241Ambrose Spencer to James Madison, 22 October 1834 (Madison Papers)
My neighbor & friend E. C. Delavan Esqr. of this City, being about to proceed to Virginia, & the vicinity of your residence, I have taken the liberty altho’ personally unknown to you, to offer him this letter of introduction—Mr. Delavan’s devotion to the great cause of temperance, would indeed supersede the necessity of any introduction; but I confess I take an interest, in an interview...
242George Joy to James Madison, 21 October 1834 (Madison Papers)
I received with the greater satisfaction your kind letter of the 8th Ult. as those which it answered had not left England many days before I learnt by the papers that the state of your health was such as to leave it very problematical whether they would reach you at all; and though subsequent advices announced your convalescence, the accounts were not such as to flatter me with the hope of...
243James Madison to Edward Coles, 15 October 1834 (Madison Papers)
I have received my dear Sir, your letter of the 15th. ultimo. I did not anticipate a complaint that mine was not full enough; being an effort which in my present condition, I had rarely made. It was not my object to offer either a plenary or a public review of the agitated topics; but to satisfy a friend that I ought not in my 84th. year, and with a constitution crippled by disease, to put...
244Aaron Vail to James Madison, 14 October 1834 (Madison Papers)
I received a few days ago your letter of the 9th Ultimo, with an enclosure for Mr George Joy, which I immediately forwarded to its destination— I should have sooner acknowledged the receipt of your former letter enclosing an Autograph for the Princess Victoria, which was received in good time; but waited to do so until I could communicate to you the satisfaction which the very kind and...
245James Madison to Mann Butler, 11 October 1834 (Madison Papers)
I have recd. your letter of the 21. Ult in which you wish to obtain my recollection of what passed between Mr. John Brown and me in 1788, on the overture of Gardoqui "that if the people of Kentucky would erect themselves into an independent State, and appoint a proper person to negociate with him, he had authority for that purpose and would enter into an arrangement with them for the...
246Jesse D. Elliott to James Madison, 10 October 1834 (Madison Papers)
Fully knowing the patriotic zeal with which you commenced & continued the last War with Great Britain, & perceiving, also, the support which you derived from the Frigate Constitution, I have the pleasure of forwarding to you a small relic of the old Ship, with the hope that it may long sustain you in the years of your declining age. I have the honor to be Sir: Very Respectfully Your Obdt Servt...
247James Madison to Edward Coles, 8 October 1834 (Madison Papers)
I have just received your letter of the 5th. with the Bond enclosed in it, and catch a fugitive opportunity of requesting by the Mail, that the small balance, may remain in your hands, applicable to some small object in Phila. Accept our joint wishes that health and happiness may attend you both; with our regret that we could not have the pleasure of personally expressing them. RC (NjP :...
248George S. McKiernan to James Madison, 8 October 1834 (Madison Papers)
An individual, who is totally unknown to your Excellency, presumes to beg a slight favour, which lies only in your Excellency’s power to grant. As all he desires is a mere specimen of your Excellency’s hand writing an acknowledgement of the receipt of this letter, will be cherished as an invaluable treasure by one who has ever admired the wisdom, and sublime qualities of your Excellency. Your...
249Edward Coles to James Madison, 5 October 1834 (Madison Papers)
I have recd. your letter of the 3d. instant enclosing me a Check on the Bank of Virginia at Fredericksburg for $2050. in payment of the principal and interest of the sum borrowed of me. Your Bond for which I return you enclosed—on the back of it you will perceive I have enterd the interest which you have from time to time paid on it. You will also perceive that I have endorsed on it the sum of...
250James Madison to Edward Coles, 3 October 1834 (Madison Papers)
I have received yours of the 15th Sepr. and have commenced an answer; but interruptions of different sorts and my crippled fingers, make the progress very tedious. Tell me where an answer will catch you. Finding that I have in order to avoid the sale of Negroes sold land till the residue will not support them, concentered and increasing as they are, I have yeilded to the necessity of parting...
251James Madison to Isaac A. Coles, 3 October 1834 (Madison Papers)
J. Madison with his best respects to Col: Coles, requests the favor of him to have the enclosed delivered to his brother, if in the neighbourhood. Should he have left it, and be out of immediate reach, Col C. will be so obliging as to return it to me, with a notice of the most expedient address for a letter to his brother. [printer’s fist] The enclosed letter contains a check on the B. Bank of...
252J. H. Campbell to James Madison, 3 October 1834 (Madison Papers)
Being a Virginian and having had the pleasure in my Earlier days of often Seeing and hearing you together with the interest which I feel in the present political contest in the South must be my apology for obtruding myself upon you in this manner The good and wise I know may be always safely approached by the humblest of their fellow Citizens when instruction is their object Accompanying this...
253Thomas B. Reily to James Madison, 2 October 1834 (Madison Papers)
Permit me to present you, through my friend Mr. Crabb, of Philadelphia, now on a patriotic pilgrimage to Montpelier, the portrait (lithographed) of that distinguished patriot Amos Kendall—who, for efficient emulation of your brilliant services in support of that Democracy whose applause hath made your name immortal—is now traduced and vilified as much even as you have been by that same spirit,...
254James Madison to James Leander Cathcart, September 1834 (Madison Papers)
I recd. in the due time your letter of Aug. 11. But in my present condition I have been obliged to spare the use of the pen as much as possible, especially when an answer was not pressing, and I could give none that could be of much importance. It may well be supposed that at my age, and after a lapse of nearly 30 years, my memory must be a very fallible resort for information as to...
255Nicholas P. Trist to James Madison, 25 September 1834 (Madison Papers)
Unless the day should be unfavorable, Mrs Trist & myself & children will set out to-morrow, to dine at Gordonsville, and reach Montpellier in the evening. Cornelia & Mary, and one of Mr. Randolph’s younger daughters (Cary Ann) will follow the next tuesday; and we propose all to leave you on the ensuing friday evening, so as to be in Washington the next day. I thought, when last with you, that...
256Mann Butler to James Madison, 21 September 1834 (Madison Papers)
On the credit of the inclosed letter of introduction from an ancient colleague of the early services of your great career, permit me to solicit, at your perfect ease and convenience, some attention to events in our history. It is not unknown to you, the deep excitement which in 1806 seized the public mind of Ky. in regard to early Spanish intrigues in 1788, to detach the State from the...
257James Madison to Isaac S. Lyon, 20 September 1834 (Madison Papers)
I must apologize for the great delay in acknowledging your letter of Apl. 20th, by referring, (now a common and necessary resort) to the feebleness of age, accompanied by severe & continued inroads on my health. My respect for your object, would make it very agreeable to me, to aid it in the way you mention. But on looking into the parcels of pamphlets I possess, I find none that would supply...
258Benjamin Waterhouse to James Madison, 17 September 1834 (Madison Papers)
Ever since certain evil minded persons entered the Navy-yard at Charlestown, and beheaded the full-length figure of President Jackson fixed on the stem of the renowned Ship Constitution, riot & midnight misrule had become in a measure epidemic. A Roman Catholic Convent or Nunnery, a spacious establishment, in the neighborhood of Bunker-hill, within cannon-shot of the centre of Boston, was...
259James Madison to Thomas R. Dew, 15 September 1834 (Madison Papers)
J. M. presents his thanks to Professor Dew for the Copy of his Essay on Usury. The subject being very ably handled, will doubtless aid in dissipating the erroneous views of it which have so long prevailed. FC (DLC) .
260James Madison to Henry D. Gilpin, 15 September 1834 (Madison Papers)
J. M. with his respects to Mr. Gilpin acknowledges the receipt of his able & eloquent Speech on the 4th. of July. The delay in returning his thanks for it, has an apology in the decrepit state of his health, of which he is obliged in this as in other cases to avail himself. FC (DLC) .
261James Madison to Samuel L. Southard, 15 September 1834 (Madison Papers)
J. Madison with his respects to Mr Southard returns him many thanks for his biographical discourse on Mr Wirt. The character of this meritorious Citizen is a rich theme for eloquent and instructive comments; of which the discourse is a signal & happy illustration. RC (NjP) ; FC (DLC) . In an unknown hand, signed by JM.
262James Madison to William H. Winder [Jr.], 15 September 1834 (Madison Papers)
I am sensible of the delay in acknowledging your letter of and regret it. But apart from the crippled condition of my health, which almost forbids the use of the pen, I could not forget that I was to speak of occurrences after a lapse of 20 years, & at an age in its 84th year; circumstances so readily and for the most part, justly referred to, as impairing the confidence due to recollections &...
263Edward Coles to James Madison, 15 September 1834 (Madison Papers)
In returning my thanks, which I do most heartily, for your letter of the 29th ulto, I must be permitted to express my regret that it was not quite as full as I could have wished. Perhaps my apprehension of ill consequences from the late usurpations and abuses of power by the President, & the great confidence I have in the soundness & influence of your opinions, may have led me to expect too...
264Thomas Lehre Sr. to James Madison, 15 September 1834 (Madison Papers)
I have been much distress’d to hear, that you have lately been so ill as to be given over by your Physcians, since which, I am happy to learn from an authentic source, that you have got much better, & in a fair way of being restored to your usual state of health. God grant that your health may be renovated, & that you may live for many years, not only on account of yourself, family, & friends,...
265Henry Phillips to James Madison, 14 September 1834 (Madison Papers)
It is with a great degree of diffidence that I intrude on your advanced age and retirement with this Epistle. But hope It will a sufficient apology for this intrusion when I say to you that I am but a youth and that my sole object in thus troubling you is to acquire information on a subject of the most vital importance to the safety of our beloved Country. Knowing full well from your venerable...
266Thomas Dyson Clark to James Madison, 12 September 1834 (Madison Papers)
Suffer me to ask a favour of you (as a Relic and a testimonial of that Regard that a father would have to his son) to write to me, your favour & Letter will be Transfixd with my father’s letters and writings. (Samuel Clark of the Revolutionary War who fought under the Immortal Layfeatte . Layfeatte is no more . the Great & Good Layfayaet is no more!! his last advice to us was, according to the...
267Samuel H. Smith to James Madison, 11 September 1834 (Madison Papers)
In transmitting the enclosed letter for Mrs. Madison, I cannot resist the impulse of my feelings in communicating to you my best wishes for your continued happiness, and for the improvement of your health, and that you may live to see the clouds dissipated that darken our political horison. With my best respects to Mrs. Madison I beg you to receive the assurances of my unabated consideration &...
268James Madison to George Joy, 9 September 1834 (Madison Papers)
I have received your two letters of June 4th & 11th. with their enclosures. The letter to your brother records a touching incident in the life of Lafayette, a life which if history does it justice, will fill some of its most conspicuous & interesting pages. Observing that Mr. Adams had been designated by Congress to prepare an Obituary Memoir of the man so much admired and beloved by our...
269James Madison to Aaron Vail, 9 September 1834 (Madison Papers)
I inclose a letter for Mr. George Joy of London, which I request the favor of you to have delivered. I am anxious that it should not fail to reach him. In compliance with your letter of—I forwarded to you the autograph lines which were wished. I hope the letter got safely to hand. With cordial salutations FC (DLC) .
270George W. Featherstonehaugh to James Madison, 1 September 1834 (Madison Papers)
It was with much reluctance I gave up the idea of calling to see you on my way to the Mountains, but, I had never been through the Shenandoah Valley, and as we (My Wife, and my eldest Son) took our departure from Baltimore, I went to Harper’s Ferry by the way of the railroad, as far as Fredericktown in Maryland, and then took a Carriage to the Potomac. Following that fine Valley to Staunton,...