To James Madison from John Payne Todd, 9 October 1814
From John Payne Todd
Ghent 9th Octr. 1814.
Dear Papa
I have just informed Mr Gallatin that Messers. Gereaux and Lewis would leave this place early tomorrow morning for Dartmouth to embark for New York in the Jenny a cartel for the exchange of prisoners.
It has been the intention of the ministers to send despatches by this opportunity; but the uncertain situation of the negociation as Mr Gallatin expressed himself altered this determination apprehending a communication at the present stage of the negociation might cause a wavering opinion upon the final result. The moment it is desired to send despatches the Transit at Bordeaux1 may sail or perhaps now the Chauncey.
This vessel it appears the Ministers have not the command of as it was their intention to have sent her about a week ago having procured a passport for this purpose. Mr Barkers agent objected to her sailing so soon. She would of carried the duplicates and the notes which have passed between the ministers and British plenipotentiaries Since the sailing of the Jno. Adams. The progress made in the negociation would be seen to be not great; it has been conducted in a manner extremely dilatory The British commissioners choosing always to refer to their Government previou[s]ly to making reply to an American note. Whether this dilatory manner of proceeding on the part of the British Gt is chosen on account of the incompetency of her Commissioners to fulfil the important duties attached to their office or from an intention to procrastinate the Negociation in order to give time to their expeditions against the United States to act, So as to be de[te]rmined by the result: and at the same time to be made acquainted by the progress in the negotiation at Vienna to what extent it will be likely a diversion of their forces may be necessary on the continent: and to have likewise the advantage of involving in uncertainty at the Congress the present Negotiations in order to serve their purposes you who are so well acquainted with he[r] policy can decide.
The Note received last evening which I have not yet seen Mr Clay (with who⟨m⟩ I lodge) has told would give a turn to the negotiations so much so that they may yet be delayed here to the end of the Month of November.2 From the general observations of Mr Gallatin it must be concluded that great difficulties will exist in raising a loan in Europe. Money commands a high rate of Interest. He, jointly with Mr Adams addressed a note to our Bankers in Holland a few days after the arrival of Mr Boyd.
About ten days ago we received the painful news of the destruction of the public buildings in Washington this Act of the enemy meets with universal execration and has induced for the first time the Paris Journals to published what was supposed Contrary to the ⟨incli⟩nations of the British Government. I must a⟨lways⟩ regret my abscence for if I could have been servic⟨eable⟩ in no other way I might have been perhaps useful ⟨to you⟩ or my mother. I send by this opportunity some Newspapers and an article in manuscript as a specimen of one of the late essays which appeares in the Paris journals. I have reason to beleive it and probably some others to have been written by Made de Stael who requests me to make Known to you her high respect.3
I shall an opportunity to write again in a Short time.4 Yours Affectionately
John P Todd.
RC (NN); draft (NHi). RC damaged by removal of seal; docketed by JM. The copies vary extensively in phrasing; for content included in the draft but omitted from the RC, see nn. 1 and 3. Enclosures not found.
1. From this point the draft continues: “will sail, the Chauncey at Ostend for which passports have already been procured may be expected to sail in the course of ten days according to the account of Mr Barker’s agent.”
2. The 8 Oct. 1814 note from the British to the American commissioners prevented the failure of the negotiations by receding from the British ultimatum requiring a guarantee of Indian territory within the United States (see JM to Congress, 10 Oct. 1814, n. 1) and substituting a reciprocal agreement that the United States and Great Britain would make peace with their Indian enemies immediately after the ratification of a treaty ending the War of 1812. The bulk of the note, however, consisted of arguments defending the British assertion that the United States had declared war with the goal of annexing Canada, denying that Great Britain had incited the Indians against the United States, and refuting the American commissioners’ efforts to prove that the British government’s concern for its Indian allies was unprecedented in the annals of treaty-making (, Foreign Relations, 3:721–23).
3. Anne Louise Germaine Necker, baronne de Staël-Holstein (1766–1817), was the daughter of Jacques Necker, a native of Geneva who served as director of finances in prerevolutionary France, and Suzanne Curchod de Nasse Necker, who entertained Thomas Jefferson and members of the Paris intelligentsia at her literary salon. In 1788, two years after marrying the Swedish baron Erik de Staël-Holstein, Germaine de Staël published Lettres sur les ouvrages et le caractère de J. J. Rousseau. Exiled from France as a dissident during the Revolution and the Napoleonic era, de Staël authored two novels, Delphine (1802) and Corinne ou L’Italie (1807). Her De l’Allemagne (1810), informed by her association with German writers including Johann Wolfgang von Goethe and August Wilhelm Schlegel, was suppressed in France (Looney et al., Papers of Thomas Jefferson: Retirement Series, 5:452).
4. Draft has: “I shall have an opportunity to write by the Herald which I understand will proceed to New York in a few days.”