Washington observed:
The intercepted letter, if genuine, is really an abomination, disgraceful to the author; and to be regretted, that among us, a man in high trust and a responsible station, should be found so debased in his principles as to write it. With respect to the sentiment which relates to me, as late President of the United States, I hold it, as I shall do the author, if he uttered it, in the most sovereign contempt; but such an attempt as is therein exhibited to poison the minds of the Indians, and destroy the utility and influence of the agents employed by the government for the express purpose of preserving peace and harmony with the Indians, and this too for the avowed design of facilitating a plan which he is unwilling, or ashamed to express; and more than probable from the complexion of the letter, is of an injurious nature to the country, deserves an epithet which he can be at no loss to apply.
Within a few days Washington knew that the disgraceful affair had been laid before Congress on July 3. Full reports submitted to Congress by Pickering and McHenry, based on correspondence with the British and Spanish ministers and latest advices from the southern border, sustained the accusations against the Senator. When Blount was confronted with the letter on the floor of the Senate, the case against him was irrefutable. On July 8 he was expelled from the Senate.
As the summer progressed Martha began to show the fatiguing effects of the hospitality extended at Mount Vernon. Her weariness was the greater because her health was not consistently good. It distressed Washington to see her going about supervisory tasks and entertaining guests even when one side of her face was badly swollen. There were always sufficient servants, but they did not function automatically. “These require instructions in some cases,” Martha confided, “and looking after in all.” Someone, if possible, must be obtained to relieve the mistress of Mount Vernon. The General advertised for a competent housekeeper at a wage of $150 a year. Disappearance of the cook added a further complication and it seemed Washington would have to resort to purchase rather than hire for a replacement. “I had resolved never to become the master of another slave by purchase,” he wrote George Lewis, “but the resolution I fear I must break.” On this business of slavery he had previously written Lawrence Lewis on August 4: “I wish from my soul that the Legislature of this State could see the policy of a gradual abolition of slavery; it would prevent much future mischief.”
There soon were two less in the Mount Vernon family. George Washington Lafayette and Felix Frestel left October 12 for Georgetown where they would take a stage for New York, there to embark for France. The General accompanied them to the Federal City, gave young Lafayette $300 for the voyage and sent in his care a warm, devoted letter to the boy’s father. Reunion of the Marquis and his family had been rumored for weeks, and when report of his liberation came to Mount Vernon the overjoyed son determined to depart as quickly as possible. Washington thought it would be wiser to await authenticated information, but he had not the heart to oppose the boy in his eagerness “to fly to the arms of those whom he holds most dear.” Young Lafayette had won the admiration and affection of the entire Mount Vernon family and said he had been as happy as possible in their tender care. Frestel also expressed appreciation for Washington’s “kind, tender and truly paternal affection.” He had come away, he added, with the lasting impression “that all who are truly great are consequently—and necessarily good.”
By the first of November circumstances on the plantation had bettered with the arrival of the new gardener and prospect of a new housekeeper, but no personal business of his could shut out the General’s concern in public matters. European developments were discouraging and internal discord undiminished. While the Republican press was prophesying that the three envoys would be received, Washington believed it unlikely that pride would allow the Directory of France to “acknowledge its errors and tread back its steps immediately.” Any change for the better on the part of France would occur by slow degrees, and, the French would insist, entirely to the credit of their own magnanimity. Unofficial word had come that preliminary articles of peace between that country and Great Britain had been signed at Lisle. The tendency among many Americans to minimize defensive measures in the face of this news was deplored as “a false and fatal security.” In his Annual Address on November 22 President Adams warned Congress: “I hold it most certain that permanent tranquility and order will not soon be obtained.”
Direct word came at last to Washington in letters from Marshall and Pinckney of their meeting at The Hague. The General had only newspaper reports of their subsequent arrival in Paris. As he wrote each of them on December 4, his thoughts were of the negotiation which, he presumed, already had begun. “What has been the reception of the embassy by the French Directory is to me unknown; and what will be the result of it, is not for me to predict.” Uncertainty became anxiety as week after week went by without further communication from the envoys. It was an unwelcome, ominous silence.
Washington found an unexpected diversion and encouragement in his private affairs when, on November 24, a stranger presented himself with a letter of introduction from Gen. Daniel Morgan. Although Morgan said little more than that he knew the bearer to be one James Welch, Washington invited the visitor to dine. The Greenbrier County resident came with an offer for the lease of lands on the Great Kanawha. This roughshod caller with his smooth-spoken propositions must have given Washington pause, for he asked the opinion of Dr. James Craik, who began an investigation of the man. Craik reported he was not favorably impressed and would be hesitant to bargain, especially when he learned the eagerness with which Welch hoped to acquire the acreage belonging to Craik as well as that of Washington. The master of Mount Vernon was not sufficiently wary to dismiss the backwoods trader, in spite of Craik’s caution. After several interviews and a considerable exchange of letters, Washington instructed his attorney, James Keith, to draw up a contract for long lease of the property—more than 23,000 acres—with an option for purchase. The price was computed at 6 per cent interest on $200,000, payable annually, beginning January 1, 1799. As security Washington accepted promise of a trust deed from Welch for some one hundred thousand acres which the buyer certified he owned in Randolph County. In any event, a substantial cash income would furnish a commodity rare at Mount Vernon. What Washington’s Potomac plantation could not produce, western lands might yield.
The New Year began auspiciously. The Maryland Legislature approved a loan towards continuance of public buildings in the Federal City, and Washington had reason to hope that similar consideration would be given another “favorite object of his heart”—full navigation of the Potomac. Best of all, welcome word of the safe arrival of Lafayette and his family at Hamburg came directly from the consul there—authentic news for which Washington long had waited. The reunion of George Lafayette with his parents and sisters still was unverified, but Washington hoped the meeting had been accomplished. The General was not too busy with his correspondence and with plantation matters to put in writing the system and daily conduct expected of his grandson, who was at Mount Vernon for an indefinite stay. Young Custis may have been unimpressed by his elder’s instructions and unmindful of their valuable application in the General’s own self-discipline, but he was now exposed to example as well as precept.
Newspaper accounts from France were not, for Washington, adequate proof of diplomatic progress, or indeed of the well being of the three envoys. Only direct word from them would satisfy him. He was puzzled by their silence. At the same time, he was made curious by the lack of silence of the recalled Monroe, and requested Pickering to send him the pamphlets now in circulation from the pens of Monroe and his counterpart, Fauchet. The master of Mount Vernon wished to be told “with the most unreserved frankness,” the public sentiment respecting them, especially Monroe’s View of the Conduct of the Executive of the United States. Pickering reported that Monroe’s View, like Randolph’s Vindication, “is considered his own condemnation or death warrant” when he sent the pam
phlets. As for Fauchet’s bold assertions, the Secretary added, they had little regard for truth or reason of decency and were of so little merit as to be below animadversion.
Sometime during March the General took up his copy of the View and simultaneously took up his pen. When he had finished, the margins were heavy with comments. The pungency of his sentences disclosed satisfaction in the mere process of pulling apart these morsels Monroe had offered for general consumption. In the first place, Washington questioned the propriety of employing private instructions and official correspondence as a means of personal vindication. Then, topic by topic, in unequivocal phrases, he inscribed his own review and refutation. With that, he closed the subject because, he explained, “I shall leave it to the tribunal to which he himself has appealed. . . .”
On February 12 the General and his family rode into Alexandria to a ball in honor of his birthday. At Philadelphia ten days later the former President’s birthday was celebrated with a banquet in Concert Hall. Governors and Judges there were, and others of high station, but the one who ranked them all, the President of the United States, did not attend. When the card of invitation from a committee of Philadelphians arrived, Adams “took the earliest opportunity to inform them that he declined accepting it.” The President’s absence provoked hearty criticism from many Federalists and friends of Washington, but the Vice President’s failure to participate apparently disturbed no one and called forth comment only from the President’s Lady, who assumed Jefferson’s absence to be out of deference to her husband.
Whether the plantation proprietor had expected it, his first post-presidential birthday evoked comparisons between himself and his successor. Most incisive was Madison’s observation:
There never was perhaps a greater contrast between two characters than between those of the present President and his predecessor. . . . The one cool, considerate and cautious, the other headlong and kindled into flame by every spark that lights on his passions; the one ever scrutinizing into the public opinion, and ready to follow where he could not lead it; the other insulting it by the most adverse sentiments and pursuits. Washington a hero in the field, yet overweighing every danger in the Cabinet—Adams with a single pretension to the character of a soldier, a perfect Quixotte as a statesman; the former Chief Magistrate pursuing peace everywhere with sincerity, though mistaking the means; the latter taking as much pains to get into war, as the former took to keep out of it. . . .
Washington, in the single brief letter he wrote on his sixty-sixth birthday, lamented to Senator Alexander Martin of North Carolina that “when all hearts should be united . . . ready to rejoice at the good, or repel the evil which awaits us . . . nothing but internal dissensions and political hostilities are to be found in the councils of our common country.”
Plantation problems seemed never to diminish. Restoration of his estate would consume many months yet; Martha’s frequent indispositions troubled him; and something must be decided about the future of Washington Custis. Mount Vernon would not afford the necessary discipline or direction. In consultation with the youth’s stepfather, David Stuart, arrangements were made for Custis to enter St. John’s College at Annapolis. On March 5 Doctor Stuart and his stepson set out for the college. In the weeks that followed the pattern of correspondence between Mount Vernon and Annapolis became unhappily familiar—exhortations, promises, disappointments, more exhortations, more promises. Washington at length displayed undisguised pique when Custis inquired whether he should withdraw from St. John’s on his forthcoming visit to Mount Vernon. “The question . . . really astonishes me!” replied the General, “for it would seem as if nothing I could say to you made more than a momentary impression.” But somehow this grandson usually had his way, though Washington did not tolerate the idea, much less foresee the fact, of the boy’s failure to resume his studies in the fall.
Almost constant concern for public affairs made correspondence burdensome and, as the work at Mount Vernon necessitated much extra bookkeeping, the General resolved to employ a clerk, if one could be found at a moderate wage. Consequently, the arrival of clerical assistance in the person of Albin Rawlins, who “wrote a good hand and had a knowledge of accounts,” was most welcome.
Anxiety approached anguish as weeks grew into months without word from Pinckney, Marshall and Gerry. On March 4 Washington’s apprehension was betrayed in his query to McHenry: “Are our commissioners guillotined, or what else is the occasion of their silence?” As it happened, the first dispatches from the envoys after their arrival in Paris were received at Pickering’s office that very evening, and the next day President Adams notified Congress. The dispatches were in cipher, except the last—a letter of January 8, 1798. This paper with its enclosure—a translation of the astounding decree of the French Directory declaring all neutral ships with any British-made cargo to be lawful prizes and all French ports closed to any vessel that had touched an English port in the course of its voyage—accompanied Adams’ brief message. It had seemed to Washington that continuance of French depredations on American commerce “would have united all parties and all descriptions of men . . . in a firm and temperate demand of justice, or in preparations for the worst. . . .” but the natural expectation had not followed. The unnatural response of many Americans—censure of their own government and leniency towards France—was a disturbing fact. Early in April brought the further information that the envoys had not been received. Moreover, Washington saw no encouragement in the President’s message to Congress on March 19. In the light of communications from the envoys, Adams declared that the mission evidently could not be accomplished “on terms compatible with safety, honor and essential interests of the nation.” He recommended that merchant vessels be permitted to arm and exhorted Congress to proceed with “zeal, vigor and concert, in defence of the national rights, proportioned to the danger with which they are threatened.”
Reassurance did not issue from Congress. Albert Gallatin had predicted that little business would be done there before the fate of the French mission became known; but the President’s intimation of its failure and appeal for prompt defensive measures disturbed few members of the House of Representatives. When at last the House resolved itself into a Committee of the Whole to consider the state of the Union, discussions still were trifling. Then on April 2, when a resolution to demand the official communications was proposed, it passed readily. On the third the desired documents were presented in full, with a short message from Adams.
By mid-April Washington also had received the revelatory dispatches. Now the conjecture of recent months was ended, the long silence explained. Washington saw revealed the wisdom and the wiles of men and nations. From the moment of their arrival in Paris October 4, 1797, the envoys had met only delay and indirection. Their dispatches told an astonishing story: On the afternoon of the eighth, Monsieur Talleyrand admitted them to his house as unofficial callers but insisted he was “too busy” to promise a further interview. Official reception of the Envoy Extraordinary then was postponed on the ground of the Directory’s wounded feelings due to certain phrases in President Adams’ address to Congress on May 16, 1797. But, the envoys soon were informed, if the speech were abrogated and a douceur of $250,000 placed at Talleyrand’s disposal, the Minister’s hurt would be healed. Moreover, a loan to the French Republic would mollify the Directory and set the stage for negotiation. Suddenly it was obvious to the three Americans what the real grievance was: they had not come bearing money or offers of money. This was made abundantly clear, though not by Talleyrand himself. Instead, one by one there appeared spokesmen in his behalf. Whereas these agents claimed they were not sent by the French Minister, they professed to know his mind and each in turn stated Talleyrand’s propositions with supreme assurance, always with a single object—money to bribe the privilege of a stay in Paris and more money to buy an authoritative audience. When on April 3 President Adams disclosed the documents to Congress, he omitted the names of Talleyrand’s unofficial deputies
and denoted them simply as W, X, Y and Z. The first to call had been Monsieur W, whose part was only that of introducing Monsieur X. At the envoys’ request, Monsieur X put in writing the monetary demands already stated on behalf of the French Minister. This done, he ushered in a confidant of Talleyrand—Monsieur Y—who came forward with suggestions to ensure a successful mission. Monsieur Y described a subtle arrangement for the requisite loan to France: The United States could purchase certificates of a mandatory Dutch loan to the French Republic, valued at $12,800,000—but worth about half that amount on the current market—with the apparent expectation of a return to par when peace came again to Europe. In that way a gift of some $6,000,000 could be made to France without arousing English fury. But, Monsieur Y was careful to insist, the loan and the private gift of douceurs must be considered separate matters and must be kept so. In any event, these pecuniary procedures and a revocation of the offending speech were imperatives to further transaction.
The plenipotentiaries were commissioned with ample authority to make treaties, but they were not empowered to make a loan. The envoys countered that one of the three would return to the United States to consult on that point if the French would discontinue depredations on American commerce in the interim. As for the President’s speech, that could not be recanted. Monsieur X then made a more impassioned plea for money. Over and over again payment was importuned. Until that was accomplished all words would be useless and other efforts futile. At this point Gerry was approached by yet another caller in the person of Monsieur Z, who came to reaffirm Talleyrand’s good disposition towards the United States. As proof, he would arrange a private though unofficial interview between the French Minister and one of the envoys, preferably Gerry, since both Talleyrand and Monsieur Z had known him in Boston. The meeting finally was effected, but nothing was accomplished beyond a certain satisfaction on the part of Gerry that he was singled out for conference.
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