ALS, DNA: RG 59, Miscellaneous Letters.

For background to British occupation of the posts on northern Lake Champlain, see Thomas Jefferson to GW, 5 June, n.2. For the administration’s policy “to repel force by force” in order to bring the matter forcibly to the attention of the British government and compel “propositions to an amicable settlement,” see Jefferson to GW, 27 Mar., GW to Jefferson, 1 April 1791. Dissatisfied with the boundaries drawn by the Treaty of Paris of 1783, the British desired to limit American settlement along the Canadian border in order to pursue future opportunities to redraw the line, especially in the Old Northwest, where they hoped to establish an Indian buffer state. In northeastern New York and northern Vermont their policy was to warn off potential American settlers from disputed areas. In February 1791 the governor of Quebec complained to the British commander at Point au Fer on Lake Champlain that the Canadian border had been “destroyed” in 1775 and 1776, and that “there is no frontier. When a frontier treaty shall be formed, all foreign improvements on the Canadian side will be lost. Those who complied with the warning will be satisfied; those who stealthily made a pitch, as they call it, will probably be punished more than could be wished by the loss of their time, labour, and expense. This is to be repeated to them from time to time with civility and good humour” (Lord Dorchester to Lieutenant Colonel Buckeridge, 14 Feb. 1791, calendared in Brymner, Report on Canadian Archives, 1890, description begins Douglas Brymner. Report on Canadian Archives . . . 1890. (Being an Appendix to Report of the Minister of Agriculture.). Ottawa, 1891. description ends Q. 50–1, pp. 283–84). In writing to other post commanders, Dorchester’s military secretary stressed “that the people shall always be treated by the troops in a gentle, friendly manner” and “to be told civilly to remove and warned of the loss they will sustain if they refuse to obey the warning” (Francis Le Maistre to British commanders, 14 Feb., 8 April 1791, ibid., 284, 286). Reacting to Lord Dorchester’s dispatches of June 1791, Lord Grenville instructed George Hammond on 2 Sept.: “You will represent, that it is absolutely necessary both in point of Justice and from the regard which is due in return for the friendly line of conduct now adopted by His Majesty that no steps should be taken by the American Governments to alter the relative situation of the two Countries, such as it now exists de facto, pending the Negotiation to which your Mission will give rise. And therefore, that every degree of discouragement should be given [by] those Governments as well as [by] His Majesty’s officers to any Americans who may under these circumstances attempt to settle themselves within the limits of the Country now occupied by the British. Some recent Circumstances of this nature which have occurred make it particularly necessary that you should urge this point, and I am persuaded that if the American Governments are really desirous to promote a good understanding, it will not be difficult for you to convince them how repugnant it is to such an object to suffer points of so much magnitude to be brought into discussion by the Enterprises of Individuals, instead of being made the Subject of temperate and friendly negotiation between the two Governments” (Mayo, Instructions to British Ministers, description begins Bernard Mayo, ed. Instructions to the British Ministers to the United States, 1791–1812. Washington, D.C., 1941. In Annual Report of the American Historical Association for the Year 1936, vol. 3. description ends 13–17).