1To Thomas Jefferson from William H. Cabell, 10 June 1806 (Jefferson Papers)
My brother Joseph C Cabell who will deliver you this letter has just returned from Europe where he has been for several years past in pursuit of health & information. I take the liberty to make him known to you; & to assure you I shall feel myself much gratified by any attentions or civilities you may do him the honor to shew him during his short stay in Washington I have the honor to be with...
2To Thomas Jefferson from William H. Cabell, 17 July 1806 (Jefferson Papers)
This will be presented to you by Mr. Woodward, who will shortly pass through Washington on his way to New-York—Permit me to introduce him to your acquaintance as a gentleman of talents and respectability. Any attentions which you may extend to Mr. Woodward, will be acknowledged as a favor conferred on me. I have the honor to be with the highest respect Sir yr. Obt. Servt. DLC : Papers of...
3To Thomas Jefferson from William H. Cabell, 21 January 1807 (Jefferson Papers)
I laid before the General Assembly of Virginia the letter which I had the honor to receive from you enclosing the Act of Congress for laying out and making a road from Cumberland in the State of Maryland to the State of Ohio, together with the partial report of the Commissioners: and I have now the honor to enclose you the Copy of an Act of the General Assembly, giving the assent of this State...
4To Thomas Jefferson from William H. Cabell, 22 January 1807 (Jefferson Papers)
Mr. William McKindley, a member of the General Assembly from the County of Ohio, having informed me of his intention to return to his County by way of the City of Washington, I have requested him to take charge of a letter to you enclosing the copy of an Act of the General Assembly “giving the assent of this State to an Act of Congress for laying out and making a road from the river Patowmac...
5To Thomas Jefferson from William H. Cabell, 25 June 1807 (Jefferson Papers)
I have the honor to enclose you a copy of a letter this morning received from General Mathews covering the Copy of another which he had written to the Secretary of State; and also a Copy of a letter, without Signature, which I this morning received from Hampton. They State the daring insult offered to our Flagg, in the illegal and savage attack made by the British Ship of War Leopard on the...
6From Thomas Jefferson to William H. Cabell, 29 June 1807 (Jefferson Papers)
Your favor by express was safely recieved on Saturday night, and I am thankful to you for the attention of which it is a proof. considering the general & state governments as co-operators in the same holy concerns, the interest & happiness of our country, the interchange of mutual aid is among the most pleasing of the exercises of our duty. Captn. Gordon, the 2d in command of the Chesapeake...
7To Thomas Jefferson from William H. Cabell, 6 July 1807 (Jefferson Papers)
I received by Express last night the copy of a correspondence between Commodore Douglass and the Mayor of the Borough of Norfolk, together with information that the British Squadron had taken its station in Hampton Roads at the mouth of Elizabeth river, for the declared purpose of preventing any Vessel from going to or from Norfolk—I should have taken measures to give you early information of...
8From Thomas Jefferson to William H. Cabell, 8 July 1807 (Jefferson Papers)
You will have recieved from the Secretary at War a letter requesting that the quota of the state of Virginia of 100,000. militia be immediately organised and put in readiness for service at the shortest warning; but that they be not actually called out until further requisition. the menacing attitude which the British ships of war have taken in Hampton road, the actual blockade of Norfolk, and...
9To Thomas Jefferson from William H. Cabell, 10 July 1807 (Jefferson Papers)
I have received your letter of the 8th. authorizing the Executive of this State to call into immediate service such a portion of the Militia as might be judged necessary & most convenient, for the defence of Norfolk, & the Gunboats at Hampton & in Mathews, & for the protection of the Country against the hostile acts of the British Squadron now blockading Norfolk—You will before this, have...
10To Thomas Jefferson from William H. Cabell, 15 July 1807 (Jefferson Papers)
I do myself the pleasure to enclose for your perusal, a copy of a letter this morning received from General Mathews, together with copies of certain other papers accompanying it, giving the latest intelligence from Norfolk—you will perceive that the British Vessels have left Hampton Roads, but it does not appear from any information afforded by the enclosed papers, that they have left our...
11From Thomas Jefferson to William H. Cabell, 16 July 1807 (Jefferson Papers)
Your letter of the 10th. has been recieved, and I note what is said on the provision which ought to be made by us for the militia in the field. an arrangement by the Secretary at war to meet certain other persons at N. York to concert a plan of defence for that place has occasioned necessarily his temporary absence from this place, and there is no person sufficiently informed to take the...
12From Thomas Jefferson to William H. Cabell, 19 July 1807 (Jefferson Papers)
Your letter of the 15th. was recieved yesterday, and the opinion you have given to General Matthews against allowing any intercourse between the British Consul & the ships of his nation remaining in our waters in defiance of our authority, is entirely approved. certainly while they are conducting themselves as enemies defacto, intercourse should be permitted only, as between enemies, by flags...
13To Thomas Jefferson from William H. Cabell, 19 July 1807 (Jefferson Papers)
Since my letter to you of the 15th. positive information has been received that all the British Vessels had left the waters of the Chesapeake, and had taken their station off Cape Henry, but still within our jurisdictional limits. This apparent respect to the authority of the Government, added to the assurances of General Mathews that the force now under his command, exclusive of the...
14To Thomas Jefferson from William H. Cabell, 20 July 1807 (Jefferson Papers)
I am sorry that the information I must now give is not calculated to strengthen those hopes which might have been excited by my last that the British Squadron intended to respect the authority of our Government—I enclose for your perusal a copy of a letter this morning received from General Mathews, together with copies of his instructions to Captains Shepard & Taylor, and also of the report...
15To Thomas Jefferson from William H. Cabell, 22 July 1807 (Jefferson Papers)
Yours of the 19th. was received by yesterdays mail—On the order for discharging that portion of the Militia that had been sent to Norfolk from this place and Petersburg, some farther explanation is necessary than what I had time to give when I wrote to you before on that subject. That information should be asked from you, and that a decision should be made before time has been given to impart...
16From Thomas Jefferson to William H. Cabell, 24 July 1807 (Jefferson Papers)
Yours of the 20th. has been duly recieved. the relation in which we stand with the British naval force within our waters is so new, that differences of opinion are not to be wondered at respecting the captives who are the subject of your letter. are they insurgents against the authority of the laws? are they public enemies acting under the orders of their sovereign? or will it be more correct...
17From Thomas Jefferson to William H. Cabell, 27 July 1807 (Jefferson Papers)
The Secretary at War having returned from New York, we have immediately taken up the question respecting the discharge of the militia which was the subject of your two last letters, and which I had wished might remain undecided a few days. from what we have learnt of the conduct of the British squadron in the Chesapeake since they have retired from Hampton roads, we suppose that until orders...
18From Thomas Jefferson to William H. Cabell, 31 July 1807 (Jefferson Papers)
I shall tomorrow set out for Monticello, considering the critical state of things, it has been thought better, during my stay there, to establish a daily conveyance of a mail from Fredericksburg to Monticello. this enables me to hear both from the North & South every day. should you have occasion then to communicate with me, your letters can come to me daily by being put into the...
19To Thomas Jefferson from William H. Cabell, 31 July 1807 (Jefferson Papers)
Your favor of the 24th. was duly received, and I immediately gave to General Mathews the necessary instructions for permitting the return of the Captives. I have not yet heard of the manner in which he has executed them. I had not supposed that the Proclamation, altho it authorized and required the use of force, had carried us quite so far into a state of even qualified war, as to justify the...
20To Thomas Jefferson from William H. Cabell, 5 August 1807 (Jefferson Papers)
Yours of the 31st. of July has been duly received, and I shall by this days mail give the instructions which you require, so as to ensure the most direct information as to the movements of the British Squadron—The papers from Norfolk represent them as being quiet at present, but I have not received any letters from General Mathews for several days—I have not heard from him since he received my...
21From Thomas Jefferson to William H. Cabell, 7 August 1807 (Jefferson Papers)
Your letters of July 31. & Aug. 5. were recieved yesterday. the ground taken, in conformity with the act of Congress, of considering, as public enemies, British armed vessels in, or entering, our waters, gives us the benefit of a system of rules, sanctioned by the practice of nations in a state of war, and consequently enabling us with certainty & satisfaction to solve the different cases...
22To Thomas Jefferson from William H. Cabell, 7 August 1807 (Jefferson Papers)
I enclose for your perusal the only letters I have received from Norfolk since those forwarded to you by Mr. Coles—My letter by him was written in very great haste, and amidst much interruption, and since reflecting more maturely on the subject, I find that Mr. Tazewell has not, in his construction of my letters on the subject of intercourse, differed so widely from what was intended, as I at...
23From Thomas Jefferson to William H. Cabell, 9 August 1807 (Jefferson Papers)
In my letter of the 7th. I informed you that on consultation at Washington it had been concluded best to commit the whole business of flags to Capt Decatur. I now find that I had not recollected our conclusion correctly, and that it had been understood that the commanding officers, by land & water should have equal authority to license the sending & recieving flags: which is not only proper,...
24From Thomas Jefferson to William H. Cabell, 11 August 1807 (Jefferson Papers)
Your favor of the 7th. is recieved. it asks my opinion on several points of law arising out of the act of Congress for accepting the service of 30,000 volunteers. altho’ your own opinion, & those of some of your counsellors, more recent in the habits of legal investigation, would be a safer guide for you than mine, unassisted by my ordinary & able associates, yet I shall frankly venture my...
25To Thomas Jefferson from William H. Cabell, 11 August 1807 (Jefferson Papers)
your letter of the 7th was received yesterday morning. My last, by the way of Fredericksburg, will have corrected a mistake into which I had fallen in my letter by Mr. Coles, on the subject of Mr. Tazewell’s report—That mistake, however, was productive of no inconvenience, as it was discovered before I wrote to General Mathews; to whom, no instructions have been given variant from those I have...
26To Thomas Jefferson from William H. Cabell, 11 August 1807 (Jefferson Papers)
I am this moment favored with yours of the 9th, but I fear the direct mail to Charlottesville is already closed—No inconvenience will arise from the circumstance mentioned in your letter because as I understood that Capt. Decatur was not in Norfolk. I did not state to General Mathews that he no longer had the power to receive and regulate the intercourse by flag with the British Squadron—Your...
27To Thomas Jefferson from William H. Cabell, 12 August 1807 (Jefferson Papers)
I send you the letter which I received this morning from Norfolk—I regret that the Norfolk mail does not arrive in time for me to send you the letters the same morning by the Fredericksburg Mail—I have written to General Mathews for copies of the papers referred to in Capt: Taylors report, which shall be forwarded to you without delay—I have not seen, nor have I been informed of the nature of...
28To Thomas Jefferson from William H. Cabell, 13 August 1807 (Jefferson Papers)
I am sorry it is not in my power to give you any information from Norfolk, as I received no letters by this mornings mail. I am with the highest respect Sir yr. Ob. St DLC : Papers of Thomas Jefferson.
29To Thomas Jefferson from William H. Cabell, 14 August 1807 (Jefferson Papers)
There was no mail this morning beyond Petersburg. I have therefore again to regret that I can give you no information from Norfolk. Should I receive any letters of importance tomorrow morning, I will send them by express to overtake the Fredericksburg mail, which generally leaves this place before the arrival of the Norfolk mail— I am with the highest respect Sir yr. Ob. St. DLC : Papers of...
30To Thomas Jefferson from William H. Cabell, 16 August 1807 (Jefferson Papers)
I have the honor to enclose you General Mathew’s letters of the 12th & 13th of this month, which were both received at a very late hour yesterday morning. Not knowing whether you take the Norfolk Ledger, I take the liberty to send you a paragraph from that paper, which gives information very interesting if true— I am with the highest respect Sir yr. Ob. St DLC : Papers of Thomas Jefferson.