James Madison Papers
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https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Madison/02-07-02-0053

To James Madison from Robert Smith, 13 April 1804 (Abstract)

§ From Robert Smith

13 April 1804, Navy Department. “Immediately on receiving your letter of 30 ult1—I called on Capn Morris for the information therein required—& yesterday received from him two letters of which the accompanying are true copies.”2

RC and enclosures (DNA: RG 59, ML); letterbook copy (DNA: RG 45, Letters to Secretary of State). RC 1 p.; in a clerk’s hand, signed by Smith; docketed by Wagner. For enclosures, see n. 2.

1PJM-SS description begins Robert J. Brugger et al., eds., The Papers of James Madison: Secretary of State Series (7 vols. to date; Charlottesville, Va., 1986–). description ends , 6:632.

2The first enclosure is a copy of Richard V. Morris to Smith, 10 Apr. 1804 (3 pp.; docketed by Wagner), stating that the Paolina, Lucca Radich, master, with a cargo bound from Malta for Tripoli, was seized by Andrew Sterett on 18 Jan. 1803. With the governors of both Malta and Gibraltar refusing jurisdiction over the case, Morris sent Sterett to the U.S. to report and to seek a decision on the prize. The second enclosure is a copy of Morris to Joseph Pulis, 1 July 1803 (1 p.; docketed by Wagner), requesting Pulis to inform Radich that if he posted security for the ship’s value, it would be surrendered to him. Should Radich decline, Morris authorized Pulis to offer the vessel at public sale and hold the proceeds in escrow until word of a decision was received from the U.S.

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