by Gore Vidal
Mrs. Blennerhassett was as clever and as febrile as before and on very short notice gave us a magnificent dinner party. I must say I always found it marvellously strange in the west to dine grandly off silver-plate, to drink champagne from Irish crystal, to be served like a lord in a mansion that had been dropped as if by magic in the midst of a primaeval wilderness.
Theodosia delighted everyone, myself most of all. I had missed her, as I do miss her every moment of my life. We could say anything to one another; said everything.
After dinner, the ladies withdrew to the long drawing-room while I sat with Blennerhassett and those lieutenants who had come with me. We spoke of provisions, of money, of the future.
Blennerhassett was all afire, and despite a tendency to want to discuss Voltaire when I wanted to talk of barrels of pork, he was good company and not entirely useless; he contributed what money he could.
It was during our first stay on the island that Mrs. Blennerhassett took me riding through gardens hacked rather unconvincingly from the forest. In a beech grove, beside a gazebo, she intimated that we were in some rich strange way special souls. I was kindly (as befitted her sovereign) and confirmed to her what I had already secretly granted her husband, my embassy to London.
“But we cannot go back! He knows that!” She reined in her horse. Yellow leaves set off her red riding-habit; she looked heraldic.
“Why not?”
“Because we—we have—we are—not like others.”
Not married, I thought immediately, as I gazed at her solemnly, imitating Solomon as reported in my grandfather’s favourite book. She started to weep; then shouted to me her terrible sin: “I am Harman Blennerhassett’s niece!” My horse shied; hers whinnied.
“But what is wrong with that?”
“Wrong? I have married my own uncle! They would burn us in Ireland!”
“But in England, surely, they will fête you!”
“Do you think so?” The moment of high drama was swiftly replaced by her natural high spirits. “I’m not at all certain. It is a complicated matter.” She dismounted. I did the same. In the course of a pleasant hour she told me the amazing, the unique, the extraordinary story of her life, and the periodic need in it for change. It is my rule always to listen to this story with the sympathy that it deserves.
In less than a week the island was transformed into a workshop. Corn was dried and ground into meal. Barrels of supplies from Marietta arrived and were stacked on the island’s wharf. Against my counsel, the Blennerhassetts packed all their belongings: they would go with us to the Washita Lands and there await the conquest of Mexico.
At this point I had heard nothing beyond the “I am ready” letter from Wilkinson. For once both Jefferson and I were kept in precisely the same suspense by the Washington of the West.
When would Wilkinson obey Jefferson’s orders (not to mention mine!) and confront the Spaniards on the Sabine? As it turned out, he did not leave St. Louis until the first week in September. Then slowly, slowly, he proceeded to Natchez where he wrote senators Adair and Smith that he was now ready with fire and sword to rid American soil of the Dons. He also wrote Adair that “the time long looked for by many and wished for by more has now arrived, for subverting the Spanish government in Mexico.”
Adair sent me a copy of this letter, and I was delighted though puzzled. Why had Wilkinson not written to me? I confess that it occurred to me that he was toying with the idea of himself striking at Mexico—betraying both Jefferson and me.
Toward the end of September, Wilkinson sent word to the Spanish commander that if he did not withdraw from the west bank of the Sabine River, there would be war. To everyone’s surprise (and to my consternation), the Spanish did exactly what he ordered. On September 27 they were gone from American territory.
During these weeks, I had continued to make preparations for either the settling of the Washita River lands or the invasion of Mexico. In either case, the assembly of men and supplies was the same.
On September 27, I was in Nashville where Andrew Jackson gave me a public dinner at Talbot’s Hotel, proposing the antique toast “millions for defence; not one cent for tribute!” As a commander of the Tennessee militia, Jackson was in a position to make possible the war which now seemed imminent. On October 4, at my request, he gave the order for a general alert. He vowed that he would ride at my side into Mexico.
A few days after the alert in Tennessee, Sam Swartwout and Peter Ogden delivered my cipher-letter to Wilkinson who was now at Natchitoches on the Mexican border. It had taken them two months to find the commanding general of the American army who had, finally, obeyed the President and arrived four months late at his post.
Swartwout gave Wilkinson my letter. After Wilkinson read it, he asked Swartwout to help him prepare a coded answer whose burden was, as usual, “I am ready.” Wilkinson despatched the letter to me. Then, suddenly, mysteriously, he had second thoughts. He sent a messenger to intercept his own letter and had it destroyed. I only know the gist of the contents from Swartwout.
On October 20, Wilkinson wrote Jefferson that there was currently afoot a western plot to seize New Orleans. He mentioned no names. He did not have to. One nice touch: the conspirators were bent, he declared, on causing an insurrection of the blacks in Louisiana. Jamie knew how to distress Massa Tom.
According to Jefferson’s recently published journal, he was convinced as of October 22, 1806, that I was guilty of treason for it was on this fateful day that my proposed expedition was discussed by the Cabinet. Despite my “guilt,” it was agreed in Cabinet that as I had committed no indictable act, the government could do nothing beyond warning the western governors to be on their guard against a traitor who had, as yet, not committed treason. This was Jeffersonian logic at its most glorious.
Unaware of the attention I was getting in Washington, I continued to assemble men and supplies.
October 6, I left Nashville (with my newest recruit, a nephew of Mrs. Andrew Jackson) and went on to Lexington where I met Theodosia and her newly arrived husband.
In November, I planned to begin the descent of the Mississippi. Wilkinson was now on the border and despite his curious behaviour with the Spanish I expected, as did everyone, a war with Spain.
Earlier in the year, two sodomites had started a scandalous newspaper at Frankfort called Western World. They now accused Wilkinson and me of trying to revive the old Spanish Conspiracy. As a result, an ambitious Kentucky politician named Joseph Daveiss decided to intervene directly in my affairs. For some time Daveiss—a dedicated Federalist—had been trying to establish that certain distinguished westerners were secretly in the pay of the Spanish government. By an odd coincidence, each of these distinguished figures was a power in the Republican party. Among those he named were the senators Adair, Brown, Smith and Breckinridge, as well as the senator-to-be Henry Clay, Governor William Henry Harrison and General Andrew Jackson—apparently all were involved with Spain in a plot to separate west from east. At the head of this list of worthies he now placed Wilkinson’s name and mine.
Daveiss wrote Jefferson his suspicions. The President was no doubt as delighted to find me in command of such a conspiracy as he was appalled to learn that most of his western political supporters had also been branded traitors by young Mr. Daveiss, brother-in-law of the arch-Federalist himself John Marshall. Warily, Jefferson asked for more information.
The relentless young Federalist went to St. Louis in the spring to talk to Wilkinson who talked altogether too much, revealing to Daveiss that he had sent out a regular army officer named Zebulon Pike to blaze a possible trail into Mexico, preparatory to an invasion. Daveiss then began bombarding Jefferson, Madison and Gallatin with letters, passing on every rumour afloat, and there was at least one tall tale for every gossip in Kentucky. In his zeal to damage the Republican party, he made so many reckless charges that Jefferson ended by ignoring him. But unfortunately it was not possible to ignore Daveiss on his home ground for he was the district a
ttorney of Kentucky and in a position to make a scandal, which he now proceeded to do.
After a cursory inspection of my vast fleet and provisions at Louisville (five flat-boats and some barrels of flour), Daveiss went back to Frankfort and on November 5 presented to the local judge an affidavit to the effect that I was planning an invasion of Mexico to be followed by a separation of the western states from the east. He was thoughtful enough to admit to the judge that although there exists no law forbidding anyone from inciting a state to secession (if there was, Jefferson would have long since been in prison), I ought anyway to be bonded over in order to stop such a dangerous conspiracy. The judge denied Daveiss’s motion. Daveiss then asked for a grand jury to be empanelled, which was done November 12.
I was at Lexington when Daveiss first presented his affidavit to the court. I rode as swiftly as possible to Frankfort in order to put a stop to the proceedings. But I was too late. I found a most confused situation. Charges and counter-charges filled the press. A dozen careers were destroyed; among them that of my friend John Adair who, failing to be re-elected to the Senate, resigned in favour of the twenty-nine-year-old Henry Clay, reputedly the state’s best lawyer. When I saw how far things had gone, I engaged the senator-elect to defend me.
Not until the first week in December did I appear before the grand jury. These gentlemen were of the opinion that an expedition against Mexico was not such a bad thing. In fact, after listening to me and to my eloquent counsel, the grand jury returned “no true bill” with a further address to the effect that both Adair and I were pretty fine fellows. Needless to say, Henry Clay’s ringing oratory had much to do with this happy result.
In passing, I continually marvel at how different today’s lawyers and politicians are from us of the first generation. We did not possess a single orator to compare with the present crop. Jefferson and Madison were inaudible. Monroe was dull. Hamilton rambled and I was far too dry (and brief) for the popular taste. Fisher Ames was the nearest thing we had to an orator (I never heard Patrick Henry). Today, however, practically every public man is now a marvellous orator—no, actor! capable of shouting down a tempest, causing tears to flow, laughter to rise. I cannot fathom the reason for this change unless it be the influence of a generation of evangelical ministers (Clay always makes me think of a preacher a-wash in the Blood of the Lamb who, even as he calls his flock to repent, is planning to seduce the lady in the back pew); and of course today’s politician must deal with a much larger electorate than ours. We had only to enchant a caucus in a conversational tone while they must thrill the multitude with brass and cymbal.
On November 25, Wilkinson arrived in New Orleans. That same day his first letter of warning reached Jefferson. Two days later the President issued a proclamation, “warning and enjoining all faithful citizens” to abandon any illegal conspiracy against Spain. This proclamation did not reach the west for some weeks.
On December 11, Blennerhassett’s Island was invaded by the county militia in order to forestall what the local judge had determined on his own was a major insurrection. Since there was no one on the island except poor Mrs. Blennerhassett, the troops drank up all the wine and then wrecked the house in order to show their contempt for civilisation. At the time none of this was known to me. In fact, it has taken me thirty years to work out the chronology of events that I now record.
I left Frankfort after a glittering ball in my honour where the senator-elect Henry Clay imitated barn-yard creatures most authentically.
At Nashville I was visited by General Jackson and his friend John Coffee at the Clover Bottom Tavern.
Jackson was terrified. “Colonel, you have got yourself and me in a most terrible pickle.”
I have never known that fierce man ever to lower his voice for fear of being overheard but now his brazen voice was a hoarse whisper as we huddled in a corner of the tavern’s main room, a rack of newspapers partially shielding us from the gaze of the curious. John Coffee waited just out of earshot.
I told Jackson what I was soon to grow weary of repeating. I had no separatist designs. “Why would I? It is Mexico, Mexico, Mexico.”
“Not so loud!” Jackson looked alarmed. “I have had the worst reports—about you and Wilkinson.”
“What of Wilkinson?”
“You trust him?”
“No. But I trust his self-interest. Jefferson is planning to remove him. He has nothing to lose and everything to gain by continuing with us.”
The thought of Jefferson deflected for a moment the familiar catechism. “You’ve always said … well, you’ve sort of let on that Jefferson knows what you are doing.”
“He has known all along, and he is just as anxious as you and I to reduce Mexico.”
“Without war?”
“Preferably.”
Jackson looked nervously about him; then he whispered, “Do you know what Wilkinson’s relations with Spain are?”
“Years ago he swore an oath to the Spanish crown so that he could trade at New Orleans and Mobile but …”
“That’s nothing! Better men than him took that same oath. Don’t mean a thing. But did you know that he was … do you know that he still is a Spanish agent?”
“You have been reading the newspapers.”
“I have been reading reports from Mexico. From friends of mine. And I have proof that James Wilkinson has been Spanish agent number thirteen for at least fifteen years and that he is still Spanish agent thirteen, pensioned by the King of Spain.”
“I don’t believe you. It’s not possible.” For once I was not capable of disguising either my amazement or my alarm.
I think Jackson realized that I was not dissembling. With grim pleasure, he went on, “Well, Colonel, you have been properly dished. Now Wilkinson’s in trouble with the Spanish and he’s in trouble with Jefferson. This year his pension from the Spanish is going to stop while it looks like Jefferson is going to remove him as commander of our army. Our army! By the Eternal!” Jackson’s voice suddenly filled the room and startled everyone; himself, too. He dropped his voice. “You must admit we got ourselves a precious horse’s ass for president, and that is the plain truth. Who else, I ask you, but Jefferson would turn the American army over to a Spanish agent?”
I was in no mood for Jacksonian mordancy. “If this is true …”
“It’s true. I got all the proof you’ll ever need, short of seeing the bastard’s actual commission.”
It was all depressingly clear. I understand now why Jamie had disobeyed Jefferson, why he had refused to go straight to the Sabine River and why, when he did, the Spanish melted away.
“Colonel, you got your head in a noose, and you got my head half-way in as well. Well, I’m taking my head out. I’ve already written the President, written that fool of a governor in New Orleans, written everybody I can think of, saying that though I hate the Dons with a passion I have nothing to do with you and Wilkinson and that I will take my stand for the union forever …”
“We are not for separation …” I was mechanical, thinking hard.
“I’m sure you’re not. After all, you ain’t stupid. But by the time Jefferson gets through with you every one will think you’re the greatest traitor since Benedict Arnold. As for Wilkinson …”
“He will denounce me.” I stated the obvious.
“Yes, and Jefferson will be pleased as can be. After all, he’s got to prove to everybody that his general is loyal while his enemy is a traitor.”
“Does Jefferson know that Wilkinson is a Spanish agent?”
“The man who told me—a Don, no less—says that Jefferson was informed as early as last spring.”
“My head is in the noose” was all that I could say, or think.
“Well, I’ll stick by you, Colonel, as best I can. Now let’s play-act for my old friend John Coffee. You still have that blank commission you showed me, signed by Jefferson?”
In the interest of verisimilitude, I usually carried with me a blank military commission, given
me by my friend and ally the Secretary of War. I said that it was in my jacket.
“Good. Now we’ll have us a row in front of old John and I’ll accuse you of not coming clean with me, and then you’ll say what you always say about Mexico, and I’ll say does the President approve? And you’ll pull that sheet from your pocket and say, ‘Here’s a blank commission, signed with his name,’ and I’ll scratch my head, like the dumbest darky you ever saw, and agree that that looks like the real thing.”
“It is.”
“Why, then so much the better.” Jackson’s good humour was restored and we acted out our charade for John Coffee. I hope he was impressed. My own thoughts were elsewhere. There is nothing more humiliating than to be outwitted by a man one knows to be a fool.
Wilkinson next appeared in New Orleans as its defender against Aaron Burr “whose accomplices,” he declared, “stretch from New York to this city and whose army of invasion numbers twenty thousand desperate men.”
Despite the feeble objection of Louisiana’s governor—and the loud objection of everyone else—Wilkinson declared martial law, jailing Dr. Bollman (a German recruit to our adventure), Peter Ogden and Sam Swartwout. To forestall any attempt at habeas corpus, Dr. Bollman and Swartwout were put in chains and taken aboard a ship in the harbour, bound for Washington.
While Wilkinson played Caesar at New Orleans, I was floating down the Cumberland River with two flat-boats. On December 27 I was joined by Blennerhassett’s “flotilla.” In all we now had ten small boats, and about fifty men. I told our discouraged company that I could not for fear of spies tell them our exact destination but that it ought to be plain to anyone that a group as small as ours was not about to do any fighting. We were now, in fact, what I had always wanted us to be in appearance—genuine settlers, headed for the Washita River lands.