1To James Madison from Solomon Birckhead, 7 May 1813 (Madison Papers)
I hope it will not be thought presumptuous in a private Citizen of Baltimore to address the President of the Union upon an occasion so awful & alarming as at present hangs over our City. Congress have thought proper to involve us, with this once happy Country, in a state of war, with a powerful nation, against whom we can atchieve nothing—whom we can injure little—and at whose mercy our Towns...