To James Madison from William Davis Robinson, 28 December 1820
From William Davis Robinson
Washington December 28th. 1820
Sir,
I take the liberty of sending you by mail a volume of my memoirs of the Mexican Revolution,1 which I request you will do me the honor to accept, and I shall be much gratified to learn that any thing containd therein compensates for the trouble of perusing it.
My career in life has not afforded me many opportunities of exploring the walks of literature, hence the style of the volume in question may be objectionable to the eye of the Critic, but as I disclaim all pretensions to the character of an Author, I trust my fellow Citizens will view with indulgence any errors in point of literary composition. Respectfully I have the honor to subscribe myself Your obedt. Servt.
Wm. Davis Robinson2
RC (DLC). Docketed by JM.
1. William Davis Robinson, Memoirs of the Mexican Revolution: Including a Narrative of the Expedition of General Xavier Mina. … (Philadelphia, 1820; Shoemaker 3035).
2. William Davis Robinson (b. 1774) was a Philadelphia merchant and adventurer with commercial ties to Caracas and other places in Latin America. In 1816 he entered Mexico to lend his support to the revolutionaries but was soon imprisoned by the Spanish authorities and held for three years, first at Vera Cruz, and then at Ceuta in North Africa (Eduardo Enrique Ríos, Robinson y su aventura en México, 2d ed. [Mexico City, 1958], 5, 27, 38, 40; Samuel Flagg Bemis, John Quincy Adams and the Foundations of American Foreign Policy [New York, 1949], 488 n. 17).