An Artist in Treason: The Extraordinary Double Life of General James Wilkinson

by Andro Linklater

  29,995

  Balance due James Wilkinson $2095

  New Orleans, January 4, 1796.

  (Errors excepted) for Don E. M.

  Gilbert Leonard.

  This should be compared to the real account kept by his Spanish handlers: see Appendix 1.

  295 “to vary or expunge any rank Epithet”: Jacobs, Tarnished Warrior, 251.

  296 “to take care of the interests of the North:” Samuel Perkins, History of the Political and Military Events of the Late War between the United States and Great Britain.

  297 “I therefore feel anxious not only to add the Floridas to the South”: Grundy, December 9, 1811, Annals of Congress.

  298 “It has been hinted to me that I may be recalled”: Hay, Admirable Trumpeter, 313.

  299 The capture of Mobile: Memoirs, 3:339-41.

  300 “Why should you remain in your land of cypress”: John Armstrong to JW, March 12, 1813, ibid., 3:342.

  CHAPTER 29: THE LAST BATTLE

  JW’s role in the Canadian campaign is reflected darkly through Memoirs, vol. 3, written around the defense he presented in his last trial. The military background comes primarily from Quimby, The U.S. Army in the War of 1812: An Operational and Command Study; Skelton, An American Profession of Arms; Stagg, Mr. Madison’s War; and as always Henry Adams provided the broader view.

  302 “a general officer does not expose his person”: JW’s comment represents the shift from the front-led collisions of eighteenth-century warfare, to the distantly generaled battles of maneuver that Napoléon bequeathed to the nineteenth century. It was unfortunate for JW, and the entire army, that Armstrong remained mired in the earlier era.

  302 “struck at the very foundation of military character”: Memoirs, 3:345.

  305 “Two heads on the same shoulder”: JW to Armstrong, August 24, 1813, American State Papers, Military Affairs.

  306 “I have escaped my pallet and with a giddy head”: September 16, 1813, ibid.

  306 “General Wilkinson arrived this day in Sackett’s Harbor”: Armstrong’s entry quoted in Memoirs, 3:69.

  307 “in my feeble condition”: Ibid., 3:71.

  307 The story of the St. Lawrence campaign comes from Adams, History of the United States, 7:193–98; the testimony of General Lewis in Memoirs, 3:128–29; and JW’s reports in American State Papers, Military Affairs, 1: 462–79.

  308 JW’s poor health was apparent in a flood of references: October 28 he was “very ill”; on November 2 “very feeble”; on November 30 “sick”; and on December 7 “seriously indisposed.” Colonel Joseph Swift thought that between the two commanders, “Wilkinson and Lewis had not a day of sound health.” November 21, 1813, Swift, Memoirs, 122.

  310 “The mortality spread so deep a gloom over our camps”: Memoirs, vol. 3, appendix 9.

  310 “on which a box is placed to receive my bed”: Hay, Admirable Trumpeter, 323.

  310 “He threatens to make a dash soon”: Daniel Tompkins to Armstrong, ibid., 324.

  310 “blasted all my hopes”: Memoirs, vol. 3, appendix 53.

  310 La Colle Mill skirmish: Ibid., 3:102.

  CHAPTER 30: THE CHANGING OF THE GUARD

  The proceedings of JW’s court-martial form the core of Memoirs, vol. 3. The final stages of his life are covered by his letters, the autobiographical torrent finally running dry with the publication of Memoirs, vol. 2, in 1816. Academic sources are Thomas R. Hay, “Some Reflections on the Career of General James Wilkinson,” and for his last days in Mexico, Bolton, “General James Wilkinson as Advisor to Emperor Iturbide.”

  313 JW’s successful protest against his court- martial: Memoirs, 3:492–93.

  313 JW’s family loss left Celestine distraught: Jacobs, Tarnished Warrior, 282. JW was seemingly a caring father; shortly before James Biddle left with Pike’s expedition in 1806, JW wrote anxiously to the hard-driving Pike, “My Son has the foundation of a good Constitution but it must be tempered by degrees, do not push Him beyond his capacities in hardships too suddenly. He will I hope attempt any thing but let the stuff be hardened by degrees.”

  314 Henry Adams’s scathing account of the burning of Washington ends with a bitter jab: “Before midnight the flames of three great conflagrations made the whole country light, and from the distant hills of Maryland and Virginia the flying President and Cabinet caught glimpses of the ruin their incompetence had caused.”

  314 JW’s account of the opening of the court- martial, and his success in disposing of Van Buren, Memoirs, 3:4–22.

  315 “a vice my soul detests”: Supported by the testimony of several witnesses, ibid., 3:104, 144–45, 163, 211.

  315 “He is hereby honourably acquitted”: Ibid., 3:496.

  315 “the first victory gained over the enemy on a plain”: Quoted in Kimball, “The Battle of Chippawa: Infantry Tactics in the War of 1812.”

  316 “The British were beaten. It was evident”: Fortescue, History of the British Army, 10:109–10.

  316 “that so great a difference existed between regular troops and a militia force”: Madison quoted in Carl Benn, The War of 1812 (New York: Osprey Publishing, 2002), 20.

  317 “The Die is Cast,” Cushing wrote when he heard of his forcible retirement, “unless it should please the President of the United States to reward me for long and faithful services by a civil office, I shall be left on the verge of sixty years of age, after devoting almost forty years to the military service of my country, with no other prospect before me but that of spending the remnant of my days in poverty and wretchedness.” Quoted in Skelton, “Social Roots of the American Military Profession.”

  317 “General Wilkinson has broken through all decorum”: Dallas to Madison, August 3, 1815, Dallas, Life of Dallas, 436.

  320 “As to Long Tom—meaning you”: JW to Jefferson, January 21, 1811, PTJ.

  320 “that I should descend to so unmeaning an act of treason”: Jefferson to Monroe, January 11 or 12, 1812, PTJ.

  321 The story of Chisholm’s unexpected encounter with Jefferson and JW appears in Isaac Joslin Cox, “The Louisiana-Texas Frontier I.” Cox’s authority lends weight to his conclusion: “We are led to believe that Jefferson’s interest in Nolan extended farther than to the latter’s description of the wild horses of Texas.”

  321 “I have ever and carefully restrained myself”: Jefferson to Monroe, January 11 or 12, 1812, PTJ.

  322 “Suppose I get you a plantation adjoining me”: JW to van Rensselaer, December 29, 1815, Wilkinson Papers, N.Y. State Library.

  322 “Blessed with my Celestine and two beloved little daughters”: JW to M. R. Thompson, January 14, 1818, Darlington MSS, University of Pittsburgh. Thompson, a wealthy Baltimore merchant, was a new friend who brought out the best of JW’s domestic side.

  323 “new flushed, as elastic as [a] Billiard Ball”: Ibid.

  323 “You can not find any one of virtue & Intelligence”: JW to van Rensselaer, January 16, 1821, Wilkinson Papers, N.Y. State Library.

  325 “more the Lamb than the Lion, the Spinster than the Soldier” and “literally a Washington in all his great qualities”: JW to Jefferson, March 21, 1824, PTJ.

  325 “slothful, ready to vice, insensible to social affection”: JW’s memorial to Iturbide appears in Bolton, “General James Wilkinson as Advisor to Emperor Iturbide.”

  325 “divinely situated on the Coast of the Gulph”: JW to Jonathan Williams, December 1822, quoted in Jacobs, Tarnished Warior, 308.

  327 That JW was caught on the horns of a dilemma, unable to make his fortune and too proud to return penniless, was made clear in a letter to Thomas Aspinwall, U.S. consul in London. JW said he needed to make a fortune in order not to have to depend on “gifts and graces” from the “little Jesuit Madison or his Bi-faced friend Monroe.” JW to Aspinwall, April 17, 1823, printed in Bulletin N.Y. State Library 3:362.

  327 “I have just made a contract apparently”: JW to Joseph Wilkinson, February 25, 1825, Tarnished Warrior, 311.

  BIBLIOGRAPHY

/>   NOTES ON SOURCES

  There has never been a shortage of material on James Wilkinson. He hoarded letters and papers obsessively, and his notoriety in his own lifetime ensured that many people either corresponded directly with him or made reference to his activities. The only problem is to make sense of information, which was rarely biased toward the truth.

  James Wilkinson’s papers are widely distributed. The largest single collection, the James Wilkinson Papers, containing about 650 documents, is held by the Chicago Historical Society. Other notable sources are the Filson Historical Society of Louisville, Kentucky, covering the period 1784 to 1805, especially Wilkinson’s land deals and separatist activity; the Pennsylvania Historical Society, for papers relating to the Biddle family and Wilkinson’s political activities to 1807; the Mississippi Department of Archives and History, the Winthrop Sargent and William Claiborne Letters for the period 1795 to 1807; the Missouri Historical Society, covering Wilkinson’s governorship and exploration; and the Library of Congress (LoC). In this last location are also to be found important collections relevant to Wilkinson’s life: the Andrew Ellicott Papers relating to their connection, 1795 to 1807; Harry Innes Papers, particularly volumes 19, 22, and 23, containing Wilkinson’s business correspondence, 1784 to 1805; Thomas Jefferson Papers (TJP), correspondence from 1800 to 1824; George Washington Papers (GWP), letters and references, 1776 to 1799; and the Papeles Procedentes de Cuba of the Archivo General de Indias, in particular photostats of legajos (bundles) numbers 2373, 2374, and 2375, containing most of Wilkinson’s coded communications.

  The Jefferson and Washington Papers are also available online at, respectively, http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/collections/jefferson_papers/index.html., and http://rotunda.upress.virginia.edu:8080/founders/GEWN.html, as are other LoC sources: American State Papers; Journals of the Continental Congress (JCC); Letters of the Continental Congress; and the Annals of Congress— at http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/browse/index.html. The Adams Family Papers (AFP) have been assembled online by the Massachusetts Historical Society, and the War Department Papers (WDP), once widely scattered, have been brought together at the Center for History and New Media, George Mason University, also available online.

  Many of Wilkinson’s official letters were also published in his different volumes of memoirs.

  UNPUBLISHED PAPERS

  Archivo General de Indias. Papeles Procedentes de Cuba (PPC), legajos 2373, 2374, and 2375. LoC. The library also has photostats of manuscripts from the Archivo Histórico Nacional, Madrid, containing references to Wilkinson.

  Andrew Ellicott Papers. LoC.

  Harry Innes Papers. LoC.

  War Department Papers. Center for History and New Media. George Mason University. http://wardepartmentpapers.org/index.php.

  James Wilkinson Papers. Chicago Historical Society.

  CONTEMPORARY SOURCES

  Adams, Charles F. Memoirs of John Quincy Adams. 12 vols. Vol 9. Philadelphia: 1874–77. Adams Family Papers (AFP). Massachusetts Historical Society. (digital) www.masshist.org/digitaladams/aea.

  American State Papers. LoC. (ASP)

  —Foreign Relations. Vol. 1, 1789–1819.

  —Indian Affairs. Vol. 1, 1789–1819.

  —Military Affairs. Vol. 1, 1789–1819.

  Annals of Congress (AC) Burke, Edmund. Reflections on the Revolution in France. 1790. Reprint, New York and London: Penguin Classics, 1986.

  Burr, Aaron. Memoirs of Aaron Burr with Miscellaneous Selections from His Correspondence. Ed. Matthew West. New York: Harper & Bros., 1834.

  ———. The Private Journal of Aaron Burr During His Residence of Four Years in Europe. 2 vols. New York: Harper, 1838.

  Carpenter, T. The Trial of Colonel Aaron Burr on an Indictment of Treason. Washington, DC: Westcott, 1808.

  Clark, Daniel. Proofs of the Corruption of General James Wilkinson and of His Connexion with Aaron Burr. Philadelphia: Hall & Pierie, 1809.

  Ellicott, Andrew. The Journal of Andrew Ellicott, late Commissioner on behalf of the United States . . . for determining the boundary between the United States and the possessions of his Catholic Majesty in America . . . With six maps . . . To which is added an appendix containing all the astronomical observations made, etc. Philadelphia, 1803.

  Filson, John. The Discovery, Settlement and Present State of Kentucké. Wilmington, Adams, 1784.

  Foster, Thomas, ed. The Collected Works of Benjamin Hawkins, 1796–1810. Tuscaloosa: University of Alabama Press, 2003.

  Imlay, Gilbert. A Topographical Description of the Western Territory of North America. 3rd ed. London: J. Debrett, 1797. Reprint, New York: Augustus M. Kelley, 1969.

  Kilty, John. Land Holder’s Assistant and Land Office Guide. Baltimore: G. Dobbin &Murphy, 1808. MSA L 25529.

  Jefferson, Thomas. Notes on the State of Virginia. 1785. Reprint, New York, Evanston, London: Harper Torchbook, 1964.

  ———. The Papers of Thomas Jefferson. Ed. Julian P. Boyd. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1950–74. Online: American Memory, LoC (PTJ).

  Journals of the Continental Congress, 1774–1789. Ed. Worthington C. Ford et al. Washington, DC, 1904–37 ( JCC).

  Letters of Brunswick and Hessian Officers during the American Revolution. Trans. William Stone. Albany, NY: Munsell’s Son, 1891.

  Letters of Delegates to Congress, 1774–1789. 25 vols. Ed. Paul H. Smith et al. Washington, DC: Library of Congress, 1976–2000 (LDC).

  Lodge, Henry Cabot. The Works of Alexander Hamilton, vol. 10. Federal edition. New York: G.P. Putnam’s Sons, 1904. (WAH)

  Marshall, Humphrey. The History of Kentucky, Exhibiting an Account of the Modern Discovery; Settlement; Progressive Improvement; Civil and Military Transactions; and the Present State of the Country. 2 vols. Frankfort, KY: George S. Robinson, 1824.

  Papers of the Continental Congress. American Memory, LoC (PCC).

  Reed, Joseph. The Life and Correspondence of Joseph Reed. Philadelphia: Lindsay and Blakiston, 1847.

  Washington, George. The Papers of George Washington. Digital ed. Ed. Theodore J. Crackel. Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press, Rotunda, 2007 (PGW).

  ———. The Writings of George Washington. Ed. Jared Sparks. Boston, 1834 (WGP).

  Wilkinson, James. Burr’s Conspiracy exposed and General Wilkinson vindicated against the slanders of his enemies on that important occasion. Washington, 1811.

  ———. Memoirs of My Own Times. 3 vols. and an atlas. Philadelphia: A. Small, 1816.

  ———. (“A Kentuckian,” i.e., Wilkinson). A Plain Tale, Supported by Authentic Documents, Justifying the Character of General Wilkinson. Richmond, KY: The Inquirer, 1807.

  JOURNAL ARTICLES

  Baack, Ben. “Forging a Nation State: The Continental Congress and the Financing of the War of American Independence.” Economic History Review, n.s., 54, no. 4 (November 2001).

  Birtle, Andrew J. “The Origins of the Legion of the United States.” Journal of Military History 67, no. 4 (October 2003).

  Bolton, Herbert E. “General James Wilkinson as Advisor to Emperor Iturbide.” Hispanic American Historical Review 1, no. 2 (May 1918).

  ———. “Papers of Zebulon M. Pike, 1806–1807.” American Historical Review 13, no. 4 ( July 1908).

  Brooks, Philip C. “Spain’s Farewell to Louisiana, 1803–1821.” Mississippi Valley Historical Review 27, no. 1 ( June 1940).

  Cox, Isaac Joslin. “The American Intervention in West Florida.” American Historical Review 17, no. 2 ( January 1912).

  ———. “The Freeman Red River Expedition.” Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society 92, no. 2 (May 5, 1948).

  ———. “General Wilkinson and His Later Intrigues with the Spaniards.” American Historical Review 19 (1914).

  ———. “Hispanic- American Phases of the ‘Burr Conspiracy.’ ” Hispanic American Historical Review 12, no. 2 (May 1932).

  ———. “The Louisiana-Texas Frontier I.” Southwestern Historical Quarterly 10, no. 1 ( July 1906).<
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  ———. “The Louisiana-Texas Frontier II.” Southwestern Historical Quarterly 17, no. 1 ( July 1913).

  ———. “The Louisiana-Texas Frontier III.” Southwestern Historical Quarterly 017, no. 2. Online, p. 140.

  ———. “The Louisiana- Texas Frontier During the Burr Conspiracy.” Mississippi Valley Historical Review 10, no. 3 (December 1923).

  ———. “The Pan- American Policy of Jefferson and Wilkinson.” Mississippi Valley Historical Review 1, no. 2 (September 1914).

  ———. “Spanish Papers Relating to the Treachery of General James Wilkinson.” American Historical Review 21 (1916).

  Davis, Elvert. “By Invitation of Mrs. Wilkinson: An incident of life at Fort Fayette.” Western Pennsylvania Historical Magazine 13 ( July 1930): 145–81.