RC (DLC); at foot of text: “Thomas Jefferson Esqr. Vice Presidt. of the United States”; endorsed by TJ as received 30 May 1797 and so recorded in SJL. Enclosure: see below.

Sebastian Bauman (d. 1803) had been the postmaster of New York City since 1789. As an artillery officer during the American Revolution he had risen in rank from captain of a New York company to major in the Continental artillery (Heitman, Register description begins Francis B. Heitman, Historical Register of Officers of the Continental Army during the War of the Revolution, April, 1775, to December, 1793, new ed., Washington, D.C., 1914 description ends , 92; Robert J. Stets, comp., Postmasters and Postoffices of the United States, 1782–1811 [Lake Oswego, Ore., 1994], 184; Bauman to TJ, 30 Apr. 1802).

The pamphlet, published in New York in 1797 and entitled A Statement, Explanatory of the Resignation of the Officers of the Regiment of Artillery, of the City and County of New-York, documented the officers’ recent unanimous resignation to protest restrictions on the promotion of artillery officers that caused Bauman, the regiment’s lieutenant colonel and commandant, to be passed over for promotion within the militia to the rank of brigadier. See Evans, description begins Charles Evans, Clifford K. Shipton, and Roger P. Bristol, comps., American Bibliography: A Chronological Dictionary of all Books, Pamphlets and Periodical Publications Printed in the United States of America from … 1639 … to … 1820, Chicago and Worcester, Mass., 1903–59, 14 vols. description ends No. 32568.