1. In a letter dated 5 Sept., Pickering informed Rhode Island governor Arthur Fenner: “The President … ever desirous of manifesting the fairness and impartiality of his administration, was not in haste to decide upon the conduct of Captn Rodham Home.” Home had demonstrated “menace and insulting demands” in his letter of 31 July to British vice-consul Thomas William Moore, which Moore then communicated to Fenner. The administration had contacted British minister George Hammond and, after his departure, his chargé des affaires “with an intimation of the President’s intention to wait a reasonable time for the counter representation of Captain Home and such explanations from him and Mr Moore as they should think proper to offer.”

Time, however, had passed with “no satisfactory explanations.” Moreover, Home had continued his aggressive actions. Therefore, the president had “decided on the measures which his duty requires him to take, to vindicate the Sovereignty and rights of the United States.” Pickering asked Fenner to send word to Home of GW’s demand that the captain “immediately remove from a station within the jurisdiction of the United States, where he has violated and continues to violate their rights: and that he forthwith liberate the three seamen … William Jones, John Caton and George White, whom with an armed force he, on the 24th of the last month seized and took from on board the ship Anne, John Tillinghast master, then sailing within the jurisdiction of the United States, and carried on board the said ship Africa, where they are detained.” Fenner also should inform Home that, as of forty-eight hours after the captain received these demands, all contact between U.S. citizens and the Africa would be “forbidden.” The secretary enclosed GW’s revocation of Moore’s exequator.

Later that same day, Pickering sent a confidential letter to Fenner in which he referred the governor to section 8 of “An Act in addition to the act for the punishment of certain crimes against the United States,” passed 5 June 1794 (1 Stat. description begins Richard Peters, ed. The Public Statutes at Large of the United States of America, from the Organization of the Government in 1789, to March 3, 1845 . . .. 8 vols. Boston, 1845-67. description ends 381–84). “Although the President cannot by means of any military force … directly compel the Africa ‘to depart the United States,’ yet doubtless, under that law the militia may be called forth, to execute such measures, to restrain all intercourse with the Africa, as may render her situation uneasy; and thus indirectly compel her departure. Such use of the militia, should it be necessary, the President authorises and desires you to make” (all in DNA: RG 59, Domestic Letters).

2. Thomas William Moore (c.1737–1799) was a New York Loyalist who served as a captain in DeLancey’s brigade during the Revolutionary War. He was appointed as the British vice-consul for Rhode Island in 1793. Pickering’s letter to Moore of 5 Sept. stated: “It having been ascertained that on the 2d of August 1795, you transmitted to the Governor of the State of Rhode Island, a letter dated the 31st of July addressed to you by Captain Rodham Home, Commander of the British ship of war Africa, the contents whereof you saw were highly indecent and unjustifiable: as, unrestrained by the respect you owed the Government by whose permission you exercised your office, you have thus cooperated with Captain Home, in grossly insulting its authority: the President of the United States has judged it to be no longer proper that you should be permitted to exercise the functions or powers of a vice Consul within the United States.

“You will, therefore, receive inclosed a copy of the letters patent, which have been issued for the revoking the Exequatur, heretofore granted to you, and which will be made public” (all in DNA: RG 59, Domestic Letters). A letter-book copy of GW’s revocation of Moore’s exequatur is also in DNA: RG 59, Domestic Letters. It was printed in the Providence Gazette, 12 Sept., and other newspapers.

3. Pickering’s letter of 5 Sept. to Phineas Bond stated: “Former communications from this Department have expressed the intentions of the Government to wait a reasonable period for such explanations of the conduct of Captain Rodham Home, commander of the British ship of war Africa, and of mr Moore the British vice Consul at Rhode Island, as they might think proper to offer relative to the injuries against the rights and dignity of the United States, which were the subjects of those communications.” As “no satisfactory explanations have been given. . . . the eventual measures, announced to you respecting Captain Home, will now be taken, together with such others, as his subsequent aggressions against the United States, appear to demand; and of which the inclosed protest of John Tillinghast, George W. Page, Samuel Almy, and Daniel Young, will give you information.”

After listing for Bond the measures to be taken against Home, Pickering informed him of GW’s revocation of Moore’s exequatur and added: “These proceedings of Captain Home and mr Moore are considered by the President as the unauthorized acts of individual officers, and that they will not interrupt that harmony and good understanding, which it is the disposition of the Government to cultivate and maintain between the two nations” (DNA: RG 59, Domestic Letters).

When Pickering wrote to Pierre-Auguste Adet on 5 Sept., he informed the minister that GW had permitted time for Home to explain his actions. Nothing had arrived, and it appeared Home had “repeated his aggressions.” Therefore, GW “determined to pursue such measures as are in his power, to vindicate the Sovereignty, and rights of the United States.” Pickering described the instructions sent to Governor Fenner, except those referring to military force. Pickering also noted that he would send “a full statement” of Home’s conduct to the U.S. minister in London (DNA: RG 59, Domestic Letters).

4. Pickering wrote to William Allen Deas, at this time the senior U.S. diplomat at the British court, on 12 Sept. (not identified). He again wrote to Deas two days later and described the efforts of Home to capture the Medusa (DNA: RG 59, Diplomatic and Consular Instructions, 1791–1801).