To James Madison from William C. C. Claiborne, 18 November 1806
From William C. C. Claiborne
NO. November 18, 1806.
Sir
In a private letter to the President of the U. S.: under date of the 5 instant I expressed to him my apprehension that certain persons were forming plans inimical to the U. S.1 I am now advised by a confidential letter that the Union of the States is seriously menaced and that the storm will probably break out in New Orleans; and “that in this plot thousands are concerned.” My informant is a man of distinction but for the present I am not at liberty to mention him.2 If this be object of the conspirators the delegate to Congress from this territory is one of the leaders;3 He has often said that the Union could not last and that had he children, he would impress early on their minds the expediency of a seperation between the atlantic & Western States: Doctor Watkins & Mr. J. W. Gurley have heard these sentiments expressed by that gentleman.
If there is no cause for apprehending a conspiracy and of a serious nature I am deceived and by a man in whom the Govt. has high confidence. Whatever dangers may arise be assured of my fidelity to my country! I have the honor to be, Sir, very respectfully, your Mo. obt Servt.
William C. C. Claiborne
RC, two copies (DLC: Burr Conspiracy Collection); letterbook copy (Ms-Ar: Claiborne Executive Journal, vol. 16). Both RCs in a clerk’s hand, signed by Claiborne; encoded by Claiborne’s clerk in a State Department code; key not found. First RC, marked “(Duplicate),” postmarked at Charleston, S.C., 13 Dec. Italicized words are those that were encoded; copytext is Wagner’s interlinear decoding. Second RC postmarked at New Orleans, 20 Nov. Claiborne probably sent the duplicate by a private carrier to the Charleston, South Carolina, post office. Southern and western U.S. postal routes were notoriously inefficient, with long delays in service in the fall and winter of 1806. Few people trusted the New Orleans post office with sensitive information, convinced that it would either miscarry or be intercepted by government officials or Burr’s spies (Lewis, The Burr Conspiracy, 19–22, 25–26).
1. Claiborne to Thomas Jefferson, 5 Nov. 1806 (Ms-Ar: Claiborne Executive Journal, vol. 16). Only fragments remain in this part of the journal, with the bottom half of each page missing. The extant portion reads: “I observe by the Western Papers that Colo: Burr is in the Western States, and that a public Dinner was lately given to him at Nashville; I know not the views of this Gentleman, but I fear they are political, and of a kind the most injurious.” On the next page of this journal is what may be a continuation of this letter: “[…] Ruin; Mr. Daniel Clark is at the head of the Party; he has already had recourse to various means to effect his object, and is still true to his purpose. In the northern papers, there are Extracts of Letters from this Territory and dated at different places, which represent my Acts as feeble, and my popularity as lost forever; this is one of Mr. Clark’s artifices; the Letters are all written by himself, and are replete with falsehoods.”
2. Claiborne referenced a 12 November 1806 letter he received from James Wilkinson stating that “within Six days from the present, the President will be fully apprized of the plot, which implicates thousands and among them some of your particular friends as well as my own” (printed in Rowland, Claiborne Letter Books, 4:55–56).
3. Daniel Clark was elected the delegate of Orleans Territory in May 1806. Clark, who had long-standing business relations with Wilkinson, was suspected by many of their contemporaries of involvement in Burr’s schemes. Clark and Claiborne had openly disdained one another since Clark sought the territory’s governorship (Bradley, Interim Appointment, 337; Michael Wohl, “Not Yet Saint nor Sinner: A Further Note on Daniel Clark,” Louisiana History 24 [1983]: 195–200).