Fallen Founder

by Nancy Isenberg

  The second hearing began on December 2, when Daveiss charged both John Adair and Burr with planning an invasion of Mexico. The one witness against Adair, whom the district attorney claimed he had interviewed earlier, denied the conversation; he called the statements attributed to him a pack of lies. The case against Adair crumbled, but the prosecutor pressed on. Burr had to answer charges three days later. Having overcome any earlier concerns he might have had, Henry Clay now compared the Federalist-inspired proceedings to the “inquisitions of Europe,” and publicly declared that he “did not entertain the slightest idea of his guilt.” Burr spoke in his own defense, and dismissed all the stories about him as utterly false.112

  While Burr sought to rise above the tawdry proceedings, Daveiss increasingly found himself the subject of ridicule. Burr’s most vocal critics, the scandalmongers Joseph Street and John Wood, were finally called to testify, and were forced to admit that everything they had printed was rumor and hearsay; they could offer nothing that constituted real evidence. Wood went so far as to say that he had completely changed his mind about Burr; he now believed the ex-vice president had no designs against the union.113

  As the second hearing concluded, the jury members expressed their disgust with the prosecutor. Not only did they find “no true bill” to indict Burr, they issued a lengthy statement asserting that the district attorney was at best foolhardy and at worst vindictive. They claimed that “there has been no testimony before us which does in the Smallest degree criminate the conduct” of Burr or Adair.114

  Adding to the circus atmosphere surrounding these proceedings, two balls were held in Frankfort. One was in honor of Burr’s vindication; and the other in support of Daveiss’s efforts, pompously described in the papers as a ball “in honor of the UNION.” Joseph Street, still backing the prosecutor, praised the ladies who shunned the ex-vice president. Though the jury had deserted Daveiss, a band of “immovable American ladies” had redeemed him by refusing to dance with the “incomparable Burr.”115

  Dance cards aside, Daveiss’s behavior is difficult to explain. He abused the law, declared unsubstantiated rumor to be the equal of concrete evidence, and was intent on using the court system to harass Burr. After his defection from Daveiss, Wood gave the most convincing explanation for the district attorney’s behavior: Joseph Hamilton Daveiss held Burr in contempt for killing Hamilton. Though they shared a name, Daveiss and Hamilton were not kinsmen; however, Daveiss was related by marriage to John Marshall, the most influential Federalist in the country since 1800. Revenge may explain why this Federalist district attorney was caught up in his fanatical quest to convict Burr. Partisan politics were deeply personal—and often irrational. As far as Daveiss was concerned, Burr not only had treason in his heart but blood on his hands.116

  “CRONONHOTON THOLOGOS”

  While Burr was battling for his freedom in a Kentucky courthouse, General Wilkinson was staging a farce in New Orleans that would turn the president as well as popular opinion against the former vice president. On November 5, 1806, the same day that Daveiss presented his affidavit for Burr’s arrest, the general concluded a truce with Spanish forces on the Sabine River. Now, with no military conflict to exploit, Burr’s hopes of an expedition into Mexico ended. War alone had made Burr’s plan legitimate in the eyes of the law and in the view of his fellow countrymen.117

  Wilkinson had been busy preparing for what can only be considered a performance worthy of the calculating Niccolò Machiavelli himself. Wilkinson had a reputation for utilizing his pen along with his sword; a later enemy, Judge James Workman of New Orleans, derisively called him the “CRONONHOTON THOLOGOS OF LETTERS AND WAR.” Chrononhotonthologos was a character in a popular 1743 burlesque, whose singular trait was pomposity, whose utterances were bombast. Wherever he was, when Wilkinson delivered his lines, it was invariably an exaggerated drama.118

  That is not to suggest that Wilkinson was a fool. His peculiar military style borrowed directly from Machiavelli. The American general understood that political success required bold, even theatrical contrivance, and the creation of a viable enemy. Power, to be exercised, required an adversary. As the Spanish vanished from the horizon, in their place Wilkinson declared the presence of an “arch-conspirator”: Aaron Burr. To carry out his plans, he manufactured a dire necessity, that is, he created the illusion that Burr posed a discernible threat to New Orleans, and the nation as a whole. By implanting fear, he could demand submission to an unofficial martial law, and in the next few months Wilkinson did everything in his power to subvert the civilian authority in New Orleans.119

  It is difficult to pinpoint exactly when Wilkinson resolved that he would betray Burr. But on October 22, 1806, he sent off a report and confidential letter to Jefferson that exposed a conspiracy-in-the-making. Though the general claimed that his report came from a “public print,” it had actually been forged by Wilkinson himself. The report claimed that as many as 10,000 men had formed a powerful association, and planned to topple New Orleans, invade Mexico, and incite an insurrection capable of sending tremors far enough east to subvert the federal government. Not yet ready to accuse Burr, he claimed that he did not know the identity of the “prime mover.”120

  The general’s theatrics did not end there. A month would pass before Jefferson received Wilkinson’s first alarm, and the general’s emissary was given elaborate instructions on how he should convey it. Only at the moment when he stood before the president was he to dramatically retrieve the communiqué from the “soles of his slipper.”121

  Why did Wilkinson panic? He felt endangered by the mounting rumors that identified him as Burr’s principal co-conspirator. And like a true Machiavellian, he found it increasingly difficult to share power with Burr. He would rather act in such a manner as kept him in charge of events as they unfolded; he did not have the patience to wait and see if the former vice president could carry through on his plans. Destroying Burr seemed the only way to divert suspicion from himself and salvage his own tarnished reputation.122

  He saw the answer to his problem in a document that came into his possession in mid-October 1806. Known as the “cipher letter,” this communiqué was hand-delivered to Wilkinson at the Sabine front by a Burr aide, Samuel Swartwout. The younger brother of John Swartwout, Burr’s closest New York ally, Sam had been Burr’s traveling companion on the trip to South Carolina in 1804. The cipher letter was not written by Burr, but Wilkinson was to claim that it was in order to suit his purposes.123

  The letter was written in code, the key to which the general alone possessed. It said, in fine, that Burr was en route to New Orleans with a considerable body of men, and that he planned to make use of the British navy in his effort to carry out “our project,” by which the letter writer clearly inferred Mexico as the target of an invasion. Wilkinson, however, would twist the facts and claim that Swartwout told him Burr was planning to attack New Orleans itself and “revolutionize” the Louisiana Territory. Wilkinson also doctored the letter, carefully omitting any incriminating references to himself—thus, “our project” became neutral, as “the project.”124

  Believing himself in control and able to utilize the information as he pleased, Wilkinson set his sights on New Orleans. In mid-November, he began to dispatch letters to fellow officers, calling for the city’s defenses to be fortified, while urging that all available troops be assembled. He warned his officers not to trust anyone, for he believed secret agents to be roaming the streets. To Governor Claiborne, he warned of a “storm” about to burst in New Orleans, and that he was surrounded by “dangers of which you dream not.” In his most bombastic style, he declared that the valiant Wilkinson was on his way to save the city, or perish in its defense.125

  Wilkinson sent a similar letter to Jefferson, far more theatrical in tone than his October warning to the president. This time he unveiled a “deep, dark and widespread conspiracy,” involving virtually everyone imaginable: “young and old, the dem
ocrat and the federalist, the native and the foreigner, the patriot of ’76 and the exotic of yesterday, the opulent and the needy, the ins and the outs.” Demanding martial law, the wily general wanted complete authority over the city of New Orleans, authority that would enable him to arrest Burr’s allies, who could dispute his distortion of the facts.126

  Wilkinson arrived in New Orleans on November 25, and began his brief reign of terror, while Burr, none the wiser, remained enmeshed in legal proceedings in Frankfort, Kentucky. The general gave a rousing speech before the New Orleans Chamber of Commerce in early December, convincing the merchants to impose an embargo, and filling them with fear. Burr’s army of 7,000 lawless conspirators were fast approaching, he declared, ready and willing to plunder the city’s banks and ransack the city’s streets.127

  While he effectively caused confusion, Wilkinson wasted little time in rounding up a series of suspects. First he ordered the arrest of Swartwout and his traveling companion, Peter V. Ogden. Then he nabbed Erich Bollmann, from whom he had received a duplicate of the cipher letter. After arresting Bollmann, he appeared before the Superior Court, on December 18, to defend his actions. One of Wilkinson’s most outspoken critics, the former New York lawyer and politician Edward Livingston, captured the drama of the courtroom scene. Wilkinson arrived in full military attire, his scabbard by his side—“even the spurs were not forgotten.” As he stood before the court in full regalia, he threatened to make more arrests, regardless of station or standing, if anyone dared to get in his way. He pointedly accused both Livingston and James Alexander, Bollmann’s two lawyers, of being traitors. Shortly after this, the general arrested Alexander, who had been Bollmann’s traveling companion. All four men (Swartwout, Ogden, Bollmann, and Alexander) were shipped, under armed guard, to Washington, and charged with misprision of treason (i.e., knowledge of treasonous activities).128

  Having rounded up most of Burr’s associates, the general now aimed to stifle the press and tie the hands of the civil authorities. He arrested Judge James Workman, who had resigned in disgust after Wilkinson repeatedly defied the power of the courts. Judge Workman was targeted because he had urged Governor Claiborne to arrest Wilkinson for his repeated usurpations of the law. The general also placed Ogden’s attorney, Lewis Kerr, under arrest, but then released him, because he was close friend of Claiborne’s. However, without a second thought, he threw the editor of the local newspaper into prison, preemptively silencing a potentially dangerous critic. And when former Kentucky senator John Adair arrived in town on January 14, 1807, Wilkinson sent two or three companies of soldiers to arrest him at his boardinghouse. As he had done with Bollmann and the others, he quickly dispatched Adair by ship to the east coast. Although the governor had refused to grant Wilkinson the power of martial law, he did nothing to stop the general’s high-handed and illegal measures. Thus the inexperienced Claiborne succumbed to Wilkinson’s power play and became, in effect, his puppet.129

  Jefferson finally received the general’s first warning about the conspiracy on November 25, more than a month after it was sent. Two days later, the president issued a proclamation, a rather vaguely worded document calling for all “faithful citizens” to desist from participating in an illegal military expedition into Spanish territory. He did not mention the name of Burr. He did not mention Wilkinson.130

  Wilkinson’s second warning (sent in November) made it to Washington on January 1, 1807. Jefferson did not learn about the controversial cipher letter until he received two new letters from the general in mid-January. The president did not take further action until January 22. On that date, at the insistence of Congress, he sent along what information he had, and for the first time he publicly accused Burr of leading an illegal expedition and engineering a conspiracy to separate the western states from the union. While admitting that the information he had was questionable, that it involved a “mixture of rumour, conjectures, and suspicions” making it “difficult to sift out the real facts,” Jefferson felt no hesitation in accusing Burr of the most heinous crime imaginable: attempting to destroy his country.131

  The president also made it clear that Burr’s main accuser was trustworthy. In his message to Congress, he praised Wilkinson’s display of “the honor of a soldier and the fidelity of the good citizen.” This was a crucial turning point. Jefferson knew that the general had not been completely candid with him and had taken gross liberties with the law in New Orleans, but it no longer mattered. He had made a choice. He felt he needed Wilkinson in order to get his hands on Burr. The president had resolved to take the side of “Machiavelli,” and whether he admitted it to himself or not, he, not unlike Governor Claiborne, was following the general’s lead.132

  When Wilkinson, on November 12, sent his exaggerated second warning to Jefferson, anticipating Burr’s imminent attack on New Orleans, the former vice president was still in Frankfort attending the grand jury hearing. He did not know what forces were already working against him. In Ohio, early in December, Jefferson’s federal agent John Graham (who had been sent west to spy on Burr after the October cabinet meetings), now convinced Governor Edward Tiffin to take action against Burr’s expedition. So, the Ohio militia seized several of Burr’s vessels at Marietta, while in Cincinnati cannons were mounted for the purpose of halting Burr’s imaginary army of 20,000, which was rumored to be heading there, along the Ohio River, from Pittsburgh. On the night of December 10, Harman Blennerhassett and Comfort Tyler reacted to warnings from friends and escaped from Blennerhassett Island with four boats; the Wood County militia of western Virginia invaded the island estate the very next day. Havoc ensued as the militia ransacked the property, flagrantly destroying the Irishman’s home, and helping themselves to his wine, acting more like drunken vigilantes than noble patriots called upon to save the nation from a mounting conspiracy.133

  Burr met up with Tyler and Blennerhassett at the mouth of the Cumberland River near the end of December. At that point, he must have realized that the tide had turned against him. He did not learn of Wilkinson’s betrayal until January 10, when he quickly dispatched a letter to Cowles Mead, acting governor of the Mississippi Territory, calling the accusations against him “vile fabrications of a man notoriously the pensioner of a foreign country.”134

  By now, Burr was nearing the old Spanish commercial center of Natchez. Naturally, the news of Wilkinson’s duplicity was devastating. His filibuster was a lost cause. More important, he knew that his freedom, if not his safety, was in immediate jeopardy. The general’s betrayal, and his subsequent actions in New Orleans, meant that Burr, too, would have to be captured and silenced. Less than two years after presiding over the Senate of the United States, he was now a man on the run. His only chance, as he realized, lay in escaping the general long enough to place himself under the protection of the civilian authorities in Mississippi.

  One newspaper claimed that the “little emperor” had been “outgeneraled” by Wilkinson, but the truth of the matter is that Wilkinson had outgeneraled both Burr and Jefferson. It was his version of events that now monopolized newsprint, obliging the president to declare to Congress that Burr’s guilt was “beyond question.” Burr was a fugitive before he had even been indicted for a crime. And so he moved quickly, hoping to evade those who had been deputed by Wilkinson to capture him. A tidy reward was offered. The chase was on.135

  A romanticized rendition of Burr’s capture in 1807

  Chapter Nine

  WILL O’ WISP TREASON

  If I were to name this, I would call it the Will o’ wisp treason. For though it is said to be here and there and everywhere, yet it is nowhere. It only exists in the newspapers and in the mouths of the enemies of the gentleman for whom I appear; who get it put in the newspapers.

  —Luther Martin, defense counsel for Aaron Burr, 1807

  Betrayed by Wilkinson and pursued by Jefferson, Burr knew he had to quickly seek protection, and his best option was the nearby civil authorities
in Mississippi. On January 12, 1807, he opened negotiations with acting Governor Cowles Mead, ensuring he would be tried in the territory—not shipped to New Orleans, which was unofficially under the martial law of the desperate general. A few miles downriver from the settlement of Bayou Pierre, making camp on the Orleans side of the Mississippi, Burr bargained with Mead, while his motley crew waited in wintry weather for four days before agreement was reached. Mead’s deputies searched the boats, and instead of finding a cache of weapons found trunks of books. Shaking his head at what he discovered, Mead wrote Secretary of War Dearborn of Burr’s anticlimactic surrender: “Thus, sir, this mighty alarm, with all its exaggerations, has eventuated in nine boats, and one hundred men, and the major of these are boys, or young men just from school. . . . I believe that they are the dupes of stratagem, if the asseverations of generals Eaton and Wilkinson, are to be accredited.” And that was a big “if,” for Mead was convinced that the two generals he named had grossly misrepresented the alarm, if they had not invented it.1

  A grand jury hearing took place on February 2, in Washington, Mississippi, at the highest court in the territory. Burr’s prospects looked promising; the jury issued a presentment two days later and absolved him of all charges. The panel also took the opportunity to disparage Wilkinson, and sharply rebuked local officials for having treated Burr as a prisoner of war.

  The jury’s action came as no surprise: Burr had been warmly received in Mississippi. Confirming this impression, one of Wilkinson’s informants wrote the general that Burr was so popular, acting Governor Mead could barely muster thirty-five men to arrest him, while most of the local militia wished his filibustering “plans might take effect,” and if he attacked Baton Rouge, “they would join him.”2