Fallen Founder

by Nancy Isenberg

  His long delay in Paris is traceable to his growing list of American enemies. John Armstrong, the current minister to France, was, as Burr described him to a French friend, “for many years . . . my personal and political enemy.” As an ally of DeWitt Clinton, he had worked behind the scenes to ruin Burr’s standing among New York Republicans. As if Armstrong’s power was not enough, the American consul in charge of passports was Alexander McRae, the Virginia lawyer and loyal Jeffersonian who had served as one of the prosecutors during Burr’s treason trial. By October 1810, Burr judged that most Americans in Paris had “entered a combination” against him. Anyone who talked to him was “shunned,” and even ships’ captains refused to deliver his letters. Vanderlyn alone stood by him, expressing nothing but “pity and contempt” for those Americans who sheepishly followed the herd.53

  Burr pressed on. With Vanderlyn’s assistance, and a few new powerfully placed French acquaintances capable of pulling the necessary strings, he was able to get a passport to Amsterdam in the spring of 1811. His trip there was spurred by an opportunity to speculate in Holland Land Company shares—the same group he had invested in back in New York in the 1790s. In Amsterdam, he found a ship’s captain willing to bring him back to America; so he rushed back to Paris for a new passport, only to face more red tape. It was not until September 28 that Burr finally set sail on the Vigilant.54

  He was deeply apprehensive about returning home. Waiting in Holland, he feared that the “country which I am so anxious to re-visit will perhaps reject me with horror.” He had counseled his daughter on how she might smooth the way for his homecoming. Theodosia had already appealed to Dolley Madison, reminding the first lady that her father was “once your friend,” and the “President only can restore him to me and to his country.” Though Dolley sent a warm reply, she explained that she could do nothing.55

  Theodosia also appealed to Madison’s secretary of war, William Eustis. He had been Theodosia’s doctor and Burr’s longtime friend, and had just married Caroline Langdon, a close friend of Dolley Madison’s. Yet the “corn curer,” as Theodosia had derisively called him in a letter to her father, proved a “fair-weather friend . . . afraid of everything; of nothing.”56 Next, she issued an impassioned plea to Treasury Secretary Albert Gallatin, one of her father’s oldest political allies:

  Recollect that I have seen my father dashed from the high rank he held in the minds of his countrymen, imprisoned, and forced into exile. Must he ever remain thus excommunicated from the participation of domestic enjoyments and the privileges of a citizen; aloof from his accustomed sphere, and singled out as a mark for the shafts of calumny? What benefit to the country can possibly accrue from the continuation of this system? Surely it must be evident to the worst enemies of my father, that no man, situated as he will be, could obtain any undue influence, even supposing him desirous of it.57

  Here we see Theodosia at her most impressive, and most strategic, arguing with the same intellectual force that any male politician might bring to bear in a like situation. She made Burr’s case as well as it could be made, citing the cruel and perverse, if not irrelevant, “system” of political abuse that wrongly equated his fall from power with the loss of his rights as a citizen. But her arguments fell on deaf ears. Gallatin would do nothing, and did not even deign to answer her letter.

  To make matters worse, though Burr and his daughter were far from the nation’s capital (she moved between New York and South Carolina), nothing could curtail the wild rumors that circulated. Some in Washington were gossiping that Theodosia had been abandoned by her husband, and that the two were separated. Later, even nastier rumors would suggest that Alston had been abusing his wife. Others in government circles whispered that Burr was now “deranged,” wandering through Europe like a madman.58

  Although Theodosia encouraged her father to return home and take his stand “in the midst of the tenth legion” (by which she meant the old Burrites), she must have been aware, as he was, that there would be no political future for him. Many of his friends had already deserted him; Robert Swartwout was one of the few who continued to defend him. Aaron Burr was not a man who succumbed to defeat easily, but neither did he try to deny the facts. As his daughter had admitted to Gallatin, he would never again have any “influence” in America.59

  Burr had sailed from the northern coast of Holland aboard the Vigilant, but he did not arrive in America when that ship did. A British vessel ordered the Vigilant to dock at Yarmouth on October 9, and Burr, preferring not to remain on a crowded ship filled to the gills with sailors, pigs (“one hundred other quadrupeds and bipeds”), and luggage, requested permission to go into London. When in January 1812, the ship was finally approved to sail, its destination had been changed to New Orleans, which was out of his way; but he was desperate to sail, having paid his fare in advance. Then the captain was soon forced, by what Burr described as the “malice of agents,” to drop him from the passenger list. He tried other American vessels, only to find that they, too, would not take him, fearing some form of retaliation from the U.S. government.60

  He finally scraped together all the money he could, borrowing from friends and even enemies, and bought passage on the Aurora, using the alias “Adolphus Arnot.” This British packet was headed for Boston, taking to the sea on March 28, 1812. Two days before departure, aware of increasing tensions between the United States and Great Britain, Burr wrote brusquely in his journal: “I hope never to visit the country again, unless at the head of fifty thousand men. I shake the dust off my feet, adieu, John Bull!” The ill-treated adventurer was feeling decidedly American as he headed home.61

  “TO FILL HIS LORDSHIP’S TANKARD”

  Five weeks later, Aaron Burr came ashore in Boston. There he tarried for several weeks, uncertain whether he could return to New York unmolested by his creditors. On May 30, he sailed for Manhattan, taking the necessary precautions to conceal his identity, and slipped into the city seven days later. He sought out Samuel Swartwout, who arranged for Burr to stay with his brother Robert until he could get himself more permanently settled. From John Wickham, Burr learned that no action had been taken against him in the misdemeanor indictment in Ohio, and so he had nothing to fear from that quarter. In July, he discreetly announced in the newspapers the opening of his law office at 9 Nassau Street. With the help of his longtime business associate Timothy Green, Burr was able to put together a law library and open his doors for business.62

  But that same month he received catastrophic news. His only grandson and namesake, Aaron Burr Alston, had died. He was only eleven years old. A devastated Theodosia wrote to her father: “There is no more joy for me, the world is blank, I have lost my boy, my child is gone forever.” She was overcome with grief, and Alston worried about her health. “My present wish,” he begged of Burr, “is that Theodosia should join you . . . as soon as possible.” Alston knew his wife well enough that he could imagine how a change of scene and her father’s company would aid in her recovery. Burr agreed, fearing for his daughter’s fragile constitution. He wrote ominously to Bentham at this time: “I have reason to apprehend that she will not long survive.”63

  Plans were made for Theodosia to come north alone. Alston was unable to accompany his wife. The United States had declared war against Great Britain in June, and he was in command of the South Carolina militia. He would shortly stand for election, and win the governorship in December 1812. So, at Burr’s request, Timothy Green agreed to act as Theodosia’s escort. Green arrived in Charleston in late November, only to discover that his traveling companion was “very low, feeble, and emaciated,” and, as he prepared her father, suffering from an “incessant nervous fever.” A long coach ride was out of the question, so they purchased passage on the Patriot, a swift schooner that was equipped to reach New York in less than a week. The ship set sail on December 31.64

  Theodosia Alston never reached New York. The Patriot was lost at sea somewhere off the coast of th
e Carolinas. But Burr did not know until sometime later that there had been a violent storm, and he convinced himself, meanwhile, that because his daughter, her maid, and her escort were probably the only passengers on the chartered privateer (loaded with a shipment of Alston’s rice crop), the boat may have been pressed into service in the West Indies, searching for British prey. This was, after all, a common resort in warfare at the time. But by February 1813, Alston cried out in a letter to Burr: “My boy—my wife—gone, both!” Both men had to come to terms with the tragedy.65

  With his daughter and grandson gone, Burr tried to build a new life in New York. Since his return, he had been devoting himself “exclusively to the business of my profession,” as he wrote to a fellow New Yorker. He was spending a great deal of his time in the state capital of Albany. There he reestablished himself before the New York Supreme Court, and breathed easy upon being given what he felt was a “courteous and flattering” reception, after his long hiatus.66

  In Albany, where he had often worked as a lawyer in the prime of his career in the 1790s, he now reconnected with the Yates family. Robert Yates had run for governor unsuccessfully, and sat on the state supreme court. In befriending his son, John Van Ness Yates, a fellow attorney and the recorder for the city of Albany, Burr took both John and his young wife Eliza under his wing. Eliza was acting as her husband’s secretary, sending Burr drafts of the revised laws of New York. Her husband had been appointed to the legislature to add notes to the laws, and he was relying on Burr to review his work. Burr also took a greater interest in Theodosia’s cousins, Phoebe and Kate Bartow, to whom he also sent books, and to whom he wrote sweetly taunting letters. He told Kate: “If you dare grow ugly, Lord, how I will hate you.” His tone resembled the playful banter he had used with Theodosia, whom he had jokingly called a “hussy.”67

  And he became the mentor of Catherine B. Thompson, another woman who filled the void left by the death of his daughter. It is unclear how they met. Her father Alexander Thompson died in 1813, and Burr may have played some part in settling his estate. Their relationship was largely intellectual; he urged her to read Bentham’s writings, which she did, and he shared with her his interest in the work of Mary Wollstonecraft. Elizabeth wrote to Burr that she considered Wollstonecraft “more excellent in her errors than others are in their perfection.” She called her new, older friend the “great mogul,” in consideration of his wide-ranging intellectual interests. Catherine Thompson was unmarried, with a large family; she was a few years older than Theodosia, and later became a schoolteacher. She had a niece who adored Burr. There is something else that ought to be said: Burr needed the company of women, and he adored children, looking for ways to recreate, however imperfectly, a sense of family, and intimacy, that had been lost to him.68

  His concern for women was manifest in his law practice. Widows and desperate housewives alike appealed to him for redress. He may have been, in fact, the very first American lawyer to specialize in family law. His duties included more than pleading a case; he counseled the women who came to him, and gave charity to them. Indeed, it was not unusual for his female clients to ask for money. It is more than a coincidence that all of Burr’s divorce clients were women. It is equally apparent that they selected him because of his reputation as a man who identified easily with women’s issues.69

  Burr’s most interesting case involved Rebecca Blodget, the widow of Samuel Blodget. Her husband had been one of the greatest “high-flying” speculators of the 1790s. He made a fortune in marine insurance, founded several banks, and was a key player in the commercial development of the City of Washington, when it was not yet the seat of the federal government. He was a Renaissance man, a “projecting Genius,” in the words of George Washington, who, as an architect, designed the Bank of the United States in Philadelphia in 1795, and published the first major treatise on American economics. But his glory days did not last. In 1802, Blodget’s business partners sued him, a considerable amount of his property was sold, and he ended up in debtor’s prison. In 1813, one year before his death, more of his property was sold to cover his enormous debts.70

  As her husband’s property went up for sale, Rebecca Blodget tried to salvage what she could. In 1814, the year she first contacted Burr, she was forty-two and had four children to provide for, ranging in age from twenty-one to fifteen. She was a proud woman, as she described herself, and had once been a leading light of Philadelphia society. Her father, the Reverend William Smith, had been provost of the University of Pennsylvania and in 1790 delivered the official eulogy upon Benjamin Franklin; her mother, Rebecca Moore Smith, was part of the female literati. When the younger Rebecca married Blodget in 1792, she was known for her wit and beauty. It is clear that she knew Burr from his time in the Senate, and Burr was, of course, acquainted with her husband’s record of accomplishment.71

  Her reason for contacting Burr was simple: She needed help to regain control of a piece a property in New York. This land had been given to her by her father. It was her “unfeeling brothers,” as she put it in a letter to Burr, whose “souls are not larger than peas,” who retained control of her land, because it was attached to a larger holding in their possession. Burr devised a solution: She would sell her 1,000 acres of this land to his law partner, forcing her brothers to partition the larger holding, so she could then recover her property. In this he succeeded through clever maneuvering.72

  But her problems did not end there. Her husband had left her with nothing. She was virtually squatting in a barn near Lancaster that she had once owned—a piece of property, she claimed, that she had been “cheated out of” by her husband. She was constantly hounded and abused by her husband’s creditors. She called one a “lazy brute,” who refused to see her when she called at his home, telling his servant to say that he was asleep. With incredulity in her tone, she asked Burr: “Do you ever sleep in the day?” She admitted to feeling resentment about her less than ideal marriage: “Mr. B. died as he lived,” she wrote to Burr, “you know how he lived & I will spare myself the pain of saying how he died.”73

  The principal difference between Burr and Blodget was that the former had found a way to stay out of debtor’s prison. How he did so is a further testament to his talent as a lawyer and negotiator: Burr was able to keep one step ahead of his creditors, and to appease them well enough that they never pressed for prison time. He waged such a battle in 1814, telling his son-in-law at that time: “my old creditors (principally the holder of the Mexican debts) came upon me last winter with vindictive fury.” He was held for bail “in large sums,” and figured he would be going to prison. But somehow he avoided it. For the rest of his life, Burr was never free from creditors. He was sued many times, by former friends like David Gelston and old clients like Louis Le Guen.74

  Burr looked to the state legislature to ease his financial burdens. In February 1814, he began to lobby—in his words, make “out-door preparations”—for a bill to grant him compensation, in the form of a land grant, for his military service during the Revolution. His rationale, as he explained it to a lawyer who he hoped would promote his cause, was that he had served four years in the army without any subsequent compensation, and that his services “were principally in this state.” Burr’s request was patterned on veteran appeals that state legislatures and Congress itself were hearing: his health had suffered from the exigencies of war, and he was suffering financially, at a time in life when it was difficult if not impossible “to commence a new career.” His was not exactly a new career, but to stay solvent he would have to practice law until he was eighty years old.75

  Burr’s bill was defeated in April. He blamed its failure on the Federalist “Junto” in the Senate, and he was partially right: James Cochran, the first cousin of Alexander Hamilton’s widow, had led the opposition. Burr did have more than a few genuine supporters: ten Republicans backed the bill, including his old rival Morgan Lewis and a new ally, Martin Van Buren. Burr made a special app
eal to Van Buren, claiming that a land grant from the state was the “only hope which I have of being able to keep out of prison.” And it is clear that Van Buren was responsive, meeting with Burr and warmly acknowledging his “particular politeness & friendly solicitude.” Burr, too, proved himself willing to employ his skills on behalf of his new benefactor. In the summer of 1814, he helped Van Buren draft the “Classification Bill,” meant to establish a state militia draft. Though the bill was never implemented because the War of 1812 was ending, it was still a landmark piece of legislation, a “most energetic war measure” in what had become an unprofitable war for the United States.76

  A second attempt to get a bill passed failed, too. The committee praised Burr as an “active, zealous and intelligent officer,” but correctly concluded that his petition ought to receive attention from the national legislature, as he had not served in the lines of the state militia. This was only the beginning of his fight to secure compensation for his military services. He would turn to the federal government next, but only after new legislation was passed in the 1820s, extending pension benefits.77

  His friendship with Van Buren proved to be a lasting one. Though they had known one another since 1803, when Van Buren was a protégé of the Van Ness family of Kinderhook, the younger man broke with the Van Nesses at the time of the governor’s race in 1804, supporting Morgan Lewis over Burr, a decision that earned him William Van Ness’s personal enmity. Yet this early betrayal mattered little ten years later. The two men had much in common. Van Buren came to promote commercial republicanism, and adopted a political style that openly embraced the machinery of parties. They worked together on several high-profile law cases, and Van Buren was a firm believer in legal positivism (a Utilitarian approach to law and legislation), so one can only wonder if Burr encouraged him to read Jeremy Bentham. The resemblance between the two men extended to their personal appearance: each was of small build, dressed meticulously, and was called a “dandy.” Rumors later circulated that Van Buren was Burr’s bastard child. He was not.78