and 
 independent provinces to that of a federal union without many 
 
6 THE WEST AND THE AMERICAN UNION. 
 
 jarrings of discord. This would be especially likely in the 
 earlier days of the government, before the relative rights and 
 duties of the central and state administrations had been ad- 
 justed, and when the burdens of debt incurred by a long war 
 had to be borne, and distributed, and paid. In no part of the 
 country was this strain greater than in the recently and sparsely 
 settled regions west of the Alleghanies, where, along with a self- 
 assertion and indisposition to submit easily to control, always 
 characteristic of a frontier life, there was but little ability as yet 
 to bear heavy exactions of impost and taxation, and perhaps no 
 very great sense of the degree of previous protection extended 
 by the central government, as calling from them justly for any 
 large self-sacrifices now. They were poor, and had with great 
 hardships made homes and settlements. The Atlantic states 
 were wealthier, and had done little for them. They were not 
 patient under any heavy burdens to be put on them now. 
 
 In order to come fairly to a consideration of these early chaf- 
 ings against the new and strange bonds of union, it will be 
 necessary to remind ourselves of the political situation of the 
 Mississippi valley at that time. 
 
 On the third of November, 1762, the French king ceded to 
 Spain all the country known under the name of Louisiana,* 
 which itself, in 17 12, Louis XIV had defined in his letters patent 
 to Crozat to be all the country between Mexico and Carolina, 
 the river Mississippif from the sea to the Illinois, the Missouri 
 river, the Wabash, and all the land, lakes and rivers flowing 
 into any part of the river Mississippi. 
 
 This donation was accepted, but the transaction was kept 
 secret, and the king of France continued to act as sovereign. 
 In the treaty of Paris, in 1763, between Spain and France on 
 the one side and Great Britain on the other, it was agreed that 
 the limits of the French and British possessions should be a 
 line drawn along the middle of the Mississippi river from its 
 source to the river Iberville; aloiig the middle of that stream, 
 
 *Vergennes, Mem. Sur la Louis., pp. 32-3. 
 +Martin Louisiana, p. 114. 
 
THE WEST AND THE AMERICAN UNION. 7 
 
 and of the lakes Maurepas and Pontchartrain* to the sea ; and 
 that all on the left side of the Mississippi river, except the town 
 and island of New Orleans, should belong to the king of Eng- 
 land. New Orleans and the country to the west were to belong 
 to the king of Spain. 
 
 In the same year Great Britain divided Florida into two 
 provinces. West Florida was bounded by the Appalachicola 
 river on the east, and by the thirty-first degree of latitude on 
 the north. In March, 1764, on the representation that impor- 
 tant settlements to the north had been left out, the northern 
 boundary was made along a line due east from the mouth of the 
 Yazoo river to the Appalachicola. In 1777, Great Britain 
 purchased of the Choctaws the Natchez district, extending 
 along the Mississippi river from latitude thirty-one, one hun- 
 dred and ten miles northward to the mouth of the Yazoo. f 
 
 In November, 1782, in the preliminary articles, and on the 
 third of September, 1783, in the definitive treaty of peace be- 
 tween the United States and Great Britain, the southern bound- 
 ary of the United States was determined to be a line drawn 
 from the Mississippi river due east in the northernmost | part 
 of the thirty-first degree of latitude to the Chattahoochie river, 
 thence to its junction with the Flint river ; thence to the head 
 of the St. Mary's river; thence to the ocean; in all this coin- 
 ciding with the boundary of east and west Florida, as estab- 
 lished in 1763 by Great Britain. 
 
 On the same day the treaty of peace between Great Britain 
 and Spain declared an entire cession in full right of east and 
 west Florida to Great Britain to Spain without defining the 
 northern boundary. 
 
 From this, as was natural, and, as Pontalba asserts, as England 
 intended, arose a dispute between the United States and Spain. 
 The United States claimed, under its treaty with Great Britain, 
 that its southern boundary line was the thirty-first degree. 
 Spain, on the other hand, claimed, as part of west Florida, all 
 
 *Gayarre, third ser., p. 93. 
 fClaiborne, Miss., p. 98 
 + Treaties U. S. p. 316. 
 
8 THE WEST*AND THE AMERICAN UNION. 
 
 of the territory southijof the line running east from the mouth 
 of the Yazoo river, which was one hundred and ten miles fur- 
 ther north. To strengthen her title, in June, 1784, Spain made 
 a treaty at Pensacola with the Creeks, Choctaws and Chicka- 
 saws inhabiting this district, by which they conceded the Span- 
 ish title, and engaged to support it. Subsequently, also, Alex- 
 ander McGillivray, head chief of the Creeks, and agent of the 
 other tribes of the Muscogee confederacy, acknowledged him- 
 self subject to Spain. 
 
 Spain had possession of the disputed territory, under the 
 conquest of Galvez, and refused to surrender it to the United 
 States. She erected forts at Nogales, now Vicksburg, and 
 subsequently at New Madrid, and she strengthened her garri- 
 sons at Manchac, Baton Rouge and Natchez. Both powers had 
 equitable titles, the dispute arising from the discrepancy in the 
 terms of the treaty made by Great Britain with the two nations. 
 Of course, all this occasioned great bitterness between the powers, 
 and also individuals of each nation. 
 
 The district west of the Aileghanies, now comprising the 
 states of Kentucky and Tennessee, w^as rapidly filling with 
 adventurous persons, many of whom had been in the Revolu- 
 tionary armies. The severity of Indian depredations was no 
 longer so severely felt, and towns were springing up. The rich- 
 ness of the soil was bringing forth abundant harvests of wheat, 
 and corn, and tobacco, which could only with difficulty seek 
 a market east of the mountains, and must consume themselves 
 in the cost of transit. The natural channel of trade was down 
 the Ohio, Cumberland and Mississippi rivers, and the most ad- 
 vantageous market would be New Orleans. On account of the 
 bitterness, however, between the nations, previous to 1787 all 
 those who ventured on the Mississippi river had their property 
 seized by the first Spanish vessel that was met ; and little or no 
 communication was kept up between the respective countries. 
 
 The free navigation of the Mississippi river, south of the 
 thirty-first degree, had been reluctantly yielded to Spain.* In 
 
 * Writings of Madison, IV., p. 558. 
 
THE WEST AND THE AMERICAN UNION. 9 
 
 1780-81, when the preliminaries of peace were being discussed 
 in Paris and Madrid, the mutiny of the Pennsylvania line was 
 causing anxiety, and the British forces under Cornwallis and 
 Tarleton were overrunning the South.* There was consequently 
 a fear on the part of the delegates in Congress from South Car- 
 olina and Georgia that, if a peace was then forced by the 
 European powers, the principle of uti possidetis would cause 
 those states to fall into the hands of Great Britain, which occu- 
 pied them then. To prevent this, and secure the important 
 adhesion of Spain, the American ministers were instructed that, 
 if Spain inflexibly demanded it as a condition of alliance, the 
 concession of our claim to the free navigation of the Mississippi 
 river, south of the thirty-first degree, should be allowed. 
 
 Years had passed and peace was declared, but the United 
 States were still under the confederacy, and suffering from aU 
 the weakness which came from that temporary arrangement. 
 Its seat was in New York, at a great distance from the Mississ- 
 ippi valley : and it was but slightly aware of, or concerned 
 about, the consequence of that remote region. In 1785 Mr. 
 Jay, who was conducting a negotiation with Gardoqui,the Span- 
 ish representative on this subject, having been called upon by 
 Congress to give his views on the matter, recommended that 
 it would be expedient to conclude a treaty with Spain, limited 
 to twenty or thirty years, and for the United States to stipulate 
 that during the term of the treaty they would forbear to nav- 
 igate the Mississippi below their southern bouridary.f This view 
 was sanctioned by the seven more northern, and opposed by 
 the five more southern states. ;{: Seven states in Congress 
 authorized Jay to conclude a treat}' with Gardoqui, and restrict 
 the right of the United States to the Mississippi river, while 
 the article of the confederation expressly declared that the 
 United States should enter into no treaty unless nine states in 
 Congress assented to it. But Spain would not even agree to 
 
 * White, Georgia, p. 106. 
 
 + Butler, History Kentucky, p. 156. 
 
 X Lives Chief Justices, I, 364. 
 
lO THE WEST AND THE AMERICAN UNION. 
 
 this Stipulation, because it implied an ultimate right in the United 
 States to navigate the river.* 
 
 Naturally this apparent indifference or hostility on the part of 
 Congress to what was of vital importance to the western coun- 
 try, the free navigation of the Mississippi river, and the possi- 
 bility thus of getting a market for their produce, had an irritating 
 effect upon the excitable population of the section. This cause 
 of anger was intensified by the delay of Congress in complying 
 with the request of Kentucky to be received as a state in the 
 Union. The cause of this delay, and afterwards the rejection 
 of the overture, was the fear of disturbing the sectional balance. 
 The eastern states, by a majority of seven to six, were not will- 
 ing to give their assent to the admission of the district of Ken- 
 tucky into the Union, as an independent state, unless Vermont,! 
 or the district of Maine, was brought forward at the same time. 
 Back of this disinclination was a further cause. In the settlement 
 of the terms of peace with Great Britain, Congress had aban- 
 doned the check of a two-thirds vote on commecrial questions, 
 and substituted that of a majority. In the haste to relieve the 
 embarrassments of trade, and restore prosperous business rela- 
 tions, the more commercial states of the north, not waiting for 
 Great Britain to comply with the conditions set for it, such as 
 the surrender of slaves, and the giving up of the posts on the 
 northwestern frontier, immediately removed all restrictions from 
 trade, and left Great Britain, with her large capital free, to com- 
 pete for the business of the states. This operated to the dis- 
 advantage of Virginia and the other southern states,;}; in hand- 
 ing over their tobacco to the monopoly of England. This 
 cause would also act as a bar on the admission of any new south- 
 ern state that would be likely to change the majority and disturb 
 the existing commercial arrangements. 
 
 Spain, however, was on the alert to use for her advantage the 
 anger of the people of Kentucky, aroused by the seeming hos- 
 
 * .Secret Jour. Cong., IV, p. 296. 
 
 •f- Bancroft, History Constitution, I, 373. 
 
 :J: Bland Papers, II, 83. Tyler Letters, I, 102. 
 
THE WEST AND THE AMERICAN UNION. I I 
 
 tility of the Government of the United States to the dearest 
 interests of the West. 
 
 Among those who had come to Lexington, Kentucky, in 
 1784, to settle was General James Wilkinson. He was born in 
 Maryland, marched with Arnold in 1775 through Maine to 
 Quebec, was at the surrender of Saratoga, and had fallen into 
 disrepute with Washington, and resigned in 1778, because he had 
 told to Lord Stirling, while under the influence of wine, the 
 expressions used by Conway to Gates to the disparagement of 
 the generalship of Washington. He was a wordy, officious, 
 consequential person, who liked to make a profit, and he be- 
 came engaged in the dry goods trade. In June, 1787, he de 
 scended the Ohio and Mississippi to New Orleans, with a cargo 
 of tobacco and flour, determined to try his enterprise and ad- 
 dress at the seats of the Spanish government in Louisiana. 
 He was successful, and Governor Miro granted General Wilkin- 
 son permission to bring tobacco to New Orleans on favorable 
 terms. Wilkinson also impressed the importance of his influ- 
 ence to such an extent upon the Spanish authorities that a 
 monopoly and special remissions of duty were made to him, so 
 that for some time all the trade from the Ohio was carried on 
 in his name, and a line from him sufficed to ensure to the 
 owner of a boat every privilege and protection that he could 
 desire. 
 
 The Spanish government at this time, 1786-87, had pro- 
 jected a plan for colonizing Louisiana from the United States ; 
 and Gardoqui, the Spanish minister in New York, had sent sev- 
 eral vessels to the Mississippi with colonists. Li the depression 
 that existed during the latter years of the confederacy, when 
 the United States had not the ability to pay its old officers and 
 soldiers,* General Steuben, Colonel George Morgan and other 
 Revolutionary officers of rank opened a treaty with Gardoqui 
 for the grant of an extensive district of country west of the 
 Mississippi, upon the plan of establishing a militar}^ colony 
 under particular privileges and exemptions. In pursuance of 
 
 •Wilkinson, Mem. II, 3. 
 
12 THE WEST AND THE AMERICAN UNION. 
 
 this, in the winter of 1788-89, Colonel Morgan, of New Jersey, 
 under the sanction of Gardoqui, came down the Ohio with a 
 considerable body of colonists. Gardoqui had made to him a 
 concession of from twelve to fifteen millions of acres on the 
 west side of the Mississippi river, from the mouth of the St. 
 Francis river to Point Cinq Hommes. He proposed to estab- 
 lish a city which in ten years would reach a hundred thous- 
 and inhabitants, as near the mouth of the Ohio as the nature 
 of the land would permit, and he called the place New Madrid, 
 in compliment to the Spaniards. To Morgan Gardoqui gave 
 the concession of a free post. Thus privileged and happily 
 situated, commanding the trade of the Mississippi and Ohio 
 rivers, the place would intercept all the products of the coun- 
 try going south. 
 
 Such a plan, however, did not suit the purposes of Wilkinson. 
 He had his own scheme of colonization, which he broached to 
 Governor Miro, by which he proposed the settlement of several 
 thousand families in west Florida, or on the Arkansas and 
 White rivers, to whom lands were to be granted in proportion 
 to their numbers and condition, and for whom Wilkinson was 
 to be allowed from one to three hundred dollars a family. For 
 this purpose he presented a list of names of persons in Ken- 
 tucky as emigrants, in order to give consistency to his proposi- 
 tion. Having this scheme view, although it was never realized, 
 Wilkinson discouraged the plans of other colonists on the plea 
 that trade v/ould be diverted from New Orleans. The New 
 Madrid concession was therefore withdrawn ; the colonists scat- 
 tered, and a fort was erected there. 
 
 Wilkinson, on his visit to New Orleans, determined also to 
 demand for his services, for promoting the schemes of coloni- 
 zation into Spanish territory, the privilege of furnishing a con- 
 siderable annual supply of tobacco to the Mexican market, 
 which he thought would secure immense fortunes to himself 
 and his friends.* 
 
 As might be presumed, Wilkinson did not receive these fa- 
 
 * Clark, Proofs against Wilkinson, p. 13. 
 
THE WEST AND THE AMERICAN UNION. 1 3 
 
 vors from the Spanish governor without making pledges in re- 
 turn. He declared that there was a general abhorrence through- 
 out the western parts against Congress, because of its indiffer- 
 ence to their interests in the matter of the navigation of the 
 Mississippi river, and that on this account they were on the 
 point of separating from the Union. He appealed to Spanish 
 fears''^ on the idea that the British, who still held the north- 
 western forts, could easily unite with the increasing strength of 
 the western settlements, and invade and take possession of 
 Lousiana, and even of Mexico. Nor did Wilkinson leave 
 New Orleans without a pledge to devote himself to the task 
 of delivering up Kentucky into the hands of the Spanish king. 
 
 Wilkinson did not make this declaration without knowing of 
 the intense discontent which existed in that district. The 
 growing population were deeply excited because they had in 
 vain petitioned Congress to secure for them the free use of the 
 Mississippi river, without which it was useless for them to till 
 the ground, since they had no market for their produce; and 
 they were determined to take the matter into their own hands. 
 They were divided up into different parties. f One was for de- 
 claring themselves independent of the United States, and form- 
 ing a new republic, in close alliance with Spain. Another was 
 in favor of becoming a part of Louisiana, and submitting to the 
 laws of Spain. Another party desired to declare war with 
 Spain, and seize New Orleans. Another wanted to prevail on 
 Congress to extort from Spain the free navigation of the river ; 
 and still another party wished to have France recover Louisi- 
 ana and extend her protection to Kentucky. 
 
 As Congress, on the third of July, 1788, finally decided to 
 postpone the application of Kentucky to be received into the 
 Union, in one week from that day Mr. John Brown, who rep- 
 resented Kentucky before Congress, wrote a letter to the Presi- 
 dent of the Kentucky convention that Mr. Gardoqui, the Span- 
 ish minister, in a conversation, had stated that t "if the peo- 
 
 * Gayarre, Spanish Domination, p. 182. 
 +Gayarrc, Spanish Domin. p. 252. 
 X Butler, p. 171. 
 
14 THE WEST AND THE AMERICAN UNION. 
 
 pie of Kentucky would erect themselves into an independent 
 state, and appoint a proper person to negotiate with him, he 
 would enter into an arrangement with them for the exportation 
 of their produce to New Orleans, on terms of mutual advantage," 
 
 About this time. May 15, 1788, Wilkinson wrote to Miro that 
 Congress,* because of the present federal compact, can neither 
 dispose of men or money. The new government, should it es- 
 tablish itself, will have to encounter difficulties, which will keep 
 it weak for three or four years, before the expiration of which, 
 " I have good grounds," he said, "to hope that we shall have 
 completed our negotiations, and shall have become too strong 
 to be subjected by any force which may be sent against us." 
 And, also, " When this people shall find out that they can pro- 
 cure articles not manufactured among us more conveniently 
 through this river, the dependent state in which we are will 
 cease, and with it all motives for connection with the other side 
 of the Appalachian Mountains." 
 
 Wilkinson was, in the meantime, shipping his cargoes to New 
 Orleans, and prosecuting his profitable business ventures.j His 
 agent, Major Dunn, gave it out as certain that the next year 
 Kentucky would act as an independent state, and Miro writes 
 to the home government, as from Wilkinson, that "the direc- 
 tion of the current of the rivers, which run in front of their 
 dwellings, points clearly to the power to which they ought to 
 ally themselves. "I 
 
 In the Kentucky convention of November, 1788, the urgency 
 of Wilkinson bore on the two points : || First, the importance 
 of independence, and of the formation of a state constitution, 
 without waiting for the previous consent of the parent state of 
 Virginia ; and second, the securing of the free navigation of 
 the Mississippi, even though this could only be secured by a 
 Spanish connection. In reciting the results of that convention 
 to Miro, Wilkinson writes: "To consolidate the interests § and 
 
 * Gayarre S. D., p. 210. 
 t Bancroft, Consti., I, p. 
 J Gayarre S. D. p. 212. 
 II Butler, Ken., p. 172. 
 ^ Gayarre S. D., p. 227. 
 
THE WEST AND THE AMERICAN UNION. I 5 
 
 confirm the confidence of our friends, to try our streni^th, to 
 provoke the resentment of Congress with a view to stimulate 
 that body into some invidious act which might excite the pas- 
 sions of the people — these are the motives which influenced me 
 
 . . . In order to prevent the suspicions and feelings of dis- 
 trust already existing here, and inflame the animosity between 
 the eastern and western states, Spain must resort to every arti- 
 fice in her power. . . . Every manifestation of the power 
 of Spain, and of the debility of the United States, every evi- 
 dence of the resolution of the former to retain exclusively to 
 herself the right of navigation on the Mississippi, will facilitate 
 our views. Every circumstance, also, that will tend to impede 
 our admission as an independent state, will increase the discon- 
 tent of the people and favor the execution of our plan." 
 
 Wilkinson also sought to increase in the Spanish governor 
 the sense of obligation for his services b\' dilating on the ad- 
 dress* with which he had caused the British Doctor Connally, 
 an emissary from Lord Dorchester, the go\-ernor of Canada, 
 who had come to offer English assistance in any expedition in 
 the west to secure the free navigation of the Mississippi, to re- 
 turn affrighted to his own country after having accomplished 
 nothing. 
 
 The result of it all was that the Spanish governor, who was 
 not without his doubts all along that Wilkinson had motives of 
 his own, commercial or otherwise, in his ]5ro-Spanish declara- 
 tions, sent him five thousand dollars for the outlay that Wilkin- 
 son declared that he had been at. and half as much more with 
 which to corrupt Marshall and Muter, who were opposed to 
 the Spanish connection. f 
 
 The causes operating in Kcntuck}^ in favor of Spain also 
 manifested themselves in the western settlements of North 
 Carolina. In order to make a fund for the pax'ment of her 
 debts, Congress had asked the states to cede to her all their 
 vacant lands to the west, that they might be sold to pay Rev- 
 
 *Blennerhassett Papers, p. 87. Gayarr6, S. D., p. 235. 
 tGayarre, S. D., p. 256. 
 
1 6 THE WEST AND THE AMERICAN UNION, 
 
 olutionary claims. ^^ North Carolina did this, and ceded the two- 
 counties of Cumberland and Washington, which constitute the 
 present state of Tennessee. In compliance with this act the 
 people assembled, under the leadership of General Sevier, the 
 hero of the battle of King's Mountain, and proceeded to or- 
 ganize the state of Frankland. In a few months after North 
 Carolina rescinded its previous action and recalled its cession 
 of land.-|- This enraged the people west of the mountains, 
 who were poor, and ^had borne privations, and were harassed 
 by taxes, and the great distance of the courts in which they 
 might seek redress. There ensued, therefore, some acts of 
 violence in the contention between the two jurisdictions. The 
 settlers on the Cumberland river, which ran through the district 
 and sought the gulf, were deeply interested in the navigation 
 of the Mississippi, and, therefore, were operated on by the same 
 motives as those which were stirring up Kentucky.]' 
 
 On the twelfth of September, 1788, in his resentment. Gen- 
 eral Sevier wrote to Gardoqui to inform him that the inhabit- 
 ants of Frankland were unanimous in their vehement desire to 
 form an alliance and treaty of commerce with Spain, and put 
 themselves under her protection. They named the county of 
 Cumberland, in West Tennessee, Miro, in compliment of the 
 Spanish governor. These overtures were flattering to Spanish 
 pride, but had to be received with caution, because Spain was 
 at peace with the United States. A concession was, however, 
 made, that the people of the Washington and Miro districts 
 should have the privilege of carrying their produce down the 
 Mississippi to the market of New Orleans on a duty of fifteen 
 per cent., which Miro reserved the right of reducing accord- 
 ing to his pleasure in behalf of any men of influence who might 
 be named by the Spanish • agent. Miro communicated Avith 
 Wilkinson with regard to these negotiations, and a system of 
 
 *While these lands were a cause of contention, they furnished also a common interest 
 which kept the country together. Johns Hopkins' Historical Studies, third ser., I., 
 Introduction. 
 
 + Spark's Franklin, X, p. 290. 
 
 X Ramsey, Tennessee, p. 298 ; Gayarre, S. D. p. 257. 
 
THE WEST AND THE AMERICAN UNION. 1/ 
 
 cypher messages between them was devised to ensure secrecy. 
 
 In the year 1789, a powerful company was formed in South 
 Carolina, and purchased from the state of Georgia an immense 
 tract of land, including lifty-two thousand square miles, and 
 extending on the Mississippi river from the Yazoo to the neigh- 
 borhood of Natchez. As this was in the debatable ground 
 between the United States and Spain, no time was lost by the 
 company in endeavoring to come to a good understanding with 
 the Spanish authorities in New Orleans. Their alliance was 
 sought, and the company declared its desire to form itself into 
 an advantageous rampart for Spain. Miro communicated the 
 business to Wilkinson, who immediately addressed himself to 
 the South Carolina gentlemen, protesting his own disinterested- 
 ness, and influence with the Spanish governor, and their need 
 to have the services in New Orleans for the negotiations of a 
 gentleman of distinction, with full powers, and offering him- 
 self for the position. He loaned to Captain Cape, the agent 
 of the South Carolina company, according to his statement to 
 the Spanish governor, three thousand dollars, to secure his in- 
 fluence. His efforts, for a time, did not seem to be without 
 result. Miro praised Wilkinson for the part that he had acted 
 toward the company. On the twenty-fourth of May, James 
 O'Fallon, the general agent for the South Carolina company, 
 wrote to Miro, from Lexington, Kentuck}', the residence of 
 Wilkinson, that he had "prevailed upon the company to con- 
 sent to be the slaves of Spain, that they had formed the resolu- 
 tion of separating themselves from the Union, and that all that 
 they desired from the Spanish Crown was a secret cooperation, 
 which would soon ripen into a sincere friendship."* 
 
 Thus, throughout the whole west, the restlessness of the 
 frontier settlers, along with the feebleness of the confederacy, 
 worked, with the machinations of Spain, to bring about a dis- 
 position for the severance of the western country from the Uni- 
 ted States, with the hope of placing it under the protection of 
 that power which held the key of the situation, in the posses- 
 
 *Gayarr6, S. D. p, 289. 
 
1 8 THE WEST AND THE AMERICAN UNION, 
 
 sion of the mouth of the Mississippi river. And in this busi- 
 ness General Wilkinson was the principal agent of the Spanish 
 governor, and a stipendiary upon the Spanish treasury. Thus, 
 later,, when his offices seemed to bear less results, the governor 
 writes to the home secretary that in his opinion the general 
 should be retained in the service with an annual pension of two 
 thousand dollars; and he also recommends that a pension be 
 granted to Colonel Sebastian, of Kentucky, because "he will 
 be able to enlighten me on the conduct of Wilkinson, and on 
 what we have to expect from the plans of the said brigadier- 
 general."* One spy was hired to watch the other spy. 
 
 But such a plan of securing Spanish dominancy in the west 
 could not permanently be successful. In the first place it was 
 founded upon deceit and stealth. Then the texture of charac- 
 ter of the hardy American would inevitably in the end prevail 
 as a ruling interest and controlling power as against the weaker 
 and subtler nature of the Spaniard. Furthermore, the schem- 
 ing had profited by the weakness of the confederacy. This, 
 however, in 1789, gave place to the greater efficiency of the 
 Union under the present constitution; and the firm and wise 
 administration of Washington soon began to tell in the respect 
 for authority, and the greater cohesion of the parts. Besides 
 this, the reduction of the tariff on the part of Spain on ship- 
 ments down the Mississippi, diminished the inducements for 
 separation, and the greater numbers and boldness of the western 
 settlements made it clear to the Spanish authorities that they 
 must change their tone of menace. 
 
 In the year 1791, the Spanish intrigues in the west and south 
 began to slacken from want of success, and the United States 
 set on foot persuasives, through its minister in Madrid, to have 
 Spain give up New Orleans, and confine itself to the western 
 bank of the Miss^issippi river. 
 
 While these efforts were making, the west came to feel some 
 of the effects'^of an agitation which was dividing political parties 
 in tlie east, and had its origin on the continent of Europe. A 
 
 *Gayarre, S. D., p. 286. 
 
THE WEST AND THE AMERICAN UNION. I9 
 
 •supposed inclination * towards Great Britain, our old antago- 
 nist, was a mark of the Federal party, which dominated in the 
 administration of President Washington. A sympathy with 
 France, our former ally, was the characteristic of the Republi- 
 can party, which was in opposition, and whose leader a little 
 later was Jefferson. The one side emphasized the necessity 
 of strengthening the Federal Union ; the other party asserted 
 the original rights of the states, and enlarged upon the dangers 
 of centralization. The bitterness between the parties was for 
 many years most violent. 
 
 In 1793, the sympathy in this country with France, which 
 was in the throes of revolution, took the form of the organiza- 
 tion of democratic societies, at first in Philadelphia, which 
 violently proclaimed the most extreme anarchical notions of 
 universal rights, such as had broken to pieces the social order 
 in France. There would, therefore, be little wonder that in 
 Kentucky, where Great Britain was charged with being the in- 
 stigator of the barbarous Indian depredations, and where many 
 of the old soldiers lived who had fought along side of the 
 French during the Revolutionary struggle, similar societies 
 should be organized. f Genet, the French minister in this coun- 
 try, appealed to the alliance of 1778 as the ground on which 
 we should side with his country in its differences with PLngland, 
 made a triumphal progress through the states, dealt out com- 
 missions to privateers, enlisted officers and men, J; organized 
 Jacobin clubs, and sent out four § agents to Kentucky, who set 
 on foot societies in Georgetown, Lexington and Paris. They is- 
 sued addresses, in which they traded on the grievances of the 
 western people, enlarged on the advantages which \\ould flow 
 from their separating themselves from the rest of the United 
 States, and the glorious results which would accrue from going 
 down and freeing Louisiana from the thraldom of Spain and 
 
 *Barb^ Marbois, His. Louisiane, p. 241. 
 + Blennerhasset Pap. p. lor. 
 J Lives Chief Justices, I, p. 390. 
 2 American State Pap., I., 455. 
 
20 THE WEST AND THE AMERICAN UNION. 
 
 setting up a republic there. They called upon the French in 
 Louisiana to rise against their present rulers. 
 
 A force of two thousand men was enlisted for this expedi- 
 tion, at the head of which George Rogers Clark* accepted the 
 office of "Major General of the Army of France, and Com- 
 mander-in-Chief of the Revolutionary Legions of the Mississ- 
 ippi river. " 
 
 The firmness of Washington compelled the recall of Genet, 
 the French minister, and this caused the collapse of the intended 
 movement against the Spanish posts. f 
 
 At this time there were symptoms of a war between Great 
 Britain and Spain. The former power had not yet given up 
 possession of the forts on our northwestern frontiers. It held 
 them with the hope that they might be of advantage in 
 strengthening its hold on the western parts of America. There 
 is good reason for believing that its purpose was, if war had 
 been declared with Spain, to march its troops through the west- 
 ern territories and seize upon Louisiana. The Spanish minister 
 alleged, this to our government, and induced it to strengthen its 
 frontier posts and issue strict orders against the passage of any 
 British troops through our territory. Our government was the 
 more induced to do this as it was endeavoring to persuade the 
 Spanish ministry to consent to a cession of the district east of 
 the Mississippi. 
 
 So soon, however, as the danger of invasion was past, the 
 Spanish governor at New Orleans, Carondolet, again imposed 
 restrictions upon the commerce on the Mississippi, endeavoring 
 thus to show to the western people that their only hope lay in 
 a separation from the United States. Along with this, re- 
 newed efforts were made to subsidize leading citizens of the 
 west in favor of the Spanish interests. The United States were 
 being pressed from without by troubles with Great Britain, 
 France and Spain. The whiskey insurrection in Pennsylvania 
 was putting;|: to a strain the relations of federal and state au- 
 
 * Butler, p. 224. 
 
 + Barbe Marbois, p. 167. 
 
 X Monette, History, Valley Miss. II, p. 202. 
 
THE WEST AND THE AMERICAN UNION. 21 
 
 thority, and requiring the militia of several states to quell it. 
 Hamilton's financial plans had not yet begun to ease the public 
 credit. All the northwestern tribes of Indians were harassing 
 the Ohio and Kentucky settlements. England on the north- 
 west, and Spain on the south A^est, were pressing on both flanks 
 of the western territories, to cause them to break loose from 
 the Union into permanent separation. 
 
 While the United States were pushing Spain for a settlement 
 of the boundary line, and for amicable commercial arrange- 
 ments by diplomacy, Spain was endeavoring to break the force 
 of the pressure by securing the influence of the leading men of 
 Kentucky on its side by bribery. In the summer of 1795,* 
 Carondolet sent Gayoso up the Mississippi river, with a force, 
 under the pretense that it was to be used for the building of a 
 fort at the Chickasaw bluffs ; but Gayoso went on to New 
 Madrid, and informed Don Thomas Portell that he had impor- 
 tant dispatches which must go forward immediately to Ken- 
 tucky. Portell gave them to Thomas Power, who had been 
 charged with a similar secret embassy before. Power made his 
 way to Kentucky and delivered Carondolet's letter to Wilkin- 
 son, who had two years before reentered the military service of 
 the United States. Wilkinson and Power had nocturnal meet- 
 ings in Cincinnati, and Wilkinson gave him letters to Carondo- 
 let, in which he recommended the following points to the 
 Spanish governor rf First, that cargoes should be sent up from 
 New Orleans to the Ohio river, by which the confidence of the 
 people should be gained, and the channel pointed out and made 
 familiar through which they could best receive foreign com- 
 modities. Second, the mouth of the Ohio should be strongly 
 fortified, and works erected of such strength as to arrest for one 
 campaign the progress of any army that should come down 
 from the north. Third, a bank, with a million of dollars of cap- 
 ital should be established in Kentucky, and the leading char- 
 acters in the country be made directors. Fourth, General 
 
 * Clark, p. 221. 
 
 i" Gayarre, h. D., p. 360. Clark, Notes, p. 34. 
 
22 THE WEST AND THE AMERICAN UNION. 
 
 George Rogers Clark, and his adherents, who had been in the 
 pay of the French RepubHc* recently, should be brought inta 
 the service of Spain, which should increase its agents in Ken- 
 tucky, and establish a magazine at New Madrid. 
 
 Under Wilkinson's direction, Power was joined at Redbanks 
 by Colonel Sebastian, and it was intended that they should be 
 joined by Messrs. Innes, Murray and Nicholas. These last did 
 not come, and Power and Sebastian went to New Madrid, and 
 thence proceeded to New Orleans to meet the governor. The 
 next year Power again communicated dispatches from Carondo- 
 let to Wilkinson, and carried him nine thousand dollars con- 
 cealed in barrels of sugar, f 
 
 In the meantime the negotiations between the United States 
 and Spain reached the point that, on the twenty-seventh of Oc- 
 tober, 1795, a treaty was signed in Madrid,;}; which stipulated 
 that the southern boundary of the United States should be the 
 thirty-first degree, and that within six months after the ratifica- 
 tion of the treaty the troops of each power should retire to its 
 own side of the boundary ; that, within that time, also, com- 
 missions on each side should be appointed to run and mark the 
 line; that the middle of the Mississippi river should be the 
 western boundary of the United States to the thirty-first par- 
 allel ; that the whole width of the river from its source to the 
 sea should be free to the people of the United States, and that 
 the people of the United States should, for a period of three 
 years, be permitted to use the port of New Orleans as a place 
 of deposit and export, with only local charges, and that after 
 this the time, by further negotiation, might be extended, or 
 some other point on the island of New Orleans designated for 
 the purpose. 
 
 Although this treaty was thus concluded, it was very evident 
 that there was very little idea that the measure was anything 
 more than a temporary piece of diplomatic finesse, which 
 
 * Blenn., Papers, p. loi. 
 
 + Clark, Notes, p. 37. 
 
 + Gayarrt^, S. D., p. 356. Treaties U. S., p. 776. 
 
THE WEST AND THE AMERICAN UNION. 23 
 
 would not be carried into effect, and would soon be abrogated. 
 Spain was on the point of declaring war against Great Britain, 
 and desired to secure the United States as a neutral power, be- 
 tween Canada and Louisiana, to prevent invasion on the part 
 of Great Britain. Not for one moment did the efforts in the 
 direction of subsidizing individuals cease. 
 
 In June, 1796, Governor Gayoso* wrote that the treaty of 
 the year before never would be carried into effect. Great Brit- 
 ain had, in 1794, made a treaty with the United States, the ob- 
 ject of which was to attach them to her interests, and to coun- 
 terbalance this Spain had made her treaty of limits. As Great 
 Britain had totally failed in her object, f the governor thought 
 that Spain should not regard her stipulations. Besides, it was 
 expected that several states would separate from the Union, 
 and this would absolve .Spain from its engagements. He con- 
 cluded, therefore, that nothing but the free navigation of the 
 Mississippi would be the result of the treaty. 
 
 On the death of General Wayne, in December, 1796, Wilkin- 
 son succeeded to the command of the American army. He 
 had intimated to Baron de Carondolet that he was getting 
 ready a force to accompany the commissioner, Mr. Andrew 
 Ellicott, to take possession of the forts of Natchez and Walnut 
 Hills, and to run the territorial line between the possessions of 
 th.e two powers under the treaty. The baron was determined 
 not to surrender the territory. He, therefore, secretly commis- 
 sioned Mr. Power, in May, 1797, to go to General Wilkinson, 
 in order to state to him that, on account of the doubts as to the 
 manner of delivering the posts, and the apprehension that a 
 British force was marching from Canada to attack upper Louisi- 
 ana, he was resolved to retain the forts until he could receive 
 the decision of the Spanish minister. He, therefore, requested 
 that the march of the American troops be suspended until such 
 decision could be reached. 
 
 The Spaniards had some grounds for the fear which they ex- 
 
 * Mariin, Louis, p. 269. 
 
 + Stoddard's Sketches, p. 99. 
 
24 THE WEST AND THE AMERICAN UNION. 
 
 pressed. The Spanish governor still retained possession of the 
 post at Natchez. So long as this was done, it kept open all the 
 irritating^questions as to boundaries between the Americans in 
 the districts of Tennessee and Mississipp, and the Indian tribes 
 in that section. The Americans complained because their gov- 
 ernment seemed so slow in asserting its rights against Spain 
 and protecting them from the Indians. At this juncture,' in 
 April, 1797, Mr. Blount, the United States Senator from Ten- 
 nessee, who had a wide influence in his state, entered into a 
 secret correspondence* with the English envoy in this country, 
 Mr. Liston, the object of which was to induce England to send 
 forces from Canada by Lake Michigan, down the Mississippi 
 river, where boats and abundance of provisions would be sent 
 to them from Kentucky and Tennessee ; and they would rapidly 
 descend the river, overcome the feeble Spanish garrison at New 
 Orleans, and occupy the whole of Louisiana and Florida. This 
 correspondence, however, in transmission to Etigland, fell into 
 the hands of a person who thought it his duty to send it to the 
 President. In consequence of this, the plan fell through, and 
 Mr. Blount was expelled from the Senate. The scheme, how- 
 ever, affrighted the Spaniards when they heard of it. 
 
 Baron Carondelet, when he therefore sought to delay the 
 giving up of the posts on the Mississippi river, and sent Mr. 
 Powers on his mission, gave him instructions so confidential 
 that he was only to retain them in his memory.f He directed 
 him, while traveling through the western country, to sound the 
 disposition of the people as he went. He gave him also a sys- 
 tem of signs in writing his dispatches, which would indicate 
 whether he found a hostile condition, and as to the number of 
 pieces of artillery and any other warlike preparations which he 
 might find. He was also to persuade the people, as he was 
 able, that the delivery of the posts to the United States was 
 opposed to the interests of the western people, who, as they 
 would have one day to separate from the Atlantic states, would 
 
 *Barbe Marboi's, p. 176. American State Papers II, p. 76. Ellicotfs Journal, p. 64. 
 + Gayarre, S. D., p. 360. Wilkinson, Mem., II, note 46. 
 
THE WEST AND THE AMERICAN UNION. 2$ 
 
 find themselves without communication with lower Louisiana, 
 from whence they might expect powerful help in artillery, arms, 
 ammunition and money as soon as ever the western states 
 should determine on a separation ; and that for this reason the 
 west, in allowing Congress to take these posts from Spain, was 
 forging fetters for itself. 
 
 The baron then stated to Power some propositions which he 
 desired him to place before Messrs. Sebastian, Innes, Murray 
 and Nicholas, and any other persons pointed out by them. 
 
 First. They were to exert all their influence in impressing 
 on the minds of the inhabitants of the western country a con- 
 viction of the necessity of their withdrawing and separating 
 themselves from the federal Union, and forming an indepen- 
 dent government wholly unconnected with that of the Atlantic 
 states. To prepare for this, the most eloquent and popular 
 writers should, in well-timed publications, expose, in the most 
 striking point of view, the inconveniences and disadvantages 
 that a longer connection with and dependence on the Atlantic 
 states must draw upon them ; and the benefits they will cer- 
 tainly reap from a secession ought to be forcibly pointed out. 
 The baron pledged himself to appropriate one hundred thou- 
 sand dollars for the use of those who should engage in this 
 work, and to indemnify those who should lose any positions 
 thereby. * 
 
 Second — Immediately after the declaration of independence, 
 Fort Massac, on the Ohio, near the mouth of the Cumberland, 
 Avas to be taken possession of by the new government, which 
 would be furnished arms by the king of Spain, who would 
 further engage to supply one hundred thousand dollars for rais- 
 ing and maintaining such troops. 
 
 Third — He was to endeavor to discover General Wilkinson's 
 disposition, and he thought it scarcely possible that he would 
 prefer to command the army of the Atlantic states to that of 
 being the Washington of the western states, that at the slight- 
 est movement he will be named as the general of the new re- 
 
 *Clark, Notes, p. 82. 
 
26 THE WEST AND THE AMERICAN UNION. 
 
 public, that the army is weak, and devoted to Wilkinson, and 
 nothing is required but an instant of firmness to make the 
 people of the west perfectly happy. To suffer the instant to 
 escape would be for them to place themselves forever under the 
 oppression of the Atlantic states. 
 
 The baron declared that Spain, limiting itself to the posses- 
 sion of the forts of Natchez and Walnut Hills, would cede to 
 the western states all the east bank of the Mississippi from 
 thirty-one degrees to the Ohio, which would form a very ex 
 tensive and powerful republic, and that Spain would not inter- 
 fere with its constitution and laws. Mr. Power was also 
 directed to conciliate Mr. Ellicott, the American commissioner, 
 and endeavor to induce him to come to New Orleans.* 
 
 Mr. Power went -secretly through Tennessee overland, to 
 avoid the forts, to Kentucky, and had an interview with Se- 
 bastian, and the others, and then went on to Detroit, where 
 General Wilkinson was. Wilkinson was no longer so sanguine 
 as to the hopefulness of a separation of the western states,. 
 for the reason that so many of the purposes for which there 
 had been such a desire, had now by treaty been realized. 
 He complained of having been betrayed before; but he told 
 Power that if he was made governor of Natchez, he would 
 there have opportunities to comply with the baron's political 
 desires. He held secret meetings with Power; while, because 
 of the suspicions that he was conscious were resting on him for 
 his Spanish dealings, f he publicly sent Power away under 
 guard, and, apparently, in disgrace.;}; Power, on his return to 
 New Orleans, gave a discouraging account o[ the disposition of 
 the great body of the western people in the matter of separa- 
 tion. 
 
 In November, 1798, Mr. Ellicott, the commissioner, states 
 that by a very extraordinary accident a letter from the gov- 
 ernor-general, on its way to a confidential officer in the Spanish 
 
 *Clark, p. 84. 
 
 +Clark, p. 89 ; Wilkinson Mem., II, Note 48. 
 
 JClark, Notes, p. 97. 
 
THE WEST AND THE AMERICAN UNION. 2^ 
 
 service, fell into his hands. The letter contained the most un- 
 equivocal proof of the late existence of a plan to injure the 
 United States, in which a number of citizens were engaged, 
 and a correspondence between Spanish officials, and one whom 
 he indicates as General Wilkinson. He says that dispatches 
 and twenty thousand dollars in silver were sent up from New 
 Orleans ; and although the jboat was searched, these articles 
 were overlooked. These facts he communicated in cypher to 
 the State Department.* 
 
 On the twenty-ninth of March, 1799, the Spaniards having 
 lost all hope of causing a dismemberment of the Union, evacu- 
 ated the forts at Natchez, and the United States troops on the 
 next day entered into occupation. Thus ended the long cher- 
 ished dreams of Spain to build up a strong nation at the gate- 
 way of the Mississippi. So long ago as 1783, the Count de / 
 Aranda, the Spanish minister, declared to his king his belief 
 that both France and Spain had acted in opposition to their own 
 interests in espousing the cause of the colonies. ' "This Fed- 
 eral Republic," he said, "is now a pigmy. The day will come 
 when she will be a giant. She will forget the services she has 
 received from the powers which have helped her, and will think 
 only of her own aggrandizement." By the strange irony of 
 fortune, all that Spain received for the alliance of 1778 was the 
 Floridas, by which she hoped to retain the commercial control 
 of the Gulf of Mexico, which for years had been slipping- 
 away ; but in this she was disappointed. All that she had was 
 eight years' possession of Florida and Louisiana, and the re- 
 visionary right of the latter from France. By recognizing the 
 political existence of a great, independent nation in the new 
 world, Spain condemned herself to lose, sooner or later, the 
 magniiicent transatlantic domain, the sovereignty of which had 
 been transmitted by the princes of Austria to the Bourbons. f ^ 
 
 The treaty with Spain in 1795, gave to the citizens of the 
 United States the right to deposit produce in New Orleans, for 
 
 * Blennerhasset Pap. p. 429. Ellicott's Journal, p. 183. 
 ■|"R. C. Winthrop, ' France and United States,' p. 38. 
 
28 THE WEST AND THE AMERICAN UNION. 
 
 export trade, for the period of three years, which time might 
 be extended, or some other point on the island designated for 
 the purpose. The attitude of Spain to this country in 1799 
 was not pacific. Her privateers preyed upon our commerce, 
 and in July the Intendant Morales issued an order prohibiting 
 the use of New Orleans as a place of deposit by the western 
 people, without designating any other point.* Naturally, when 
 this order became known, it excited the most intense indigna- 
 tion. The west had become too strong and resolute to endure 
 this closing up of her great artery of trade. 
 
 An immediate campaign was set on foot against Louisiana. 
 President Adams called for the raising of twelve new regi- 
 ments. Three regiments were ordered to assume a position 
 near the mouth of the Ohio, and to keep their boats in readi- 
 ness to go down the river. General Washington accepted the 
 chief command! o^ the armies raised in the east and west. He, 
 however, died that fall, and the retirement of Mr. Adams from 
 the Presidency, and the entire change in Federal politics, caused 
 a suspension of hostilities, and a disbanding of the regiments in 
 the summer of 1800.;}: 
 
 In the meantime Napoleon,^ whose power was at its zenith 
 in Europe, had set on foot inquiries which gave him the most 
 minute information about Louisiana, and he had determined as 
 a part of the vast system which he had planned with which to 
 aggrandize France, to acquire this then Spanish province. A 
 remarkable memoir, § prepared for him by Mr. Pontalba, who 
 had long resided in the colony, and had held official position 
 under Spain, states, with extraordinary comprehensiveness and 
 eloquence, the present and prospective importance of the coun- 
 try about the mouth of the Mississippi. He says that Louisi- 
 ^ ana is the key of America, and, therefore, of the highest im- 
 portance, and has been far a long time past the object of the 
 
 *Barbd Marbois, p. 233. Gayarre, S. Dom., p. 399. 
 tSparks' Washington, XI, p. 395. 
 tGayarre, S. D., p. 409. 
 H Barbe Marbois, p. 184. 
 ^ Gayarr^, S. D., p. 410. 
 
THE WEST AND THE AMERICAN UNION. 29 
 
 ambition of the United States. He argued that an appropria- 
 tion of three millions of francs, to be placed in the western 
 country, would procure the immigration of thirty thousand 
 persons to the better lands near the mouth of the Mississippi, 
 and that the immigrants from Kentucky and the neighboring 
 districts would sell their lands and come down into Louisiana, 
 where they could have land for nothing, and better facilities 
 for trade. He also showed that France would in this hold the 
 key of Mexico, and be able to control its commerce. He 
 thought such a power, affording the best market for all this 
 grown in the Mississippi valley, would present a powerful mo- 
 tive to induce the inhabitants of the western districts to sepa- 
 rate from the United States, in order to form an alliance with 
 France, with the obligation that they should defend Louisiana 
 in case of an attack from the United States. He spoke of 
 the powerful influence which General Wilkinson — although he 
 did not call him by name, as not desiring to expose him — had 
 extended on behalf of Spanish interests for a series of years, 
 and expressed no doubt but that such interest could still be 
 secured. 
 
 Pontalba presented his memoir on the fifteenth of September, 
 1800, and on the first of October a treaty was concluded at St. 
 Ildefonso,* an article of which was that the king of Spain en- 
 gaged to retrocede to the French Republic within six months 
 after the execution of the treaty with the Duke of Parma, the 
 province of Louisiana, with the same limits that it had then 
 in the hands of Spain, that it had when France possessed it, and 
 for such enlarged territory as had been acquired from the treat- 
 ies which had subsequently been made between Spain and 
 other states. The stipulation with the Duke of Parma was 
 that Napoleon was to put the duke, who was a member of the 
 Spanish house of Bourbons, in possession of Tuscany, and 
 erect it into a kingdom. For this boon Spain was to cede 
 Louisiana to France. The vast territory, therefore, included 
 under the name of Louisiana was bartered off for a petty Ital- 
 
 * ' Barb6 Marbois,' p. 184. 
 
30 THE WEST AND THE AMERICAN UNION. 
 
 ian principality. As France was at war with Great Britain, and 
 this power was master of the sea, and could easily attack and 
 conquer Louisiana, if known to be a French dependency, all 
 knowledge of the treaty between France and Spain was care- 
 fully concealed, and Spanish officials remained in power. 
 
 The cession of Louisiana to France was a blow to the United 
 States,* as it placed at the gateway of the Mississippi a strong 
 and aggressive power, instead of a weak one, such as Spain 
 was. It was also a menace to Great Britain, because, if France 
 extended her influence up the Mississippi river towards the 
 British possessions in Canada, it virtually destroyed the results 
 of the Seven Years' war and the treaty of 1763. Intimations of 
 the ratification of the treaty of cession gradually came to the 
 ears of our ministers abroad; and they set on foot remon- 
 strances against it. Before publicity was had, however, peace 
 was concluded, on the first of October, 1801, • between Great 
 Britain and France ; and, concealment being no longer neces- 
 sary, the latter power immediately prepared to send twenty- 
 five thousand troops to Louisiana. 
 
 Delay in dispatching the force, however, resulted from a dif- 
 ference between Spain and France as to the meaning of the 
 treaty ; whether the cession included Florida or not. In the 
 meantime the Mississippi, which had been opened for deposits 
 at New Orleans in 1 801, was on the sixteenth of October, in the 
 next year, closed again, in accordance with the policy of the 
 Spaniards to discourage the settlement of Americans in Louis- 
 iana. This produced great excitement throughout the country, 
 as it also came near causing a famine in New Orleans by stop- 
 ping the supplies of flour and other western produce. Strong 
 remonstrances were made to the general government against 
 the injury caused to the west by these repeated interruptions 
 of her commerce. Barbe Marbois, in his history, gives a speci- 
 men of some of the language used by the western people, f 
 "The Mississippi," said they, "is ours by nature. Its mouth 
 
 * Bauduy des Lozieres, Sec. Voy., p. 195. 
 f P. 235. Gayarre, S. D., p. 456. 
 
^THE WEST AND THE AMERICAN UNION. 3 1 
 
 is the only issue which nature has given to our waters, and we 
 wish to use it for our vessels. No power shall deprive us of 
 this right. If our most perfect liberty in this matter is dis- 
 puted, nothing shall prevent us from taking possession of the 
 Capital, and when we are once masters of it, we shall know 
 how to maintain ourselves there. If Congress refuses us effect- 
 ual protection, we will adopt the measures which our safety 
 requires, even if they endanger the peace of the Union, and 
 our connection with the other states. No protection, no alle- 
 giance." 
 
 Mr. Livingston, the American minister in Paris, sent over 
 specially by Mr. Jefferson to settle this business, discovered 
 that the projected establishment, in Louisiana was disapproved 
 of b>' every statesman in France'^^ as certain to cause a great 
 waste in men and money, excite enmities and produce no pos- 
 sible advantage to the nation. Mr. Livingston pressed upon 
 the French government the expediency of their selling the 
 country to the United States. The United States, he said, did 
 not desire the territory west of the Mississippi river, and by 
 ceding the district on the eastern side, the respective nations 
 would have the river as a safe boundary, and the claims of 
 American citizens also against France for spoliations could be 
 satisfied. Mr. Madison, the Secretary of State, in representing 
 to Mr. Livingston the sensibility of the western people on this 
 subject, and the reasonableness of this sensibility, said: "The 
 Mississippi to them is everything. It is the Hudson, the Dela- 
 ware, the Potomac and all the navigable streams of the Atlantic 
 states formed into one stream, "f 
 
 The denial of the right to deposit was taken up in Congress, 
 when it was seen that efforts at negotiation for redress were 
 fruitless, and resolutions were passed in the House to raise 
 eighty thousand troops to vindicate the natural right of the 
 western country to the free navigation of the Mississippi.]; 
 
 *.Amer. State Pap., II, p. 513. 
 + Gayarre, S. D., p. 473. 
 :J; GayarrtS S. D., p. 492. 
 
32 THE WEST AND THE AMERICAN UNION. 
 
 While these negotiations were going on, war was on the point 
 of breaking out again between Great Britain and France, and 
 the prospect of this forced the question of the ownership of 
 the territory to its issue. For if France still held possession, 
 after war was declared. Great Britain, which had a fleet in the 
 Gulf of Mexico, would seize Louisiana, and France would lose 
 it and get nothing. On the eleventh of April, 1803, Talley- 
 rand asked'^ the American minister whether he wished to have 
 the whole of Louisiana. Mr. Livingston, in his reply, showed 
 what to us now seems a singular lack of perception in his esti- 
 mate of the relative value of the parts in question. Louisiana 
 included then the whole country west of the Mississippi, as far 
 as Mexico and the Pacific, and north as far as the British lines ; 
 and also, as the United States then supposed, east and west 
 Florida. It afterwards appeared that east Florida had not been 
 ceded to France by Spain,t and therefore could not be sold. 
 When Talleyrand then asked Livingston whether the United 
 States desired to have the whole of the country, Livingston 
 replied that they did not, that they wished only for New 
 Orleans and the Floridas. Talleyrand replied that if France 
 gave New Orleans, the rest would be of little value to her, and 
 he wished an offer from the United States for the whole of it. 
 
 The interest was intense on both sides of the ocean. Napo- 
 leon had set his heart on this plan for the extension of France ; 
 a force was ready to start under Bernadotte to occupy the coun- 
 try ; war was instantly impending between France and Great 
 Britain ; the ministers of the United States and France were 
 having daily conferences. Our country was still poor, and could 
 not afford to pay large purchase money. The difference between 
 what was first offered, twenty millions, and what France de- 
 manded, one hundred millions of francs, made the prospect of 
 agreement remote. To make a result more feasible, and yet 
 with a strange insensibility to the future importance of the 
 region in question, Mr. Livingston even suggested to Mr. Mad- 
 
 * Barbfe Marbois, p. 305. 
 ■f* Barbe Mar., p. 313. 
 
THE WEST AND THE AMERICAN UNION. 33 
 
 ison that, if only New Orleans and the Floriclas could be kept, 
 the purchase money to be paid might be raised by the sale of 
 the territory west of the Mississippi river, with the right of 
 sovereignty, to some power in Europe, whose vicinity we should 
 not fear.* 
 
 At length, on the tenth of April, 1803, Napoleon expressed 
 his purpose to sell, and on the thirtieth the treaty was signed by 
 which the whole of Louisiana, including west Florida, all that 
 had been acquired by France from Spain, f was transferred to 
 the United States, on the condition of the payment of sixty 
 millions of francs, exclusive of the amounts due by France to 
 American citizens on account of spoliations, which account the 
 United States assumed. JWhen Napoleon was informed of the 
 signing of the treaty, he prophetically said : " This accession of 
 territory strengthens forever the power of the United States, 
 and I have given to England a maritime rival that will sooner 
 or later humble her pride. ||" 
 
 The first point gained in the effort to secure the reluctant 
 consent of Napoleon to the sale of Louisiana, was the abso- 
 lute pledge which Mr. Livingston extorted, that the claims of 
 our merchants by reason of the spoliations by French priva- 
 teers should be paid. This compelled § that something should 
 be done. In the treaty with France in 1778, however, the 
 United States had pledged themselves to France, as one of the 
 conditions of the alliance, to guarantee forever all the posses- 
 sions in America which France had or should have.^li This 
 was a vast and perpetual obligation, which the United States 
 
 * Gayarre S. D., p. 509. 
 
 i-Amer. State P. I. p. 507 
 
 + It is a curious fact, brought out recently by M. Leon Say, that there is no trace 
 whatever in the French archives of the receipt of the fifteen millions of dollars paid by 
 the United States for the purchase of Louisiana. Napoleon probably appropriated it to 
 his own use. It has been surmised that he treated with the American commissioners 
 directly through Marbois, rather than through his minister, Talleyrand, because of his 
 fears of the latter's well known rapacity. — ' Adams' Neutrality in America.' p. 35. 
 
 II Barb^ Mar., p. 314. 
 
 § Oneida Historical Coll., 1881, p. 166. 
 
 11 Treaties U. S. p. 243. 
 
34 THE WEST AND THE AMERICAN UNION. 
 
 had not seen the full effect of. This would have to be abrogated. 
 France would only consent to it, however, on the assump- 
 tion by the United States of the payment of the debts which 
 France owed to our marine for spoliations. Thus the little word 
 "forever," in the treaty,* was only redeemed twenty-three 
 years after at the price of ten millions of dollars, which the 
 United States pledged itself to pay, and not one cent of which 
 French claims has up to this time been paid to our citizens. 
 
 This whole business had to be concluded in Paris, with no 
 special communications from this country, the United States 
 ministers, Livingston, and Monroe who had been specially sent, 
 taking the responsibility. The vote in the Senate to ratify the 
 treaty was twenty-six to six, these last all being from New 
 England. In the debate f objections were made to the treaty, 
 and strong fears were expressed of the stability of the govern- 
 ment with its citizens removed two or three thousand miles 
 from the capital, where they could scarcely feel the rays of the 
 general government. Senator White of Tennessee declared 
 that he would rather see the territory to the west of the Missis- 
 sippi given to France, to Spain, or to any other nation, upon 
 the mere condition that no citizen of the United States should 
 ever settle within its limits, than to have it sold for one hundred 
 millions of dollars, and we retain the sovereignty. 
 
 So soon as Spain heard of the sale to the United States,! she 
 vigorously protested, because France had covenanted with her 
 never to part with the country, and she declared that she ought 
 to have had the first chance for purchase. For a time it was 
 thought that Spain would not make a peaceful surrender. The 
 French had sent Laussat to Louisiana as a commissioner to re- 
 ceive the district from Spain, before the cession was made to 
 the United States. On the thirtieth of November, 1803, Spain 
 surrendered Louisiana to France. On the twentieth of Decem- 
 
 *C. F. Adams. Add. N. Y. Hist. Soc, 1870, p. 38. 
 
 + Gayarre S. D. p. 561. 
 
 J Barbd Mar., p. 345. Gayarr(f, S. D., p. 535. 
 
THE WEST AMD THE AMERICAN UNION. 35 
 
 ber, twenty days after, the tricolored standard of France gave 
 place to the American flag.''' 
 
 A recognition of the immense issues which were at stake in 
 the possession of the mouth of the Mississippi river will be had 
 in this rapid statement of the varied means used to maintain 
 the control of it, and the reluctance shown in parting with it. 
 The west was constantly becoming a larger factor in the nation; 
 and, in the manifestation of its discontent at the monopolizing 
 by the east of all the great offices, it succeeded in causing the 
 nation to purchase, for an amount which was then quite exhaust- 
 ing, the outlet of its great river and the country beyond, the 
 wealth of which was only afterwards apprehended. Still New 
 Orleans was, at the time of the purchase, virtualh' a foreign 
 city, with only a comparatively small American colony in it. 
 Many of the Spanish officers remained as residents, ready to 
 sympathize with an\' movement hostile to the United States, 
 and they had ultimately to be requested by the governor to 
 remove. The purchase of the territory put a stop, however, 
 for some time, to the efforts of conspirators. 
 
 The source from which sprang the motive for the next at- 
 tempt at the separating of the west from the Union was the 
 disappointed ambition of one of the most astute and daring 
 men in American political life. That which furnished oppor- 
 tunity and hope to Burr, or any other adventurer, was the 
 vast stakes that would fall into the hands of the boldest schemer, 
 in the largely unsettled but fertile regions of the west, the 
 remains of prejudice yet existing against the older and more 
 calculating communities in the east, and the lack of entire na- 
 tional and social homogeneity arising from distance and imper- 
 fect communication. All this caused the eyes of disappointed 
 ambition to turn for more hopeful fields of exercise to the 
 new and more excitable communities in the west. 
 
 In the general election of i8oi, Mr. Jefferson and Colonel 
 Burr were found to have received the same number of electoral 
 votes for President and Vice-President, "f^ No one receiving a 
 
 * Martin, p. 295. Barbe Mar., p. 352. + Davis, Burr, I, 435. 
 
36 THE WEST AND THE AMERICAN UNION. 
 
 majority of votes, the decision went to the House of Representa- 
 tives. It was evident that the Repubhcans had intended their 
 votes for Mr. Jefferson for President and Colonel Burr for Vice- 
 President. When, however, the Federalists despaired of elect- 
 ing their candidate, Mr. Adams, they, in considerable numbers 
 together with some Republicans, turned to Colonel Burr, and 
 voted for him for President against Jefferson, and this with 
 Burr's connivance. The contest was prolonged until within a 
 few days of the time of the inauguration, when Mr. Jefferson 
 was elected President and Colonel Burr Vice-President. His 
 alleged complottings with the Federalists in this contest to 
 seize the presidency were the occasion of the political feuds-f- 
 in New York which resulted in the duel with Alexander Hamil- 
 ton July II, 1804. After Mr. Hamilton's death, Colonel Burr 
 had to flee before the intense popular indignation, and was for 
 a number of months in obscurity in the south. He returned 
 to Washington in the winter of 1804-5, ^"d took his place as 
 the president of the senate. He was, however, himself aware 
 that from the odium in which he was held his political fortunes 
 were at an end. His term as Vice-President closed March 3, 
 1805, but he left Washington for Philadelphia before the close 
 of the session, after making a speech of farewell which moved 
 his bitterest opponents to tears. 
 
 General Wilkinson was in Washington at the time, having 
 just been appointed governor of Louisiana,]; with residence in 
 St. Louis. He was an old friend of Burr. They had fought 
 before Quebec together in 1775. He showed great interest in 
 the fortunes of his former comrade. W^ilkinson commended 
 him to the delegates from Louisiana in Washington, and told 
 them that so soon as Burr's vice-presidency was at an end he 
 would go to Louisiana, where he had certain projects; adding 
 that he was a man who would succeed in anything that he 
 would undertake, and, throwing out mysterious hints, asked 
 them to give him all the information in their power respecting 
 that countr}'. 
 
 t Hammond's Polit. Hist. N. Y., I., p. 131. JBlennerhassett Pap., p. 432. 
 
THE WEST ANO THE AMERICAN UNION. 37 
 
 He also expressed to Matthew I.yon, the eccentric member 
 from Kentucky, originally from Vermont, and who subsequently 
 came out to Missouri, his sorrow that a person of Burr's bril- 
 liant abilities was about to be^lost to public life, and wondered 
 what he could do. Wilkinson urged* that a foreign mission be 
 secured for him ; but Lyon assured him that this would be 
 impossible. Lyon, however, suggested that he might, if he 
 took the right steps at once, be returned to Congress from 
 Tennessee. To do this, however, he must instantly set out 
 that spring, make a residence, and begin the practice of law in 
 Nashville, and during the summer let his friends indicate that he 
 would stand for Congress; and Mr. Lyon thought his abilities 
 would, in the fall, secure him the position, and his killing of 
 Hamilton would be found to have done him no injury. Burr 
 took the matter up leisurely, allowed himself to loiter over a 
 project for the cutting of a canal at the Falls of the Ohio, 
 started for the west, went down the river, stopped at Blenner- 
 hassett's island, not however meeting the owner, as he was not 
 at home, and so went on to Louisville. From thence he set 
 out overland for Nashville, stopping on the way at Lexington, 
 which was the centre of a brilliant social life and of political 
 influence in Kentucky. 
 
 Mr. Lyon assured him at the time that, on account of his 
 delays, his chance for being elected to Congress from Tennes- 
 see was destroyed, and stated afterward on Burr's trial that there 
 seemed much m}-stery in his conduct, and he suspected projects 
 which he could not penetrate. Burr's arrival and stay in Nashville 
 were the occasion of an ovation. He then came down the Cum- 
 berland river to Fort Massac, sixteen miles below its mouth on 
 the Ohio. Here in June he met Wilkinson, who had come 
 down from St. Louis expressly for the purpose of having this 
 meeting with Burr, with whom he had had for several years a 
 cipher correspondence. Wilkinson furnished him with an ele- 
 gant barge, with sails and crew, and gave him a letter of intro- 
 duction to Daniel Clark, a wealthy merchant of New Orleans, 
 
 *Wilk. Mem., II., p. 273. 
 
38 THE WEST AND THE AMERICAN UNION. 
 
 and Burr went down the river.* In his note Wilkinson com- 
 mended Burr as a persecuted man, who had a claim on his ser- 
 vices, about whose business there were many things of which 
 he could not write, and for which he referred him to Burr in 
 person. In New Orleans Burr, on account of the eminent posi- 
 tion he had held in the previous administration, was highly 
 honored, dined with Governor Claiborne and other distinguished 
 persons, and was shown many other attentions. 
 
 It is to be noted, in view of subsequent events, that Mr. 
 Clark, to whom Mr. Burr had been specially commended, within 
 two months of Burr's visit set out on a journey to Mexico, with 
 regard to the objects and results of which journey he wrote after 
 his return to Wilkinson: "I have been to the land of promise, 
 and have got safe from it, after having been represented as a 
 person desirous of acquiring information about its strength, 
 and where and how it may be assailed with the greatest prob- 
 ability of success. At a future period I shall communicate to 
 you all I have picked up there, "t 
 
 Wilkinson declared;}; that his purpose of commending Burr to 
 Clark was that, since the expectation of election in Tennessee 
 was at an end, he now desired to promote Burr's election to 
 Congress from Orleans, or his appointment as governor in place 
 of Claiborne. In his memoirs he complained that while he 
 was thus ingenuously promoting Colonel Burr's political aspira- 
 tions. Burr had already, while keeping him in ignorance, made 
 Clark his confederate in the scheme for invading Mexico, and 
 had persuaded Clark that himself and the army were ready to 
 unite in an expedition against that country. A letter written 
 from New Orleans during Burr's visit asserts that the common 
 rumor there was that a combination was forming, the object of 
 which was to take Louisiana out of the Union. 
 
 After a stay of some weeks in New Orleans, Burr went to 
 Natchez, and from thence to Nashville, Lexington, Louisville, 
 and from thence in September, 1805, to St. Louis, where he 
 made a visit to Wilkinson, and also went with him to St. 
 
 *Clark, p. 119. +Wilkinson, Mem. II. App. 73. JWilkinson, II., p. 285. 
 
THE WEST AND THE AMERICAN UNION. 39 
 
 Charles. Before this, Major Seth Hunt stated that Wilkinson, 
 on the twenty -eighth of June,* at Kaskaskia, in returning from 
 his meeting with Burr at Fort Massac, declared to him that 
 "he was engaged in a scheme full of danger, requiring enter- 
 prise; but, if successful, full of fortune and glory." fin the 
 same year Wilkinson wrote to Colonel McKee, inquiring whether 
 he could not raise a corps of cavalry "to follow his fortunes 
 to Mexico. " 
 
 At this time also, in June, and after his interview with Burr 
 at Massac, Wilkinson assured General Adair, senator from Ten- 
 nessee, that Burr reckoned on him in his project, and in a letter, 
 marked "private," asks Adair to meet him, and he will tell him 
 all, and that "they must have a peep at the unknown world be- 
 yond him. "J Of the meaning of this allusion perhaps a hint 
 maybe had in the question contained in Adair's reply, § "Pray, 
 how far is it, and what kind of a way, from St. Louis to Santa 
 Fe, and from thence to Mexico?" While Wilkinson protests 
 that he knows nothing as yet of any confederacy, he declares 
 his assurance that at this time Adair was connected with Burr's 
 "sinister project." 
 
 As the result of his conversations during Burr's stay in St. 
 Louis in September, 1805, Wilkinson states that he was per- 
 suaded that Burr had a scheme in hand, but that he did not 
 know of its treasonable character, and that his confidence in 
 Burr was shaken. In Burr's trial, subsequently, Wilkinson de- 
 clared that in an interview in St. Louis, Burr stated that he had 
 "a great project in contemplation, but whether it was author- 
 ized by the government or not Burr did not explain, nor did 
 he inquire." The extreme unlikelihood of this statement is 
 apparent. General Wilkinson and Colonel Burr had for years 
 been corresponding intimately in cipher. Wilkinson was the 
 commander-in-chief of the army, and would be in a position 
 to know what projects were on foot by the government. He 
 knew, moreover, that Burr was in utter antagonism to the 
 President. 
 
 ^Wilkinson II, p. 292-3. +Clark, 121. JClark I., 120. ^Wilkinson II., App. 77^ 
 
40 
 
 THE WEST AND THE AMERICAN UNION. 
 
 In September Burr left St. Louis for the east, and on the 
 twenty-third was at Vincennes, where was General Harrison, 
 the governor of the Northwestern territory, to whom Wilkin- 
 son had written a letter strongly commending Burr. Colonel 
 Burr wrote back from there to Wilkinson, apparently about 
 
 AARON BURR. 
 
 the project which they had in common : "I have had no conver- 
 sation on the subject you mentioned, but we have gone round 
 about it, and there is every evidence of good will, in which I 
 have entire belief. There is probably some secret embarrass- 
 ment, of which you and I are ignorant."* 
 
 *Wilkinson, II, App. 82. 
 
THE WEST AND THE AMERICAN UNION. 4I 
 
 Burr went on to Philadelphia and Washington, between 
 which places he renriained until August, 1806. He had been 
 indicted, in 1805, by the grand jury in New York for murder, 
 in the matter of Hamilton, and this had been stated by Gen- 
 eral Adair as the cause of his going west. He had influential 
 political adherents in New York and New Jersey, among whom 
 were General Dayton, and the son of Matthew Ogden, of 
 New Jersey, Samuel Swarv/out and Marinus Willet, of New 
 York. Among them he raised an amount of money for the 
 purchase of a large tract of land on the Washita, a branch of 
 the Red river, in the Louisiana country, the colonization of 
 which was one of the alternative projects which he placed be- 
 fore his friends. Baron Bastrop had secured from Spain a 
 concession of one million two hundred thousand acres of land. 
 Mr. Lynch had bought from the baron six-tenths of this tract, 
 the time for the completion of which purchase was drawing 
 to its close. Colonel Burr, in July, 1806, contracted to pur- 
 chase from Mr. Lynch the land, and was to pay fifty thousand 
 dollars, and did pay down five thousand. Burr, for this pur- 
 pose, raised among his friends fortx^ thousand dollars, and more 
 was forthcoming. 
 
 In the meantime he was writing frequently in cipher to Wil- 
 kinson, and Wilkinson replied. In April, 1806, he wrote to 
 Wilkinson: "The execution of our project is postponed. 
 Want of water in the Ohio rendered the movement impractica- 
 ble. The association is enlarged, and comprises all that Wilkin- 
 son desires. Confidence limited to a few. Although this delay 
 is irksoine, it will enable us to move with more certainty and 
 dignity. Burr will be throughout United States this summer."* 
 
 General Eaton, who had recently returned from operations 
 against the pirates of Tripoli, and was supposed to have griev- 
 ances against the government, because of its failure to reim- 
 burse him for advances made there, and who therefore might be 
 supposed to be ready to entertain propositions adverse to the 
 government, testifiedf in the trial of Burr that during the winter 
 
 *Wilkinson, II., App. 83. fBurr's trial, I., p. 536. Life of Eaton, p. 391. 
 
42 THE WEST AND THE AMERICAN UNION. 
 
 of 1805-6, Burr informed him that he was forming a mihtary 
 expedition against the Spanish provinces to the southwest of 
 the United States, and also had a project of revolutionizing the 
 territory west of the Alleghany mountains, and establishing an 
 independent empire there ; New Orleans to be the capital, and 
 himself the chief; gathering a military force on the waters of 
 the Mississippi, and carrying conquest to Mexico. He said 
 that he had in person made a tour through the western country 
 during the previous season ; that he had secured to his interests 
 and attached to his person the most distinguished citizens of 
 Tennessee, Kentucky, and the territory of Orleans; that he had 
 inexhaustible resources and funds ; that the army of the United 
 States would act with him and be reinforced by ten or twelve 
 thousand men from the above mentioned states and territories. 
 He said that General Wilkinson would be the commander, 
 and Burr offered Eaton the second place. He said that Wil- 
 kinson was doubtful about his retention of his present position 
 and desired to secure a permanency with him, and would also 
 use his influence with the army on the promise to it of double 
 pay and rations, the ambition of the officers, and the prospect 
 of plunder and military achievements. In addition to the posi- 
 tive assurances which Burr said he had of assistance and coopera- 
 tion, he said that the vast extent of territory of the United 
 States west of the Alleghany mountains would, with its offer 
 to adventurers of the mines of Mexico, bring to his standard 
 volunteers from all quarters of the Union. The line of separa- 
 tion of the Union was to be drawn by the Alleghanies. He 
 was persuaded that he had secured the most considerable citi- 
 zens of Kentucky and Tennessee, but expressed some doubts 
 about Ohio, as he thought they were too much of a plodding, 
 industrial people to engage in the enterprise. 
 
 Burr had three plans in mind,* and was incessantly moving 
 about, putting forward one or the other projects, as he found 
 persons more favorable to one or the other. 
 
 Fh'st. To organize the restlessness and discontent of the 
 
 *Amer. State Pap. Miscel. I., p. 468. 
 
THE WEST AND THE AMERICAN UNION. 43 
 
 frontier states and territories, and to separate the southwest from 
 the Union, and set up an independent government, with its 
 capital in New Orleans. 
 
 Second. In conjunction with the first, to enlist recruits and 
 make arrangements for an expedition against Mexico and the 
 Spanish provinces, especially in the event of a war between 
 Great Britain and Spain, which at that time seemed inevitable. 
 
 Third. In the event of the failure of both these projects, 
 and as a means to commit to him and his m^easures irrevocably 
 those who would revolt at such revolutionary plans as the fore- 
 going, the purchase and colonization of the tract of land on the 
 Washita river. 
 
 In deciding upon his course he was driven on by desperation 
 and disappointed ambition. He gave too much credit to the 
 declarations of a few partisan leaders who, in the desire to serve 
 their own ends, overstated the restlessness of the western 
 people. He made no proper estimate of the simple, law-abiding, 
 republican habits of the great body of the inhabitants of the 
 country. He deceived himself as to the conditional, really 
 timid pledges of adherence on the part of a few men, which 
 actually were wholly falsified in the event. And yet the bril- 
 liant audacity and versatility of Burr, in spite of his being almost 
 alone in his planning, and of the popular odium and social isola- 
 tion in which he was held, inspired and kept life in his scheme in 
 spite of its desperation. As Wirt said afterward : "Pervading the 
 continent from New York to New Orleans, he draws into his 
 plan, by every allurement which he can contrive, men of all 
 ranks and descriptions. To youthful ardor he presents danger 
 and glory; to ambition, rank and titles and honors; to avarice, 
 the mines of Mexico. To each person v.-hom he addresses he 
 presents the object adapted to his taste. "* 
 
 On the fifteenth of April, 1806, I\Ir. Jefferson says t that, 
 about a month before that time, l^urr called on him and, re- 
 minding him that Jefferson had, some five years before, inti- 
 mated his purpose to give him a high position if he had not 
 
 •Burr's Trial, II., p. 118. t Jefferson's Works, ix, 208. 
 
44 THE WEST AND THE AMERICAN UNION. 
 
 been elected as Vice-President, told him that he was now dis- 
 engaged, had supported his administration, could do him, if he 
 chose, great harm, and was willing to receive from him a prop- 
 osition. Jefferson says that he replied to him that he was 
 sensible of his talents, but that he must be aware the public 
 had withdrawn their confidence from him ; and that as to any 
 harm Burr could inflict, he feared no injury which Burr could 
 do him. 
 
 In May, 1806, General Wilkinson was ordered, because of 
 the threatening character of the relations with Spain, to send 
 all his available force from St. Louis to Fort Adams, now 
 Vicksburg. He did so, and then ordered them up the Red 
 river to guard the western frontier of the United States* along 
 the river Sabine. The order from the war department under 
 which he acted simply contemplated the placing of his forces 
 at Fort Adams, guarding New Orleans, and then from there 
 maintaining observations eastward in Florida and westward on 
 the Sabine river, f The transportation of all his troops to the 
 remote point up the Red river was faulted at the time as placing 
 his force out of reach in case of any attack on New Orleans by 
 an expedition under Burr coming down the Mississippi river. 
 Wilkinson stated before the grand jury afterward in Washington 
 that, between the time of his meeting Burr at Massac and this 
 time, he had received six notes from him in cipher, which he 
 did not desire to have exposed except in the last extremity, ;{; 
 and that they were calculated to inculpate him should they be 
 exposed. Wilkinson left St. Louis to join the troops down the 
 Mississippi on the twenty-fifth of August, and reached Natchi- 
 toches, on the Red river, on the twent}'-second of September. 
 
 Burr arrived at Blennerhassett's Island,^ on the Ohio river, 
 on his way west, in September, 1806. Blennerhassett was an 
 Irish gentleman, a barrister of literary and philosophical tastes, 
 who had spent too much of his not large fortune in the pur- 
 chase, eight years before, and adornment of an island on the 
 
 •Wilkinson II, App. 87 and 90. tjeff. Works, V, p. 25, 
 
 :J:Clark, p. 117. ? Blennerhassett Pap., p. 126. 
 
THE WEST AND THE AMERICAN UNION. 
 
 45 
 
 Ohio, fourteen miles below Marietta. He now found himself 
 wanting in ready means, and willing to embark in the southern 
 venture, to which Burr had in general terms invited him, un- 
 conscious of all that it involved. A young family was growing 
 up, in order to provide for whom he was ready to embark on 
 the vague project in the Louisiana country which Burr, with his 
 
 HERMAN BLENNERHASSETT. 
 
 singular power of fascination, held up before him. They had 
 corresponded, but had not personally met until this time, Blen- 
 nerhassett having been absent when Burr stopped at the island 
 in May of the previous year. 
 
 Burr imparted to his host, with some reserve, that the senti- 
 ments of the larger part of the inhabitants of the Orleans and 
 
46 THE WEST AND THE AMERICAN UNION. 
 
 Mississippi territories were disaffected to the government to 
 such an extent that, unless early measures were taken to pre- 
 vent it, they would fling themselves into the arms of any foreign 
 power which should pledge itself to protect them. He declared 
 that, in such an event, the western states would be placed in 
 a dilemma, out of which they could only escape by an eastern 
 or western ascendancy of interests; they would no longer con- 
 sent to an alliance, but would sever themselves from the Union. 
 He said that the separation of the western from the Atlantic 
 states was no new project, that it was a matter of daily dis- 
 cussion at Washington, and that so thoroughly disgusted were 
 the people of New Orleans with the conduct of the administra- 
 tion — both with reference to themselves and to Spanish and 
 American affairs — that he expected to hear of the beginning of 
 a revolt in their seizing on the bank and custom house, and 
 appropriating to themselves the revenues and forces of the ter- 
 ritory. He declared that he had been invited, when he was 
 in New Orleans, to become the leader of a society of young 
 men there, who had taken possession of a number of cannon 
 belonging to the French, for a Mexican invasion. 
 
 Blennerhassett was easily drawn into the project which Burr 
 had in hand. In the month of September active preparations 
 were begun for the contemplated expedition. Contracts were 
 given out for the construction of fifteen large batteaux, suffi- 
 cient to convey five hundred men, and a large keel boat for the 
 transportation of provisions and arms, for the most of which 
 Blennerhassett became responsible. While this work was going 
 on, Burr visited Marietta, where his elegant manners, ready 
 address and former political eminence made him very popular. 
 He was asked to drill some troops. He visited Chillicothe,. 
 the seat of government in Ohio, and so passed on to Cincin- 
 nati, and then continued his journey to Lexington, Kentucky. 
 He gave out that his expedition had the approval of the govern- 
 ment. His object was to extend his acquaintance and enlist 
 recruits. To these he promised pay, and land on the Washita. 
 
 He induced Blennerhassett to write for the Ohio GazettCy 
 
THE WEST AND THE AMERICAN UNION. 4/ 
 
 published at Marietta, a series of essays, the design of which 
 was to show the permanent antagonism between the commer- 
 cial interests of the eastern and western states ; that the land 
 laws were invidious and unjust to western settlers ; that the 
 western people had paid the government more than four hun. 
 dred thousand dollars a year, and had received nothing in return 
 for it. On such considerations he based the conclusion that 
 a separation of the eastern and western states was necessary, 
 and that the western people should positively assert themselves 
 It is interesting to notice that, at this time, before the introduc. 
 tion of steam navigation, the writer remarks: " It will forever 
 remain impracticable for our shipping to perform a return voyage 
 against the currents of our long rivers." It was frequently 
 found best then, in going from New Orleans to Cincinnati, in- 
 stead of going up the river, to go around by sea to Baltimore, 
 and then travel overland to the Ohio. 
 
 Burr, accompanied by his daughter, Theodosia, and her hus- 
 band, Mr. Alston, with Blennerhassett, went in October to Lex- 
 ington, which was designated as the point of rendezvous. The 
 town was then a central point in the west, and society was the 
 most polite and intelligent in the Mississippi valley. The oldest 
 and best families in the south were represented there. The 
 manner of the reception of Burr and his associates in Lexing- 
 ton, the respect shown, the generous hospitality extended, 
 flattered him with the hope of the popularity of the movement, 
 a thorough organization of which was immediately begun.* 
 Burr received from friends in Lexington not less than forty 
 thousand dollars for the furtherance of his projects. In order 
 to quiet alarm, the iiripression was given out that the object of 
 the enterprise was simph' the colonization of the Bastrop lands. 
 Burr had brought with him a portion of the money raised in the 
 east. His son-in-law, Mr. Alston, had large property in South 
 Carolina, but had no ready money; and so Blennerhassett had 
 to join his personal credit with the security promised him on 
 Alston's estate, in order to procure the means required. 
 
 * Blennerhassett Pap., p. 467. 
 
48 THE WEST AND THE AMERICAN UNION. 
 
 In the meantime the preparations making had not escaped the 
 attention of the government at Washington.* Mr. Madison, the 
 secretary of state, directed Mr. John Graham, secretary of the 
 Orleans territory, to ascertain and report the facts. He learned 
 in Lexington that Mr. Burr reported that he had a credit of two 
 hundred thousand dollars with Daniel Clark of New Orleans. 
 He also warned the governor of Ohio of the treasonable de- 
 signs of Burr and Blennerhassett within the borders of the state. 
 Burr, leaving directions for the completion of the preparations, 
 and for Blennerhassett to join him with his force at the mouth 
 of the Cumberland, went down to' the Falls of the Ohio. He 
 had scarcely landed in Kentucky before Colonel Daviess, the 
 district attorney, on the third of November, before the federal 
 court, denounced the conspiracy, and moved for a warrant for 
 the arrest of Burr for treasonable practice. Judge Innis, who, 
 with Judge Sebastian, John Brown and General Wilkinson, had 
 been during the summer denounced by the Western World, 
 published in Frankfort, as intriguing with Spain, after two days 
 overruled the motion, f 
 
 Burr appeared in court and, while declaring that the judge 
 had treated the matter as it deserved, said that, as the motion 
 might be renewed in his absence, he had challenged the district 
 attorney to prove his charge. He retained Mr. Clay, then a young 
 man, as one of his counsel. WHien the day of trial came, the 
 attorney found that he could not procure his witnesses, and the 
 grand jury returned the indictment "not a true bill," and com- 
 pletely exonerated him. The result greatly added to Burr's 
 popularity in the state. Mr. Clay said that, before appearing 
 for Burr, he called on him for a pledge that he was not unlaw- 
 fully engaged, which he gave. J Mr. Clay afterward declared 
 that Burr had lied. He met Burr for the first time after this in 
 1815, in the United States court room in New York, and Mr. 
 Clay then declined to give Burr his hand, because of the de- 
 ception which had been practised on him.§ 
 
 * Blennerhassett Pap., p. 154. f Allen, History Ky., p. 72. 
 
 J Butler, Kentucky, p. 315. § Prentice, Life of Clay, p. 34. 
 
THE WEST AND THE AMERICAN UNION. 49 
 
 After the culmination of Hurr's project, the Kentucky legis- 
 lature instituted an inquiry into the allegation against Judge 
 Sebastian, that he had been a pensioner of Spain for two thous- 
 and dollars a year ; but he, to stifle the inquiry, resigned his 
 office, but not before a committee had unanimously reported 
 that for years he had been regularly receiving pay from Spain. 
 
 The authorities of Ohio moved vigorously in consequence of 
 the information furnished them by Graham. The militia were 
 called out, and pressed upon Blennerhassett and his men so 
 closely that, while some of the boats were stopped and Blenner- 
 hassett arrested, the latter was forcibly released by his fellow 
 conspirators, and he and his men in boats left the island and 
 started down the Ohio at midnight of the tenth of December. 
 
 In order to lull suspicion and to add to his resources, Burr 
 had been compelled in Washington and New Orleans to assume 
 a double part. To the Marquis de Yrujo, the Spanish minister, 
 he protested that his purpose was to divide the American 
 Union. This was a measure highly agreeable to Spain. The 
 transfer of Louisiana to the United States was always a hateful 
 thing. Many of the Spaniards in Louisiana hoped that the 
 separation was not final y'^ they thought that they would recover 
 the territory after some struggle over the different interpretations 
 of the articles of the treaty concerning boundaries. Our com- 
 merce on the Mobile and Tombigbee rivers was harassed by 
 arbitrary duties and vexatious searches. The boundaries of 
 Louisiana on the line of the Sabine were in dispute. The 
 Choctaws in the Mississippi territory were incited to war with 
 the United States. The former Spanish governor, Casa Calvo, 
 and the Litendante stayed on in New Orleans and were the 
 centre of cabals. They were told by Governor Claiborne, Janu- 
 ary 10, 1806, that they must leave the territory. In conse- 
 quence they were greatly offended, f Yrujo therefore entered 
 heartily into Burr's plans to divide the Union, and visited and 
 advised with him. He offered him the use of ten thousand 
 stand of arms, and money to any necessary amount. | 
 
 *Gayarre, S. D., p. 128. +Madison II. ,398, :|: Gayarre Am. Doni., p. 181. 
 
50 THE WEST AND THE AMERICAN UNION. 
 
 On the other hand, to Merry, the British minister to Wash- 
 ington, Burr represented that he was intending to proceed 
 against Mexico, and as such a measure would be favorable to 
 British interests, and would throw the United States into alli- 
 ance with England as opposed to France and Spain, Burr de- 
 clared that he had from Merry the pledge that the British fleet 
 would come to the mouth of the Mississippi river to help him, 
 and that Commodore Truxton had gone to Jamaica to commu- 
 nicate, on the part of Burr, with the British commander. Trux- 
 ton did not leave Washington, however, in fact, but communi- 
 cated to the President regularly all that Burr said to him. 
 
 On the eighth of October General Wilkinson was at Natchi- 
 toches. He had written to Burr in cipher on the thirteenth of 
 May, asking from him a statement of his designs. On this day 
 there came to him Mr. Swartwout, of New Jersey, with a letter 
 of introduction to him from Burr, and another letter for Colonel 
 Cushing, the second in command, from General Dayton. He 
 said that he was on his way to New Orleans, and had ex- 
 pected to find the army at Fort Adams on the Mississippi, and 
 offered his services as a volunteer. The next morning Wilkin- 
 son told Cushing that Swartwout had brought him intelligence 
 of an enterprise that was on foot in the western states, inimical 
 to the United States, in which a great number of persons, 
 possessing wealth, popularity and talents, were engaged ; that 
 Colonel Burr was at the head of it ; that he had been offered the 
 second command, and that the army was reckoned on to sup- 
 port it. Wilkinson bound Cushing to secrecy about the pro- 
 ject and his communication. 
 
 The following are the letters thus received, all in cipher, the 
 first from Burr, and dated July 22 :* "I have at length obtained 
 funds and have actually commenced. The eastern detachments 
 from different points, and under different pretenses, will rendez- 
 vous on the Ohio on the first of November. Everything in- 
 ternal and external favors our view — naval protection of Eng- 
 land is secured. ' Truxton is going to Jamaica to arrange with 
 
 *Amer. State Pap. Miscel. I., p. ^71, Wilkinson II, p. 312. 
 
THE WEST AND THE AMERICAN UNION. 5 I 
 
 the admiral there, and will meet us at Mississippi. It will be a 
 host of choice spirits. Wilkinson shall be second to Burr onl)', 
 and Wilkinson shall dictate the rank and promotion of his offi- 
 cers. Burr will proceed westward August I, never to return. 
 Send forthwith an influential friend with whom Burr may con- 
 fer; this is essential to concert and harmony of movement. 
 Send a list of all persons known to Wilkinson, westward of the 
 mountains, who could be useful, with a note delineating their 
 character. Our project is brought to the point so long desired. 
 Burr's plan is to move down rapidly from the falls (of the Ohio) 
 on the fifteenth of November with the first five hundred or one 
 thousand men in light boats, now constructing for that purpose, 
 to be at Natchez between the fifth and fifteenth of December, 
 there to meet you ; then to determine whether to seize or pass 
 by Baton Rouge. Send an answer ; draw on me for all expense." 
 
 The next two letters delivered to Wilkinson were written by 
 General Dayton, the close friend of Burr ; the first on the six- 
 teenth of Jul}-: "Everything appears to have conspired to 
 prepare the train for a grand explosion; arc you also ready? 
 As you are said to have removed your headquarters down the 
 river, you can retain your present position without suspicion, 
 until your friends join you in December somewhere on the river 
 Mississippi. Under the auspices of Burr and Wilkinson I shall 
 be happy to engage, and when the time arrives you will find me 
 near you." Eight days after this Dayton sought to bind Wil- 
 kinson fast to Burr's enterprise by intimating that he was in any 
 event about to lose his position in the army. He wrote: "It 
 is now well ascertained that }'ou are to be displaced in next 
 session. Jefferson will affect to yield reluctantly to the public 
 sentiment, but yield he will; prepare yourself for it; you know 
 the rest. You are not a man to despair, or even despond, espec- 
 ially when such prospects offer in another quarter. Are you 
 ready? Wealth and glory. Louisiana and Mexico. Receive 
 my nephew affectionately." 
 
 These letters came to Wilkinson on the eighth of October, 
 but a little more than a month before the time named b\- lUirr 
 
52 THE WEST AND THE AMERICAN UNION. 
 
 when he said he would be at the Falls of the Ohio with his force 
 coming down the river. Although it would seem as though time 
 would be of great value, and that he would hastily return to the 
 Mississippi and place Fort Adams and New Orleans in a condi- 
 tion for defence, for thirteen days Wilkinson did nothing but 
 engage himself with the small force of Spaniards on the Sabine, 
 and, as he says, endeavor to draw further facts out of Swart- 
 wout about the expedition.* His delay in communicating with 
 the President had the more significance since he knew that the 
 route of the messenger overland to Washington consumed over 
 a month at best. The President wrote on the third of January, 
 1807, to Wilkinson, that his letter of November 12, brought 
 by a special messenger, only reached him on the day before, 
 having taken over fifty days in the transit. f 
 
 General Wilkinson, in his affidavit. No. 81, as reported to 
 congress, swore that, having been requested by Swartwout to 
 write to Burr, whom he was soon to meet, he declined to do so. 
 It was, however, extorted from him afterwards in the examina- 
 tion in Richmond that he did write a letter to Burr from 
 Natchitoches, that it was sent to Natchez, to which place he 
 followed, recovered it and destroyed it.'l This is probably the 
 point at which, after long uncertainty, he at length determined 
 to give up Burr and hold to the government. And even then 
 he shaped his course in such a way that, if he discovered that 
 Burr's project caught the popular favor and was likely to suc- 
 ceed, he might not be found to be committed irrevocably 
 against it. 
 
 Only on the twenty-first of October did he send a message 
 to the President; and even then he did not send the letters or 
 copies of them which he had received ; nor did he in a long 
 communication mention the name of Burr as connected with 
 the expedition. While the letter from Burr can hardly fail to 
 convince one that Wilkinson was previously informed as to the 
 conspiracy, Wilkinson, in his letter to the President, seems 
 intent upon concealing the complicity of Burr. He declares 
 
 Wilkinson II., p. 321. f Jefferson's Works, V, p. 26. J Clark, p. 130. 
 
THE WEST AN!) THE AMERICAN UNION. 53 
 
 in his memoirs, that even yet he could hardly bring himself 
 to believe that his "long-loved friend," as he calls him, "could 
 be engaged in a treasonable enterprise."* 
 
 On the fifth of November he received from Dr. Bollman, of 
 New Orleans, a warm friend of Burr, copies of the letters of 
 Burr and Dayton, which, for further certainty, had been com. 
 manded to be delivered to him. On the same day he received 
 a letter from J. D. Donaldson, of Natchez, which informed him 
 that a messenger from St. Louis had just made known to him a 
 plan, with permission that he might inform the general of it, 
 that, Wilkinson said, staggered credulity. It was that there was 
 an expedition on foot to revolutionize the western country 
 which was matured and ready to explode; that Kentucky, Ohio, 
 Tennessee, Orleans and Indiana are combined to declare them- 
 selves independent on the fifteenth of November. It was added 
 that an accredited agent of the conspiracy had approached 
 some of the most influential persons in St. Louis and asked 
 them to join, saying that if money was necessary it might be 
 commanded to any extent. It was stated that the persons thus 
 applied to altogether refused to concur in any such plan, and 
 that it would be only superior force that would dispense with 
 the oath of allegiance to the United States. The fact of the 
 communication of this project in .St. Louis was asserted ; but, 
 it was added, that there were only four persons in St. Louis 
 privy to the disclosure made by the secret agent, f 
 
 It was, Wilkinson says, only on the receipt of this message 
 that his mind, not even persuaded by what Svvartwout had 
 told him, and the letters brought him, was convinced that 
 there was a conspiracy, and that Burr was at the head of it. 
 It was only on the twelfth of November, more than a month 
 after the receipt of the letters from Burr, that Wilkinson wrote 
 to the President, sending a copy of the letters which he had 
 received from Burr and Dayton. Even then he sent copies 
 which were, as he himself afterwards confessed, garbled, with 
 important changes made, and with all reference in them to 
 
 * II., p. 323. + Wilkinson, I., App. 88. 
 
54 THE WEST AND THE AMERICAN UNION. 
 
 Burr's previous communications with him taken out. He says 
 that this was done in order that he might not be inculpated with 
 him. He at different times swore that one and the other forms 
 of this important letter were faithful and correct. The fact 
 that he was suspected was at all times present to his mind. 
 When he revealed to Colonel Gushing the substance of Burr's 
 letter, he bade him mark the date, in order that he might, if 
 called on, make a statement afterward. Colonel Freeman, the 
 commander in New Orleans, testified that Wilkinson put before 
 him the rank and wealth which he might have if he would side 
 with Burr. Governor Mead,* of Mississippi, wrote to Gov- 
 ernor Claiborne, of Louisiana: "If Burr passes this territory 
 with two thousand men, I have no doubt but that General 
 Wilkinson will be your worst enemy. Be on your guard 
 against the wily general. He is not much better than Cataline. 
 Consider him as a traitor, and act as if certain thereof "-f- The 
 messenger who took Wilkinson's letter of November 12, to 
 the President affirmed that the first question which Jefferson 
 put to him was: "Is Wilkinson sound in this business?" 
 
 The President, on his receipt of Wilkinson's first letter, as 
 well as from information gained in other ways, issued his pro- 
 clamation;}; against the conspiracy of Burr on November 27^ 
 1806, in which he warned all persons from engaging in the 
 treasonable expedition. 
 
 After Burr had secured his triumphal acquittal in Frankfort, 
 about the middle of December, he went to Nashville to gather 
 his recruits ; but the proclamation of the President was now 
 pressing hard upon him ; and, while he had always overrated 
 the number and zeal of his adherents, this evidence that those 
 who joined him must be prepared to encounter the opposition 
 of the government, paralyzed his work. The President after- 
 ward declaredi^ his judgment that the first blow which the en- 
 terprise received was from the energy of Governor Tiffin at 
 Marietta, and that the plot was crippled by the activity of Ohio. 
 
 *Cable, Creoles of Lou., p. 153. f Gayarr^, Am. Dom. p. 169. 
 
 iJWilkinson, I., App.,Q6. ^Jefferson's Works, V., p. 28. 
 
THE WEST AND THE AMERICAN UNION. 55 
 
 Burr went down the Cumberland river with only two boats, 
 although he expected a force to come overland from Tennessee, 
 and meet him on the Mississippi near Natchez. Burr knew 
 thoroughly the condition of the road from Nashville to Bayou 
 Pierre, the point on the Mississippi near Natchez, where the 
 force was to rendezvous. On the twenty-seventh of December 
 Burr joined Blennerhassett,* who had nine boats, at the mouth 
 of the Cumberland ; and they all proceeded down the Missis- 
 sippi. Six days after they came to Chickasaw Bluffs, where 
 was Lieutenant Jackson with a detachment of United States 
 troops. Burr strove to induce him to join them, putting before 
 him in strong colors what brilliant results would follow for those 
 who survived, and while he did not state fully what his plans 
 were, he assured him that they were honorable. Jackson, how- 
 ever, was firm in refusing. The situation for Ikirr had now 
 become desperate. Those who had pledged to him their ad- 
 herence altogether withdrew on the appearance of the Presi- 
 dent's proclamation, which showed the lawlessness of the imder- 
 taking. All the western states called out their militia, and 
 the most rigid measures were taken all along the Mississippi to 
 (-luell the expedition. l-5urr saw that he must destroy all the 
 military features of his enteri)rise, and declare that it was only 
 intended as a colonizing party for the Washita country. Accord" 
 ingly one night he ordered all the chests of arms to be thrown 
 into the Mississippi river. 
 
 Burr landed at Bayou Pierre, thirty miles above Natchez, in 
 the Mississippi territory, on the seventh of January, 1807. On 
 the seventeenth he surrendered himself to Cowles Mead, the 
 acting governor,! only declaring his wish not to fall into the 
 hands of Wilkinson, whom he called a perfidious villain, and 
 said that if he was sacrificed his portfolio would prove him to be 
 a villain. W'h-.n the case of ]-)urr was gi\-en into the hands of the 
 grand jury, the\- declared that there was no evidence against 
 him, and, pending his request to be released on his own recog- 
 nizance, and hearing that instantK' upon his release he was to 
 
 * Blennerhassett Pap., i86, f Wilkinson, II., 337. 
 
56 THE WEST AND THE AMERICAN UNION. 
 
 be arrested again by the governor, he changed his clothes and 
 escaped across the country eastward. His company, in the 
 meantime, were in great confusion, and with no money. The 
 leaders were arrested by the United States authorities, and the 
 others scattered, and went back home. 
 
 In the meantime Wilkinson, aroused at last from his indeci- 
 sion, seemed determined by a frenzied, histrionic* activity 
 against Burr to conceal his previous complicity. He reached 
 New Orleans on the twenty-fifth of November ordering Fort 
 Adams to be dismantled, which should have been rather strength- 
 ened, if, as he declared to the President, seven thousand men 
 were coming down the river with Burr. He made requisition on 
 Governor Mead for his militia, in order to take them to New 
 Orleans. This, however was refused on the reasonable ground 
 that it would strip the country of all means of resistance. He 
 arbitrarily arrested in New Orleans those whom he suspected of 
 complicity with Burr, some of whom could give very damaging 
 evidence against himself; and with the force of the army re- 
 sisted the process of the courts for their release under the 
 habeas corpus act. 
 
 Burr subsequently declared that he never had any idea of 
 dividing the Union, that his hopes of prospering in his expedi. 
 tion against Mexico had depended upon war being declared 
 between Great Britain and Spain, that this expedition was 
 defeated by the death of Pitt early in 1806, and that Wilkinson 
 thereupon lost heart in the project. Wilkinson confessed, how- 
 ever, that in October he said to Swartwout he would not 
 oppose Burr's expedition.! 
 
 I^urr was rearrested on the seventeenth of February, 1807, 
 in northern Alabama, traveling with a companion, under an 
 assumed name, endeavoring to make his way to Pensacola, then 
 under the king of Spain. He was charged with high misde- 
 meanor, in setting on foot within the United States a military 
 expedition against Spain, a friendly power; and also with treason^ 
 in assembling an armed force, with design to seize New Orleans, 
 
 * Cable, Creoles of Lou., p. 153. Eaton, p. 403. fClark, p. 163. 
 
THE WEST AND THE AMERICAN UNION. 57 
 
 to revolutionize the territory attached, and separate the western 
 from the Atlantic states. It was with great difficulty that Burr 
 could be taken through the country as a prisoner. He appealed 
 to the civil authorities against his military arrest. The ladies 
 everywhere espoused his cause, and children were named after 
 him.* 
 
 At length Ikirr reached Richmond, Virginia, where, under 
 Chief Justice Marshall, his trial began on the seventeenth of 
 August. There was a brilliant array of counsel on each side_ 
 Political feeling ran at that time very high, and the greatest 
 excitement prevailed in Richmond and in Washington over 
 the progress and results of the trial. The President was a 
 Republican, and was bitterly opposed to Burr. The Chief Jus- 
 tice was more of a Federalist, and was scrupulously exact and, 
 some thought, almost timid, in his rulings. The President 
 wrote at the time to a friend: "The Federalists make Burr's 
 cause their own and exert their whole influence to shield him 
 from punishment. It is unfortunate that federalism is still pre- 
 dominant in our judiciary department, which is consequently 
 in opposition to the legislative and executive branches, and is 
 able to baffle their measures often, "f 
 
 Testimony was received touching Burr's conversations, show- 
 ing his intent before overt acts began. In addition to the evi- 
 dence given by General Eaton, which has been already referred 
 to, Colonel Morgan and his son testified that in August, 1806, 
 Colonel Burr had, at their house in western Pennsylvania, de- 
 clared that, in less than five years, the west would be totally 
 divided from the Atlantic states, and that the Alleghany moun- 
 tains would be the line of division. He said that great numbers 
 were not necessary to execute great military deeds; all that 
 was wanted was a leader in whom they could place confidence, 
 and who, they believed, would carry them through. He averred 
 that, with two hundred men, he could drive congress, with the 
 President at its head, into the river Potomac, and that, with 
 five hundred men, he could take possession of New York.^ 
 
 •Pickett's His. Alabama, </r^ Av. f Jefferson's Works, \\ 165. JBurr's Trial, I, p. 566. 
 
5§ THE WEST AND THE AMERICAN UNIOlSf. 
 
 Evidence was also received concerning the transactions on 
 Blennerhassett's Island, which, however, took on an unmistak- 
 ably warlike character only after Burr had left. Long argu- 
 ments were heard as to the competency of other evidence which 
 was offered. At length the court ruled ^ that no testimony rela- 
 tive to the conduct and declarations of the prisoner elsewhere 
 and subsequent to the transactions on Blennerhassett's Island 
 could be admitted, because such testimony, being in its nature 
 corroborative, and incompetent to prove the overt act in itself, 
 was irrelevant until there was proof had of the overt act by two 
 witnesses; that the overt act on Blennerhassett's Island was 
 proved, but the presence 'of the accused was not alleged ; that 
 his presence when and where the overt act was committed was 
 necessary. In consequence of this ruling, the jury, on Sep- 
 tember the first, 1807, found that Burr was not proved guilty 
 of treason, under the indictment, by any evidence submitted 
 to them. 
 
 In the trial for misdemeanor, Burr was, on the fifteenth of 
 September, discharged, because the evidence sustaining it was, 
 under the former ruling of the court, excluded. It was also 
 ruled t (i) that the declaration of three persons, not forming 
 a part of the transaction, and not made in the presence of the 
 accused, is not to be received ; (2) that acts of accomplices, 
 except so far as they prove the character and object of the 
 expedition, cannot be taken in evidence; (3) that acts of accom- 
 plices in another district, even though they constitute substan- 
 tial cause for a prosecution, cannot be taken in evidence unless 
 they go directly to prove the charges made in this district ; 
 (4) that legal testimony to show that the expedition was mili- 
 tary, and destined against Spain, is to be received. 
 
 Burr was accordingly remanded for trial to Ohio, where the 
 offense was said to have been committed ; but no further proceed- 
 ings against him were had. Indignation was very widely 
 expressed at the result of the trial. The President himself 
 wrote thus to General Wilkinson^ about the failure to convict 
 
 •Burr's Trial, I, 549. fBurr's Trial (Robertson), I, 539. ^Jefferson's Works, V., 198. 
 
THE WEST AND THE AMERICAN UNION. 59 
 
 Burr: "The scenes which have been enacted at Richmond are 
 such as have never before been exliibited in any country where 
 all regard to public character has not yet been thrown off 
 They are equivalent to a proclamation of imptinity to every 
 traitorous combination which may be formed to destroy the 
 Union. However, they will produce an amendment to the 
 constitution which, keepin;^ the judges independent of the 
 Executive, will not leave them so of the nation." Burr went 
 abroad directly after the trial. 
 
 The case of Blennerhassett, which was really determined by 
 the result of Burr's trial, was remanded to Ohio, but no further 
 prosecution followed. He was distressed by the losses which 
 he had brought on himself by his adherence to Burr. He 
 became, however, completely disillusioned as to Burr's perfidy 
 and sensuality in the closer intimacy which he had with him 
 during the trial in Richmond. Although both Burr ana his 
 son-in-law, Alston, had promised to make good the advances 
 which he had made, they neither of them did so, although 
 Blennerhassett, in the loss of his home and in his utter need 
 otherwise, begged them for a repayment of what he had sacri- 
 ficed for Burr. In consequence he suffered from poverty to the 
 end of his life. His son, Joseph Lewis Blenncrhnssett, was 
 engaged in the practice of the law, antl died in Lincoln county, 
 Missouri, in 1862. 
 
 Wilkinson, in the trial of Burr, of course gave only so much 
 evidence against him as his hatred of Burr drew forth, and as 
 would conceal his own complicity. He was true to his craven 
 instincts to the last. Immediatel}' after the conclusion of the 
 trial in Richmond he sent his confidential agent, Walter Burling, 
 into Mexico, as he declared, "on grounds of public duty and 
 professional enterprise, to attempt to penetrate the veil which 
 concealed the topographical route to the City of Mexico, and 
 the military defenses which intervened, feeling that the equivo- 
 cal relations of the two countries justified the niser"^ Burling 
 w^as really sent to apprise the viceroy of the attempt of Burr, 
 
 *Wilkinson I., p. 417. 
 
6o THE WEST AND THE AMERICAN UNION. 
 
 and to demand, on Wilkinson's behalf, a compensation of two 
 hundred thousand dollars for, as he declared, ' ' great pecuniary 
 sacrifices in defeating Burr's plan, and, Leonidas-like, throwing 
 himself into the pass of Thermopylae." Yturrigaray, the vice- 
 roy, received the communication with indignation, and told 
 Burling that General Wilkinson in counteracting any treasonable 
 plan of Burr's did no more than comply with his duty, that he 
 would take good care to defend the kingdom of Mexico against 
 any attack or invasion, and that he did not think himself author- 
 ized to give one farthing to General Wilkinson in compensa- 
 tion for his pretended services. The demand having been con- 
 temptuously refused. Burling was ordered to leave the country. '^^ 
 
 Thus ended the last attempt at separating the western country 
 from the American Union. As all such attempts had their 
 strength in the distance and isolation, and consequently the 
 ignorance and prejudice of the sections, it may be confidently 
 believed that in the comparative homogeneity of the affections 
 and interests of all the people of the land now, by reason of 
 rapid and constant communication, no such attempts will again 
 be made, or, if made, will gain Cv^en the limited standing and 
 proportions which those in the past have done. 
 
 Our multiplying railroad bars and telegraph wires are more 
 than material lines of communication. Themselves created by 
 the physical and commercial needs of a great people, they are 
 the sensitive nerve connections of a complex social organism. 
 Along them pulse the currents of intelligence and an identical 
 interest, and they convey and perpetuate the throbbings of 
 simultaneous impulses and common national aspirations. In 
 these are furnished, under God, the sure hope and presage of 
 the perpetuity of our American Union. 
 
 *Davis, Burr, II., pp. 401-4. Blenneihassett Pap., pp. 210 and 578. 
 
THE ATTEMPTS 
 
 To Separate the IVest 
 
 THE AMERICAN UNION 
 
 A PAPER READ BEFORE THE MISSOURI HISTORICAL SOCIETY. 
 FEBRUARY 4, 1885 
 
 RT. REV. C. F. ROBERTSON, D. D , LL D. 
 
 Member of the American Historical Association, of the Historiciil Societies of Missouri 
 and Virginia, the Huguenot Society of America and the Southern Historical 
 Society; Corresponding Member of the Historical Societies of 
 Maryland, Wisconsin, New England Historic-Gene- 
 alogical Society, Kansas, Georgia, etc. 
 
 ST. LOUIS 
 1885 
 
I