In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:

Republican Orleans and American Louisiana •  • CHAPTER 7 Jefferson Triumphant Republican Orleans and American Louisiana D aniel Clark and Edward Livingston, already implicated in the Burr Conspiracy, further damaged their reputations when they participated in an effort to blame Wilkinson for the plot to conquer Orleans Territory and invade Mexico. When the U.S. District Court of Virginia convened in May 1807 to try Burr on charges of treason, his counsel decided to attempt to focus the court’s attention on Wilkinson, and sent James Alexander to New Orleans to ask Livingston and John B. Prevost to collect evidence against the general. Livingston gathered depositions and subpoenaed Daniel Clark to appear in Richmond to testify about Wilkinson’s past association with the Spanish government. Livingston and Prevost apologized to Clark for putting him in this position, but Clark did not resist. On September 3, 1807, he sailed for Richmond on his ship, the Comet. 1 Wilkinson, who had narrowly escaped an indictment for misprision of treason (defined as the deliberate concealment of one’s knowledge of treason) at the Richmond trial in June, learned that Clark was on his way and wrote to him on October 5. The general warned Clark that he was in possession of a letter sent to him by Burr that referred to a “communication from New Orleans” in which Clark had mentioned “a meditated Mexican expedition, and the revolt of the western states, etc. etc.” When Clark arrived in Richmond on October 11, Wilkinson went to see Attorney General George Hay and, “terrified beyond description, declared that Clark could ruin him.” Burr saved Wilkinson from “ruin,” however. After Clark arrived in Richmond, Burr sent him a note and stated that he had not sent for Clark and did not want him to testify. Clark left for Philadelphia. 2 On October 17, however, Thomas Power, a Spanish agent who had attempted to interest Wilkinson in a project to start a revolution in the American West in the 1790s, testified that Wilkinson had corresponded at that time with the Spanish governor of Louisiana, the Baron de Carondelet. Wilkinson Republican Orleans and American Louisiana •  • responded to this charge by publishing Power’s testimony ten days later along with a denial of involvement with Carondelet. Power, incensed, turned over papers connecting Wilkinson to Spain to Clark, who in turn gave them to John Randolph of Roanoke. Randolph, summoned to serve on a grand jury after Burr arrived in Richmond, “was brought in contact with a new object of intense aversion, the famous General Wilkinson.” Randolph had no patience for Wilkinson; “perhaps his irritation was a little due to the fact that Wilkinson’s vices had so much helped to cover what he believed to be Mr. Jefferson’s blunders .” Whatever his motives, Randolph focused on the destruction of Wilkinson , who had escaped an indictment for treason in June. 3 What had induced Clark to give Power’s papers to John Randolph? He could have walked away from the trial in Richmond and perhaps salvaged his reputation since it was apparent that neither Burr nor Wilkinson wanted Clark to speak about the plot. When he left Richmond, Clark showed no desire to challenge Wilkinson in court. After he reached Philadelphia, however, he decided to do so. Clark must have had some strong motive since it was a certainty that Wilkinson would respond and reveal Clark’s involvement in the plot to conquer Mexico. Wilkinson suggested that Clark’s opinion of him had changed after Clark had learned that the general had “questioned Clark’s financial credit.” It appears, however, that Clark decided to turn on Wilkinson after he learned or perhaps merely feared that Wilkinson had already denounced him. Shortly after his arrival in Philadelphia, Clark told his friend and business associate Daniel Coxe that Wilkinson “had denounced him and many others in a secret letter to the President.” Wilkinson, however, indicated in his Memoirs that Clark’s attitude toward him had changed after Clark had learned that Wilkinson had questioned Clark’s financial credit in Baltimore and that Clark had learned of this and turned on him. If Clark had ever learned of this, he never mentioned it. 4 On October 20, 1807, Burr’s trial in Richmond ended. John Marshall, who had presided over it, judged that Burr’s direct object, the conquest of Mexico , was “not a treasonous enterprise.” With the Burr trial over, Randolph attempted to have Congress examine the conduct of Wilkinson and presented two of...

Share