From James Madison to James Monroe, 12 June 1815
To James Monroe
Washington June 12. 1815
Dear Sir
Since my return hither, the purpose of which I intimated in a line to Albemarle previous to my leaving home,1 I have recd. yours of the 3d. I hope the mountain air will contribute to re establish your health, and that you will not leave it till the effect is fully produced.
Notwithstanding the Ns. paper Statement, neither a messenger nor dispatches have been recd. from our Ministers in Europe.2 Letters from Beasely to Genl. Mason, have come to hand, giving an acct. of the bloody scene among the Prisoners at Dartmoor.3 It seems to have been the work of a cruel & perhaps intoxicated commandant. An investigation has been committed to 2 Comrs. one our side, a Son of Rufus King & one on the British. The B. Govt. appears to have ⟨manifesting⟩ [sic] proper dispositions ⟨on⟩ the occasion. We are not only without direct information from our Ministers, but I see not even a printed paragraph alluding to them, nor hear of a private letter from any quarter that mentions them.
I enclose the latest French & English papers; from which with the amn. papers you will receive from the Dept of State, you will collect all we know of the State of Europe. I add to them a Boston paper which contains the qualified ratification at London, of the Treaty at Vienna of the 25th. of March.4 The check which this indicates on the Govt. from the spirit of the opposition; and the discouragement to the allies from the sparing hand with which Ld. Castlereah holds out pecuniary aids to them, according to his Speach [sic], afford the best chances of preventing war; strengthened as they may be by the position and prospects of Napoleon.5 It will be extremely difficult however to give a pacific turn to the state of things.
I think it not amiss to send you, the letter from Changuion, as he may expect some answer from you.6 If he has no special reasons for making communications immediately to you, it is probable he will come on to Washington on learning my return to it.
Your letter to Baker was modified in the last paragraph so as to chime with the instructions from the War Dept: which left a discretion with the Command at Detroit to be governed by circumstances on the subject of delivering up Malden.7 The accts. from the Comrs. at St. Louis shew that the Indians are hostile and emboldened by the idea that G. B. is by the Treaty of peace, their protector agst. the U.S.8 Whilst Mackinaw & Prairie du Chien remain in British hands, this idea will be cherished, and if in the mean time, Malden be handed back, the evil wd. be increased. The Commandt. is instructed to communicate in the most friendly manner with the B. officer, and to place the precaution on a footing not to be mistaken.
The case between the Scy. of the Navy & the Board of Comrs. is a very inauspicious one. There will be no difficulty in deciding it in a way, that must be theoretically satisfactory, so far as the questions turn on the construction of the Law. But I wish it may not be impossible to guard in practice, agst. rubs that will embarrass, if not arrest the progress of business. Such is the machinery that a grain of sand will affect it. Affce. respects
James Madison
RC (DLC: Monroe Papers). Docketed by Monroe.
2. The 12 June 1815 issue of the Daily National Intelligencer reported that “Di[s]patches for Government from our Minister at Paris” had arrived at New York via the brig James Monroe on 8 June.
3. JM probably referred to London agent for American prisoners Reuben G. Beasley’s 13, 15, and 19 Apr. 1815 letters to John Mason (DNA: RG 233, President’s Messages, 14A–D1; printed with their enclosures in , Foreign Relations, 4:49–54). The first stated that five American prisoners had been killed and thirty-four wounded on 6 Apr. 1815 at Dartmoor Prison when the guard soldiers fired on them to check a perceived escape attempt. Beasley enclosed copies of a 10 Apr. 1815 letter to him from Alexander McLeay, secretary of the transport board, giving a brief account of these events; a 10 Apr. 1815 letter from John Wilson Croker, secretary of the admiralty, to John Philip Morier, an under-secretary of state in the foreign office, reporting that the Admiralty had investigated the “riot” and attributed it to the prisoners’ “impatience to be released,” that the Americans blamed the delay on their own government rather than that of Great Britain, and that arrangements for transporting some of them to the United States had already been made by Beasley and others; an 11 Apr. 1815 letter to Beasley from Morier, forwarding the previous letter and conveying Lord Castlereagh’s request that it be sent to the U.S. government. Beasley’s second letter enclosed a copy of a 7 Apr. 1815 report by a committee of American prisoners appointed to investigate the affair, asserting that no escape attempt had been planned, that the prisoners had been fleeing when fired upon, and that Capt. Thomas Shortland had ordered the attack while drunk to satisfy a grudge he held against the Americans for their refusal to accept substandard rations. The committee also noted that “7 were killed, 30 dangerously and 30 slightly wounded, making a total of 67 killed and wounded.” In his third letter, Beasley reported that Castlereagh, Henry Clay, and Albert Gallatin had agreed that an American and a British commissioner should be appointed to investigate the affair, and that the task had been assigned to Charles King and “a Mr. Larpent.” He enclosed lists of seven killed and thirty-three wounded, provided by Shortland and British surgeon George McGrath, indicating the men’s rank and which ships they came from, and giving details of the mortal injuries.
4. The 7 June 1815 issue of the Boston Columbian Centinel contained a report that the Prince Regent had ratified the 25 Mar. 1815 Treaty of Vienna, with the condition that Great Britain would not be bound to support Louis XVIII’s restoration to the French throne.
5. In a 7 Apr. 1815 speech in the House of Commons, published in the London Times the following day, Castlereagh emphasized that Great Britain should maintain its military preparedness in light of the possibility of war against Napoleon but declared that the British government would not push its European allies toward hostilities and would offer only “what assistance [it] could to support the general interests” (, 1st ser., 30:417, 434).
6. JM probably enclosed François D. Changuion to Monroe, 6 June 1815 (2 pp.; in French; DNA: RG 59, NFL, Netherlands), stating that Changuion wished to meet with Monroe to present his letter of recall, and William I to JM, 20 Mar. 1815. Changuion enclosed a copy of the second letter (2 pp.; in French; ibid.).
7. For the draft of Monroe’s letter to Anthony St. John Baker, see Monroe to JM, 3 June 1815, and n. 1.
8. For the letters, see Alexander J. Dallas to JM, 21 May 1815, n. 3.