AMERICAN MURDER Part Five

 

I tell you the death of Meriwether Lewis could have only been murder if it was plotted by a spidery super villain at the center of a vast web of conspiracies. And amazingly, there was just such a genial traitor with “pleasing voice and charming manners”. His name was James Wilkinson (above). He was addicted to flashy uniforms and money. He was a bully. And he was a keen judge of weakness in others.

 By the age of 30 Wilkinson had been trained as a doctor, but then enlisted to fight in the American revolution. During the war he made a small fortune profiteering in war bonds, and was then linked to graft and forced to resign his commission in the Continental Army - twice.  Once back in service as a General he accepted a $7,000 a year salary as Spanish secret agent number 13.

In 1786, General Wilkinson bought 260 acres on the Kentucky River, which he promoted as the Kentucky state capital. And in laying out the street grid for his new city he named one of the streets after his Spanish paymaster, "Mero", which, of course, intersected with "Wilkinson Boulevard".  And still does. 

In fact, Brigadier General Wilkinson's first attempt to kill Merriweather Lewis might have come in 1804 when he alerted his Spanish paymaster to the route taken by the Lewis and Clark expedition. But long before then, there were rumors about Wilkinson's Spanish connections.  

Back on Monday, 8 August, 1796, a cannon at Fort Massac blasted an iron ball across the bow of a flatboat struggling up the Ohio River, just before its joining with the Mississippi. The shot had been ordered by Captain Zebulon Montgomery Pike. Pike's orders, issued by Major General (Mad) Anthony Wayne, Wilkinson's superior, were to stop all suspicious vessels, and if they found on board General Wilkinson's agent, Thomas Power, Pike was to search the boat for money and documents. 

Although Captain Pike found Thomas Power on board, the only things the boat was carrying were salt, sugar and tobacco, bound for Wilkinson's properties in Kentucky. But, as Wayne later pointed out, shipping tobacco to Kentucky was like “sending coals to Newcastle”. 

Said a crew member on the flat boat, if Pike had just looked beneath the top layer of tobacco leaves, he would have found Wilkinson's pay in Spanish silver.  Instead the boat and Power were quickly released. The next year the suspicious General “Mad” Anthony Wayne was dead, either from an ulcer or arsenic poisoning, depending on your suspicions.

Agent 13 maintained his cover through what today's spies would call careful trade craft. “He rarely met his handlers. He communicated through a wide range of ciphers and codes...He took pains to ensure that his payment (was) in silver dollars...(which he ) laundered through banks and real estate deals...he had a watertight cover story backed by forged documents and false testimonials showing them to be the outcome of commercial deals.” (“An Artist in Treason”, by Andro Linklater) 

So good was Wilkinson's cover that even while many suspected him of complicity in General Wayne's death, Federalist President John Adams named Wilkinson to replace Wayne. And Wilkinson promptly promoted Captain Pike (above)  to Major.

Wilkinson supported the Democrat-Republican party of Thomas Jefferson (above)  because they favored a weak central government, which matched the wishes of Wilkinson's Spanish paymasters. And he did everything he could to ensure the election of Jefferson as President, in 1800.

But in that election Vice President Aaron Burr (above) earned Jefferson's hatred, and Jefferson promised to block all of Burr's future domestic ambitions. That left Burr looking for more unconventional options, which lead him, naturally, to General Wilkinson.

In 1805 Wilkinson had been named Governor of the new Louisiana Territory, headquartered in St. Louis, with Aaron Burr's brother-in-law serving as Territorial Secretary. It seems likely that Burr's plan to capture Spanish Florida either originated with Wilkinson or was at least was encouraged by him. But the thought of losing $7,000 a year dissuaded Agent 13 from taking any overt action. And when Federalist newspapers caught the scent of “Burr's Conspiracy”, Wilkinson found Burr of more value as a sacrificial offering to Jefferson, than a co-conspirator. It was Wilkinson who had Burr arrested.

Burr's treason trial in Baltimore (above) allowed Meriwether Lewis, newly named Governor of Upper Louisiana Territory, to observe his predecessor on the witness stand. Lewis came away believing Wilkinson was far more involved with Burr than he admitted. But because Wilkinson was “a good Democrat-Republican” President Jefferson merely reduced "the most unscrupulous character in all of American history" to Governor of Lower Louisiana, headquartered in New Orleans.

But as he had done in Detroit, Wilkinson left behind in St. Louis, a web of business partners he had ensnared, including partnerships in lead and tin mines with the new Territorial Secretary, and Meriwether Lewis' new enemy, Fredrick Bates (above).

Thomas Power had been caught in Wilkinson's web, although perhaps he thought he was just delivering the profits from Wilkinson's legal investments.   In 1808, when Gilbert Russel went broke in land speculations, he sought to reenlist in the army. General Wilkinson signed Russell on and gave him command of Fort Pickering -  the future city of Memphis - where Governor Meriwether Lewis was carried ashore in early September of 1809. And when James Neely, “a man who enjoyed playing the fiddle, dancing and strong drink” lost his money in land speculations, he borrowed from General Wilkinson to repay some of his debts.

 Then in July of 1809 General Wilkinson recommended Neely for the $90 a month job as Agent to the Chickasaw Indian nation, which occupied land adjacent to the Natchez Trace. Potentially it could be a very lucrative position. And it was James Neely who fortuitously showed up at Fort Pickering just as the ailing Governor Lewis was recovering in Gilbert Russel's bed.

Perhaps all these “friendships” of James Wilkinson's added up to a large conspiracy, and perhaps simply that by using his fortune to make others indebted to him, and with each of his debtors acting in their own self interest, they all generally acted in Wilkinson's best interest as well.  But webs must be maintained if they are to feed the spider. And it is while tending to their web that spiders are most vulnerable.

On 21 May, 1804, when Meriwether Lewis left St. Charles, on the Missouri River, to begin the great transcontinental expedition with Clark, the American officer who saw him off was Captain Amos Stoddard (above), first Governor of Louisiana Territory. It was common knowledge the two had become friends, and before leaving Lewis had entrusted Stoddard with handling his meager finances. The men kept up a regular if spotty correspondence for the rest of Lewis' life. But in September of 1809, when Stoddard again saw Meriwether Lewis at Fort Pickering, he was shocked.. Amos told a friend, Captain James House, that the Governor was in a state of “derangement”. The word at the time usually meant Delirium tremens, aka, the DT.'s.

A pharmaceutical website identifies the at risk patient for the DT's as someone who drinks “over one pint of a distilled beverage every day”.  Another site describes the symptoms as “hallucinations... severe panic attacks, trouble making complete sentences and paranoia....usually brought on by the patient's surroundings” According to the web site “Medscape”, “Dts...occur 3-10 days following the last drink.” And the DT's may be “triggered by head injury, infection, or illness in people with a history of heavy use of alcohol.” Governor Lewis was brought ashore at Fort Pickering suffering from a recurrence of malaria, which share many of the same symptoms as the Dts.

Was Meriwether Lewis in early September of 1809, suffering from a recurrence of malaria, or the DT's? Medical guides insist, “Major withdrawal (hallucinations) occurs 10-72 hours after the last drink”. That time line seems to disabuse any diagnosis of the DT's. But how close of a look at Lewis did Stoddard get? Or could the explorer's condition have been yet another outburst of syphilis? Would Stoddard by looking, have known the difference between malaria, syphilis or delirium tremens? It is an important question because Stoddard told his shocking story to Captain House at a meeting along the Natchez Trace, and when he arrived at Nashville, House recorded Stoddard's comments in a letter, dated at least 11 days before Meriwether Lewis' arrived at Grinder's Inn.

There seem so many good reasons to believe Meriwether Lewis died of natural causes or suicide , and only one to suspect that he was murdered by agents for Agent 13. But the only reason to suspect that Wilkinson was responsible for Lewis' death, is that no one has ever argued that morally, James Wilkinson would not have done such a horrible thing. And that is damning evidence against the General. 

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AMERICAN MURDER Part Four

 

I think the breaking point for Governor Meriwether Lewis (above) came when the Federal Government denied the bill he submitted for translating the territorial laws into French - in a place where, until 1803, French was the official language. It was only $18. And even in 1808 that was not much money – it would be about $245 today. But it was just another example of the penny pinching of the bean counters in the administration of the new President James Madison.

The politicians were never very kind to Meriwether Lewis. For risking his life and limbs in the wilderness for three long years, for being shot, for repeatedly almost starving to death and almost drowning several times, when he got back alive the Captain received $1,228 in back pay (equal to about $16,000 today) and a coupon good for 1,600 acres of Federal land. (The official price of which was just $2 an acre – so the equivalent of another $3,000.) Added to this would be his yearly budget/salary  as Governor of $2,000, ($26,000 today), out of which he had to draw all incidental expenses, from which was now deducted that $18. So that was just another kick in the behind.

During their return voyage in 1806, Lewis and Clark had invited the Manndan Chief White Coyote to visit President Jefferson in Washington, and the chief had impulsively agreed. Jefferson was delighted, and the visit had cemented relations with the strongest tribe in the middle Missouri River country. But it proved difficult to get White Coyote and his entourage back home.

An attempt in 1807 had been turned back by the Arikarass tribe, at cost of the lives of three soldiers and the leg of a fourth man. More soldiers would have to be dispatched and bribes paid to allow the chief and his family to get home. But the price tag of this diplomatic mercy mission had risen to $7,000. The Washington bean counters were appalled. And they sort of had a point.

Lewis had handed the problem over to the St. Louis-Missouri River Fur Company, a private enterprise corporation. One hundred fifty men had marched and paddled up the Missouri River to the Manndan villages. They had returned the chief, and had then continued on, trapping beaver, otter and bear. All the pelts were shipped back to the company warehouse in St. Louis. The profits had gone to the shareholders, but the bill for paying all those men to pole their way up the Missouri River had gone to the Government. Sound familiar? And two of the shareholders in the St. Louis Fur Company were Governor Meriwether Lewis and his brother Reuben Lewis.

These details had been pointed out to the bureaucrats in Washington by the priggish Frederick Bates,   (above). The result was that the Madison administration, which had not picked Lewis,  had begun going over the Governor's expenses with a fine tooth comb. They grudgingly paid most of the bill for White Coyote's return, but managed to find $940 they could refuse to reimburse Lewis for. That was almost half his yearly budget and salary! 

Worse still, the Madison administration had re-opened the books on the three year old Lewis and Clark Expedition, and were now demanding a detailed accounting as to why a budget of $2,500 had ended up costing $40,000. The biggest reasons was, of course, that an enthusiastic congress, at Jefferson's urging, had added those land grants for everybody. But the Madison administration had suddenly developed amnesia about that.

The reality was that the land grants had not cost the government a dime, except in the accounting ledgers of the bean counters. But over the summer it took a month for one of the bureaucrats' demands for more paperwork to travel from Washington to St. Louis, and at least another month for Governor Lewis to respond. In the winter there was no mail at all, and for months at a time the misconstructions and misunderstandings simply piled one atop the next. It was a system made for bureaucratic misunderstandings, and the denial of the $18 translating fee was just the final straw. Meriwether Lewis, Governor of the Territory, must return to Washington and make his case face-to-face with the Federal bean counters.

In mid-August of 1809 Meriwether Lewis signed papers granting William Clark and two other friends Power-of-Attorney, in case anything should happen to him on his trip back east. It was a standard precaution, like buying flight insurance in the 21st century.  Lewis also sent a letter off to the Secretary of War protesting his treatment, and a letter to his mother, saying he was looking forward to seeing her in Virginia.  None of these were the actions of man who did not expect to return.

The St. Louis Gazette reported on Monday, 4 September, 1809 that Lewis had left town “in good health”. aboard a "Kentucky Ark", usually a twelve foot wide and thirty feet long flatboat which floated clumsily down the Mississippi.  Lewis was bound for New Orleans, where he intended upon boarding a sailing ship for the long voyage around the isthmus of Spanish Florida to Washington. But September was probably the worst time to be traveling by river in America.  And that September in particular.

It was the dry season of a dry year. The river was low, and the flatboat grounded methodically on every sand bar. It was brutally hot, the mosquito population feasted on every inch of bare flesh, and Lewis suffered a relapse of the malaria he had contracted during the transcontinental expedition.

After a week of travel, 180 river miles downriver, his flatboat arrived at the outpost of New Madrid.

This village of 800 had been a border town for a hundred years, first dividing Spanish territory from French territory, then between English and Spanish, then Spanish and American. Since 1803, it marked the border between Lewis' own Northern Louisiana Territory and the territory of Southern Louisiana, run from New Orleans. Governor Lewis was now under the authority of Governor and General James Wilkinson.

And from the moment he had landed at New Madrid (above), Lewis' behavior changed. His plans changed as well. It almost seems as if  Governor Meriwether Lewis clearly felt uncomfortable staying here while incapacitated by his fever, and allowed himself just two days to recuperate. On Wednesday, 13 September, he order his boat to shove off again.

Two days later the boat put in at the fourth of the Chickasaw Bluffs (and the future site of Memphis) at Fort Pickering.  Here Governor Lewis was carried off the river on a stretcher, badly dehydrated from his malaria fevers. He was met by Captain Gilbert Russel, commander of the sixteen man outpost. 

Captain Russel immediately turned over his own bed to the Governor, but was Lewis really so sick he could not continue the boat trip to New Orleans? Was he crazed by illness to the point of paranoia? Whatever the truth, the moment he had landed at New Madrid, Lewis' behavior had changed again. His plans certainly did. It almost seems that Governor Meriwether Lewis now thought of himself as being behind enemy lines.

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AMERICAN MURDER Part Three

I am amazed that to the 7 million people living in the United States in 1810, the old adage that "The one thing they are not making more of is land", was not true.  Ignoring for the moment that it was actually being stolen from the native peoples, the vast surplus of a commodity rare in Europe should have been the dominant economic reality in Meriwether Lewis' world. And yet, curiously, land prices remained extremely  high.

The reason was Alexander Hamilton's great compromise. He exchanged establishing the Federal Capital between Virginia and Maryland, two states which had little debt,  for allowing the Federal Government to take over all the other states' debts. This put the American economy on a solid financial footing.  But the downside was Hamilton meant to pay off the debts by selling unclaimed land as quickly as possible, 

Because of that decision, as Donald Holtgrieve explained in 1975,  "...over one-half of the land disposed of by the federal government in the history of this country went through the hands of professional land dealers before it was occupied.”

What this meant for early America was noted by Krout and Fox in their seminal 1944 book, “The Completion of Independence”. “The price of farmland, except near cities, averaged between ten and fifteen dollars per acre..." The values of actual sales were in direct contrast with the official price, set in 1795 at a mere $2 an acre. But those official bargains were only available in parcels of 320 acre lots."

And as was, again, noted in “The Completion...” “The common Carey Plow (above) was made entirely of wood, save for an iron collar to cut the sod...With such an implement an acre was a good days work." In other words, any farm over forty acres was simply of no use to a family depending upon farming for its livelihood.

The only ones who could afford to buy in the Federal auctions were wealthy speculators and corporations of speculators, who re-surveyed and subdivided the land, and then re-sold it to smaller speculators, who re-surveyed and re-sold it to, eventually, actual farmers. And at each resale the price went up.

The Yeoman farmer might be celebrated in myth, but in reality they were at the bottom of a profit pyramid, paying as much as 40% interest on the loans to buy their farms. "Farmers were thus forced to grow (not food for their own tables, but ) cash crops like tobacco or cotton, to pay their debts.” And even if, “...a farmer who found a desired piece of land,  became a squatter by clearing and planting it with the hope of one day purchasing the acres he had improved... when the cleared lands went up for auction, a speculator could out-bid the squatter....”  And usually did.

George Washington was a speculator, as was Thomas Jefferson, John Adams, Andrew Jackson and Meriwether Lewis. And none of these leaders were above hiring thugs to drive squatters off “their” land.  It was the speculators who drove Abraham Lincoln's father off his farm in Kentucky, and again off his farm in Indiana and eventually drove him to Illinois, where Abraham gave up farming entirely. 

As another source writing about this unromantic American frontier points out, “As a consequence of monopolistic tactics and official fraud, northern Alabama lands were overwhelmingly engrossed by absentee speculators and wealthy settler elites.”  The leveling process of the American frontier was largely a myth, created by the wealthy in a natural effort to romanticize their own past. On the frontier, as in the Eastern cities, money talked. America did not have to be settled in this fashion. But it was.

The image was that everyone seemed to be getting rich in land speculation. But the reality was that a majority of speculators lost money. And the farther you were down the food chain from the original government auction, the less chance you had to see a profit. Like the stock market bubbles of later generations, those drawn into the land market bubbles had to quickly sell at profit or they went broke. That drove the prices up, which made the almost unlimited American lands, painfully expensive. As it was in 2000, so it was in 1800; the only guarantee of a profit was to be a banker, or to have one as a partner.

It was this reality which faced Governor Meriwether Lewis as he first stepped onto the docks of St. Louis.

Lewis did two things immediately which almost assured he would be a failure as a Governor. First he announced that should he be out of the territory for any reason, then his old comrade William Clark (whom Jefferson had named the Indian Agent for the upper Louisiana Territory) would serve as acting Governor. This made sense to Governor Lewis because he was new to the territory and he knew and could trust Clark. 

But it was also a disaster, because Frederick Bates was the Lieutenant Governor, and had been the acting Governor for almost a year while Lewis had slowly made his way west.  Bates was, officially,  the man who was legally required to be the acting Governor should Lewis be out of the territory. And it was Bates who had already filled the government offices before Lewis arrived, making the power structure loyal to the junior officer.  So naming Clark as acting Governor was an insult Lewis was not required to deliver and probably had not intended upon making.  But from that moment forward Fredrick Bates was Lewis' sworn enemy. He would prove to be an effective opponent - for Frederick Bates was a very good at being an unpleasant man.

As Bates wrote to his brother, “My habits are pacific. Yet I have had acrimonious differences with almost every person with whom (I) have been associated in public business…But before God I cannot acknowledge that I have been blamable in one instance.” And he never would admit it.

A few weeks later, Bates (above) related how he was getting along with Lewis. “Sometime after this there was a ball in St. Louis, I attended early, and was seated in conversation with some gentlemen when the Governor entered. He drew his chair close to mine – there was a pause in the conversation – I availed myself of it – arose and walked to the opposite side of the room...He knew my resolution not to speak to him except on business, and he ought not to have thrust himself in my way.”

And these two men now found themselves in charge of dispensing millions of acres of land to the hundreds of speculators who had flocked to St. Louis to avail themselves of the bounty. And there were natural resources to be exploited, lead and tin mines just discovered beneath the rolling Louisiana territory (below). With that much profit to be made, such a pair of offended egos did not portend a profitable future for any one not skilled at bureaucratic infighting. such as Meriwether Lewis.

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