ton Rouge) and further observed that, at any rate, if the government should be disposed to trouble him, (the subaltern) before they could send off a sufficient force, he would be in a situation to take care of himself." What was this "situation" to which Mr. Clark alluded? Certainly some protectionary force against the authority of the United States; and from whence was it to come? From Spain? No! Because she was the power to be attacked. From France nothing could be expected, and our relations with Great Britain forbid her interference. It is evident then, Mr. Clark could look no where but to colonel Burr and the Ohio, for such force as would place Murry "in a situa tion to take care of himself." This exposition appals the audacity even of Mr. Clark himself, and must strike dumb his most desperate advocates: How lost to patriotism; how steeped in profligacy, must be the wretch, who could endeavor to convert a youth of honor into a military traitor; and at the same time, determine to prostitute the confidence of his fellow citizens, to the subversion of the very government which he had been elected to support; and yet this traitor, his associates and dependents, have been employed, and are still encouraged, to persecute and destroy the man who baffled their sinister projects. Could the correspondence which have ensued the last session of Congress, and the measures which have been proposed, concerted and adopted, to insure Wilkinson's ruin, be exposed to the public eye; intrigues as extensive as they are unnatural and vindictive, would be unveiled, to put those men to the blush, on whose cheeks "shame is not ashamed to sit." That such things should be, is an affliction to humanity; that they should be countenanced in the United States, is a national reproach. Here, for the present, we leave Mr. Clark, and shall close this chapter with the following depositions of captain William Tharp, and the certificate of P. Grimes, esquire, which will furnish the reader a glimpse of the ramifications, and the extent of the intrigues and combinations of Wilkinson's enemies to effect his ruin. Sterrett is a miserable dependent of Mr. Clark, and now co-editor of the Louisiana Gazette in New Orleans, notoriously hostile to the government, and devoted to Clark. One of the depositions squints also at the occult connexion between Mr. Simmons and Mr. Randolph ; par nobile fratrum. "ON the morning of the 16th September, about one o'clock, Mr. Ballard met me, and named that he had seen a friend of mine, who had inquired of him, if he had seen me, and from his countenance it appeared he had some particular business with me, but at that moment he could not recollect his name, but that if I would go to the coffee house I would find him there. I went, but no gentleman approached me, who had any business with me, that I could suppose was the one Mr. B. alluded to. On my return to my lodgings, at the corner above the coffee house, while conversing with captain Rinker, Mr. James Sterrett of this place, and formerly captain of artillery, came up and observed that he had been looking some time for me, and that he had a conversation for me of importance, and that he must see me on it: when could he have an interview with me at my lodgings? I replied at any time. Tomorrow morning said he. I answered, no objections, but tell me the outlines. He said he would, I can say it in a few words you know well the situation of the general and Clark, one or other of them must fall, and I know it will be the former. How are you treated by the general? I answered as I could wish. I will be damned, as I've always told you, if he don't lurch you one day or other, and leave you deserted. I know you and him have been long friends, but he will desert you in the same way he has all his old friends. You have it now in your power to make a friend who is able and will serve you to the utmost of your wishes, if you can give any statement against the general of consequence; but I dont believe you can. Clark will give you a plantation and negroes, that will make you comfortable for life. I have not spoken to him on the subject, but I will give a guarantee from under my hand, that shall have it. I do solemnly declare on honor, that the annexed statement, is nearly verbatim, the conversation that passed between captain Sterrett and myself, and in substance the whole truth. (Signed) New Orleans, Sept. 25, 1809. you W. THARP." WE, the undersigned, certify on honor, that the above statement was presented to general Wilkinson on this day, the 25th September, 1809, in our presence. (Signed) DANIEL CARMICK, Major of Marines. JOHN R. FENWICK,· Captain of Marines. *This is the source of Wilkinson's misfortunes, his desertion of his old friends when they turned traitors. HE, Sterrett, further declared, at the mention of the plantation and negroes, as a douceur to me for information against the general, that money with Mr. Clark was no object, let the price be what it might, to obtain information against the general, he, Clark, would have it, let it cost what it would. (Signed) Mississippi Territory, 1810.} Adams County, Feb. 10, 1810. W. THARP. WILLIAM THARP, thirty-four years of age, personally appearing before me, the undersigned, a justice of the peace in and for said county, and having the within declarations read to him, both of which are signed with his name, declared that they were in all their statements the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth. SAMUEL BROOKS, f. P. Note. The words both of and they were in all their, interlined before sworn to. (Copy.) W. Tharp's Deposition. SOME time about the 15th of October last, in the city of New Orleans, I met in the street captain James Sterrett, formerly of the army. We passed on to his compting house, where we entered into conversation on the subject of general James Wilkinson. After about ten minutes, he took out of his pocket a letter which he had just received from William Simmons, accountant of the war department, the last paragraph of which he shewed to me. It ran thus, "I have it in my power to state, that I have been for a length of time very busily employed in ransacking the war department, for evidence of the earliest date against your old friend general W. for the purpose of being used at the coming session of Congress by the honorable John Randolph." After having traced the language, I scrutinized carefully the signature of W. Simmons, and have not the smallest hesita tion to say it was his hand, having been intimately acquainted with it for twelve years past. The above, I pledge my honor, is the substance and facts as came to my view. W. THARP. Mississippi Territory, Adams County, Feb. 10, 1810. WILLIAM THARP, personally appearing on oath, deposeth and saith, that the foregoing statement to which he hath subscribed his name, is just and true. Before,. SAMUEL BROOKE, J. P. After communicating to general W. major Carmick, captain Fenwick and several other gentlemen, the attempt made on me by the late captain Sterrett, on behalf of Daniel Clark as he alledged, to suborn me to give testimony against general Wilkinson, I determined to mislead and, if practicable, to procure some testimonial of his villany, which design I made known to the gentlemen before named. For this purpose at the second interview, I led him to believe I had in my possession, some important documents from the hands of the general, which he was extremely anxious to get possession of, and I was as desirous to procure from him some written evidence of his corrupt designs; but my plan was, in this point. frustrated, as I understood from major Carmick, by the interference and advice given by serjeant M'Kinzie, formerly of the 4th regiment, to Sterrett and Clark. Sterrett informed me M'Kinzie was in Clark's confidence, and was employed as a secret agent by him, and Sterrett assured me, had acted his part beyond all expectation as a spy and informer, and had completely imposed on governor Claiborne. In the prosecution of my views, I had several meetings with Sterrett, and on the 30th September last, the following conversation took place, which I minuted down the same day, and have now before me. He, Sterrett, declared to me, that he had labored and exerted every nerve to ruin general Wilkinson, and that he would continue to do so to the last, and that during the ensuing session of Congress, the General would fall, and all his friends with him; this he knew to be certain; that he was confirmed in this belief by a letter he had recently received from a correspondent* who stood high with * This advice was no doubt from Mr. Sterrett's correspondent, Mr. Simmons, who, if we may judge from events, seems to have had a peep Mr. Jefferson, who had been assured by him, that Mr. J. was now convinced that Wilkinson was guilty, and that he would be this session either broke, or the army would be so modelled as to get him out of service; that for all his (Sterrett's) exertion, he consoled himself with a full assurance that he should live to see Wilkinson what he ought to be, into futurity; and to the same source may be ascribed the circumstance of the arrangements of the war department, always reaching Mr Clark and his friends, before they did gen. Wilkinson. The presumption is justified by the accountant's agency, in circulating Clark's libellous book; and it is a fact that the general's recal was known to Adair at Natchez, two weeks before it reached himself. Among others, a Mr. Bigelow mentioned the report to the general, before he had received his orders: and with a view, it is presumed, to accelerate his movement and facilitate his vindication at Washington in Columbia; the following billet was served on the general about theperiod of his recal, in the full expectation, he is well assured, that it would commit him to jail, at Washington, in the Mississippi territory. Such is the co-operation of Wilkinson's enemies, from the seat of government to the banks of the Mississippi; such is the concert of Randolph, and Adair, and Clark, and Simmons, and Sterrett, and an hundred other worthies. And now while Wilkinson is detained at Washington, Columbia, judgment may go against him in Washington, Mississippi territory, for $40,000, as Adair's writ was succeeded by another of the same character, doubtless at the instigation of Mr Clark. These are small specimens of the pecuniary rewards which Wilkinson receives for serving and saving his country. The Mississippi Territory of the United States, to the Sheriff of Adams County, GEEETING: You are hereby commanded, without delay, to take James Wilkinson, wheresover he may be found in your county, and him safely keep, so that you have his body before the judges of territory aforesaid, at a circuit court, to be holden at the court house in and for the county of Adams, on the second Monday in April next, to answer to John Adair, in a plea of trespass, assault and battery and false imprisonment, to his damages twenty thousand dollars, and have then there this writ. Witness the honorable Thomas Rodney, esquire, first judge of the said territory, at the court house of said county, the second Monday in October, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and nine, and in the thirty-fourth year of the sovereignty and independence of the United States of America. (Signed) THEODORE STARKE. Issued the ninth day of October, 1809. Received the day of 1809. This is an action for an assault and battery, and false imprisonment of the plaintiff, done and committed by the defendant, and no bail required unless ordered by a judge. (Signed) TURNER, P. Q. Let bail be taken in this case for seven thousand dollars, for cause shewn by affidavit, October 25th, 1809. (Signed) vol. ii. THOMAS RODNEY. 13 |