USA > Kentucky > The political beginnings of Kentucky. A narrative of public events bearing on the history of that state up to the time of its admission into the American Union > Part 6
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Reassured by this action on the part of Virginia, and strengthened by the confident expectation of speedy wel- come as an independent State into the confederation, the people of Kentucky awaited with such patience as they could command the elections which the new Act of Separa- tion had prescribed for August. It required no little for- bearance on the part of leading men to brook executive and legislative action that rebuked their most disinterested efforts for the public good, and fixed upon them public affronts.
Clark had been striving with desperate valor and tenacity of purpose to hold Vincennes and the Illinois. Logan had
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completely seconded him, hurrying back from the Wabash to make an attack on the Mad River towns of the Shawnees. Their incredible toil, patriotic sacrifice of time and estate, and all their splendid services extorted nothing better than a chilling rebuke. No sooner had Patrick Henry vacated the office of Governor (in December, 1786) than the evil days be- gan for George Rogers Clark and the policy he represented.
The new Governor of Virginia (Edmund Randolph) was quickly apprised by private letters from Kentucky that " Gen. George R. Clark had undertaken without authority to raise recruits, nominate officers, and impress provisions in the Dis- trict of Kentucky for the defense of the Post of Vincennes, and had for that purpose also seized the property of Spanish subjects contrary to the laws of nations."1
Gov. Randolph gave all the offense and irritation that was possible in proceeding upon this apparently anonymous information. He wrote to Harry Innes, Attorney General for the District of Kentucky, adverting in very general terms to the complaints that had reached him, and instructing him in vague language "to institute the proper legal inquiries for indicating the infractions of the peace."
The answer of Innes was characteristically frank. He showed how there was not enough of distinct direction in the Governor's letter to warrant any official procedure. But
I Virginia Calendar State Papers, Vol. IV, p. 322, note.
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he improved the occasion to warn the Governor that such persistent neglect (both Federal and on the part of Virginia) to protect the Kentucky frontiers, coupled with complaints against the men who, being so neglected, protected them- selves, and followed by official prosecutions of leaders like Clark and Logan, would almost certainly drive the people of the West to desperation, and he added, for the Executive's information :
"I have just dropped this hint to your Exc'y for matter of reflection; if some step is not taken for protection a little time will prove the truth of the opinion."I
Clark wisely refused to be provoked by the instructions that came from the Attorney General of Virginia directing Innes to institute a criminal prosecution. Logan quietly returned to his farm after a successful campaign, and Innes dexterously avoided the necessity of any official action by reminding the Governor that the Attorney General of Vir- ginia had no authority to instruct Kentucky officials-the right to do so lay solely with the Governor.
The public mind was thus tranquilized, and the elections prescribed for August (1787) were quietly held and members chosen, to the number of five in each county, to represent the people in the convention called to meet in September.
1 Harry Innes to Gov. Randolph, 21st July, 1787. (Virginia Calendar State Papers, Vol. IV, P. 322.)
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The Convention of August, 1787.
The sessions of the September Convention were not marked by excitement or debate. Unanimous declaration was made in favor of separation from Virginia in accordance with the act of the Virginia Legislature. Resolutions were adopted fixing 31st December, 1788, as the period of separa- tion, and the legislature of Virginia was requested to cause an inhabitant of the District to be chosen as one of her dele- gates in the Congress. The two peoples were in accord, the request was promptly granted, and Mr. John Brown (there- tofore a member of the Virginia Legislature as Senator from the counties of Kentucky) became a member of the Virginia delegation in the Continental Congress, specifically repre- senting the District of Kentucky. His long congressional career ran unbroken through the remaining period of the confederation, continued through the period between the adoption of the Constitution and the admission of Kentucky, and covered three consecutive terms as Senator from that State.
All the preliminary steps having thus been accomplished, the people of Kentucky felt certain of their admission to the Union by that formal vote of the Continental Congress which the Act of Separation prescribed should be passed prior to the Ist July, 1788.
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The District had now a voice in the Congress, though its delegate spoke as a representative from Virginia. It was expected that the apathy of politicians in the Atlantic States might be aroused by personal appeals urged by the delegate from the West. Already the Congress had committed itself to the plan of governmental organization of the country west of the Alleghanies. It had passed, on 13th June, 1787, the since famous "Ordinance for the Government of the Terri- tory of the United States northwest of the river Ohio,"1 and provided that out of the territory to which it applied there should be formed "not less than three nor more than five States."? It boldly declared that the most western of these "new States"3 "should extend from the Wabash to the Mississippi."+ The line of Clark's conquest was assumed as the national boundary toward the west. The benefit of all his labors was appropriated, while even yet an envious cor- respondent was reporting to Gov. Randolph that Vincennes was obstinately reinforced and held against Spaniard and Indian by Clark "without authority."5
That wide domain, from the Scioto to the Father of Wa- ters, over which the unaided valor of Virginia's sons in Ken-
I Journals of Congress, Vol. IV, pp. 751, 752, 753, 754.
2 Ordinance of 1787, Article 5.
3 Ordinance of 1787, Article 4.
4 Ordinance of 1787, Article 5.
5 Virginia Calendar State Papers, Vol. IV, p. 322, note.
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tucky had established dominion, was readily absorbed into the new nation that was forming. The policy of acquisition toward the west was declared and conspicuously acted on, and its purpose was made plain. New States were to come into the Union already formed by the original thirteen. Their admission was pledged "whenever any of the said States shall have sixty thousand free inhabitants therein,"' and they were to come into the sisterhood "on an equal footing with the original States in all respects whatever."1
And the great ordinance that so clearly outlined the prin- ciple of expansion in area of new States to come, and the great river as a boundary, had passed into a law by a vote that lacked only Mr. Yates, of New York, to make it unanimous.2
It was fairly assumed by the Kentuckians that Congress stood committed to the passage of the requisite enabling act to perfect their State organization. It was assumed that the long desired separate statehood would soon and smoothly follow.
Increase of Immigration.
The public confidence in this result was evinced by many marks of activity and enterprise. Immigration rapidly in- creased, and its tide distributed from Limestone to the Yellow
I Ordinance of 1787, Article 5.
2 Journal of Congress (13th July, 1787), Vol. IV, p. 754. Massachusetts was the only New England State represented and voting on the Ordinance of 1787, both Dane and Holten voting aye. The subsequent postponement (in 1788) of Kentucky's admis- sion was moved by Mr. Dane, and his action caused much irritation.
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Banks, from the Falls of the Ohio to Hazel Patch, families drawn from the best elements of the eastern populations.
Increase of population had brought with it yearly accu- mulations of the staple products of a purely agricultural community. Tobacco, flour, pork, were now produced in quantities that represented values great enough to enrich the community could a market but be obtained. All eyes were turned toward the broad waterway of the Mississippi; for it was only down its current that transportation of such bulky freight could be had. As early as May, 1782, bold Jacob Yoder had built his great broad-horn at Redstone, on the Monongahela, and as a pioneer of western commerce had safely carried it, freighted with flour, down the Ohio and Mississippi to New Orleans. With the sales of his cargo peltries were bought that had come in tribute to the king, buffalo skins from remote regions beyond the post of St. Louis, in the northern Louisiana, and beaver from the un- named streams of Iowa and Wisconsin. The furs sold at the Havana purchased sugars that were freighted for Phila- delphia; and enriched with the rewards of his expedition the successful adventurer returned across the Alleghanies and past Fort Pitt to his home, where the little hamlet of Bards- town nestled on the banks of the Beech Fork of Salt River.
The voyage of Jacob Yoder and its pecuniary results had fixed all western thought upon the riches that awaited a free
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navigation of the Mississippi and an unobstructed outlet to the sea. Interposing mountains and the adverse current of the Ohio prohibited carrying eastward to Atlantic marts the ponderous barter of the new West. Through hundreds of weary miles, through canebrakes and forests, lay the Wilder- ness Road, the only communication with Virginia, skirting the streams toward their sources, winding through the passes of the Cumberland Mountains, and threading the long furrows that nature has plowed from northeast to southwest between the ranges of the Blue Ridge. Over such a road nothing could be carried except within the limits of a load for a pack- horse.
The people of Kentucky were plainly shut up to a single port and a single route to that port. The port for their commerce was New Orleans; the route was the river Missis- sippi.
Wilkinson's Scheme of Trade with New Orleans.
It needed some years devoted to securing safety and accu- mulating the comforts and conveniences of life to bring the new country to that prosperity that demanded commerce. It was not until 1786 that Wilkinson had practically begun his plan for the establishment of trade with the Spanish ports. Already he had made an impression upon the District by his
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activity and intelligence. His manners were engaging, his oratory fervid and persuasive, and his facility as a writer aston- ishing. From his first appearance at Lexington, in 1784, he had taken an intelligent, interested, and useful part in public affairs. A rumor prevailed that the influence and capital of eastern friends supported his adventure to Kentucky, and he was supposed to be the spokesman of those who were con- trollers of opinion in New York and Philadelphia.
He had come westward for the avowed purpose of repair- ing his shattered fortunes, and launched at once into mer- cantile speculations at Lexington. He became a member of the conventions that were called for the purpose of bringing about the severance of Kentucky from Virginia, and the admission of the new State into the Confederation. He pre- pared the memorial of the Convention of August, 1785, to the legislature of Virginia, as well as the address to the peo- ple of Kentucky put forth at the same time. He was, from the first, ardent in supporting the scheme of a new State, and consistent always in asserting that the navigation of the Mississippi was a right as well as a necessity.
The mercantile operations which Wilkinson conducted showed in their scope and success the directing power of an able mind. His military career had taught him the value of system and the art of employing subordinates. In less than two years he had almost engrossed the profitable trade in
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salt, and through numerous agents bartered for otter and beaver skins far and near. His agents were everywhere, and his untiring vigilance spurred their activity. Success and comparative ease had already been secured by him, when he began in 1786 to mature a great plan for direct trade from the Falls of the Ohio to New Orleans and the outer world.
The story of this commercial venture is important to a right understanding of much of the political and personal controversy that marked the history of Kentucky for twenty years. The current of narrative may profitably be inter- rupted to give it place.
The intelligent mind of Wilkinson soon perceived the gain that would accrue from a trade in tobacco, if permission to introduce it within the Spanish territory could be obtained. Already the increasing crops of three past years had accu- mulated in quantities for which there was neither domestic demand nor an available foreign market. During the year 1786 Wilkinson dispersed his agents throughout the Dis- trict, and through them introduced the hitherto unknown commercial feature now so familiar as "options." He readily secured the right to take to himself in the coming spring, should he choose to do so, great quantities of tobacco at very low prices.
He reserved for himself the delicate and hazardous effort to secure for his contemplated purchases a market in Span-
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ish territory, and for this purpose made his appearance, un- known and unheralded, at New Orleans in June, 1787. His fleet of boats had, by rare good chance or skillful negotia- tion, been brought safely past the upper posts that guarded the banks of the Mississippi, and was safely moored at its destination before the Spanish Governor had an intimation of its coming.
The audacity and self-reliance of Wilkinson was equal to his really large abilities and exceptional accomplishments. He presented himself at once, and upon his own introduc- tion, to Gov. Miro, accompanied only by the corporal of the guard stationed at the landing place." Within a few hours he had formally visited the Intendant Navarro and the Con- tador or revenue agent of the king.
The superior address of Wilkinson prevailed with the Spanish officials. He was permitted to land and sell not less than $35,000 worth of produce, and to return home (taking ship for Philadelphia) with the profits of his voyage.
The means to which he resorted to achieve this almost unhoped for success are but obscurely known. They are differently asserted as one or another of several estimates of Wilkinson have been accepted.
For himself Wilkinson says no more than that his view was to promote his own fortune and to benefit his fellow I Wilkinson's Memoirs, Vol. II, p. 109,
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citizens "by awakening the Spanish Government of Louis- iana to a just sense of its own interests, and thereby to effect the commercial intercourse which was indispensable to the prosperity of the western country."' He half admits what Daniel Clark, in his communication to Timothy Pickering, Secretary of State, asserted in 1798, that adroit intimations were given as to the inflamed state of the public mind, and "that the people of Kentucky were already exasperated at the conduct of the Spaniards in seizing on the property of all who navigated the Mississippi, and if this system was pursued they would very probably, in spite of Congress and the Executive of the United States, take upon themselves to obtain the navigation of the river by force, which they were well able to do-a measure for some time before much dreaded by this [Spanish colonial] government, which had no force to resist them if such a plan was put into execu- tion."?
It can hardly be supposed that so ready and useful an argument was omitted. Traces of its use are found in very diverse quarters.
Oliver Pollock, secret agent of the Congress during the Revolution, charged with important negotiations in pro- curing money and gunpowder, and on terms of confidence
I Wilkinson's Memoirs, Vol. II, p. 110.
2 Daniel Clark to Secretary Pickering, 18th April, 1798. This memorial is reprinted as Appendix 6 to Vol. II of Wilkinson's Memoirs.
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with the officials, deposed that he had it from Gov. Miro that " he had consented for Gen. Wilkinson to bring down tobacco, in hopes to pacify the Kentuckians and people of the western country, to prevent a rupture between Spain and America, and in order to give time for negotiations between the two powers relative to navigation of the Mississippi."1
That the Spanish authorities were entirely alive to the danger of an irregular and overpowering attack from the western pioneers appears from State papers emanating from able and judicious officials. Navarro, the Intendant, wrote to his government as early as 12th February, 1787:
"The powerful enemies we have to fear in this province are not the Eng- lish but the Americans, whom we must oppose by active and sufficient measures. . . . There is no time to be lost. Mexico is on the other side of the Mississippi, in the vicinity of the already formidable establishments of the Americans." 2
Miro earnestly entreated the President of the Council of the Indies, in March, 1787, for an outlay of large sums in fortifications.3
I Deposition of Oliver Pollock (before a court-martial at Washington), 8th June, 1808, concluding paragraph. This deposition is reprinted as Appendix I to Vol. II, Wilkin- son's Memoirs. It was Pollock who procured from Galvez, or with his assistance, the powder which Col. Gibson brought in keel boats up the Mississippi and Ohio to Fort Pitt, and which Linn and Smith assisted in carrying around the portage at the Falls of the Ohio, in 1777. (Gayarre, History of Louisiana, Spanish Domination, 109.)
2 Navarro's Despatch of 12th February, 1787. Gayarre, History Louisiana, Spanish Domination, 182.
3 Miro to Marquis La Sonora, March, 1787. Gayarre, History Louisiana, Spanish Domination, 184.
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And after Wilkinson had (in September, 1787) left New Orleans, the long uneasiness, doubtless newly aroused by the inuendos of the adventurer, drew from Navarro another and even more earnest appeal.
Commenting upon what he considered the obvious de- cline of the Province of Louisiana, he did not hesitate to assign, as one of the principal reasons, the apprehensions produced by the threats of the Americans. He wrote thus :
"It is necessary to keep in mind that between this province and the ter- ritories of New Spain there is nothing but the feeble barrier of the Missis- sippi, which is as easy to pass as it is impossible to protect. . It is an . incontestable axiom that every remedy ought to be proportioned to the evil to which it is to be applied, and the danger which threatens us from the proximity of the Americans is of such a nature that it will soon be too late to ward it off, if we do not now guard against it by most efficacious meas- ures. Even if New Spain should never be the object of the ambition of the Americans, they ought to be for us a cause of constant distrust and apprehension, because they are not unaware that the river de Arcas is not distant from New Mexico, and that there are mines in the Ouachita district. These are powerful motives for a nation restless, poor, ambitious, and capa- ble of the most daring enterprises." 1
The mutterings that reached Natchez and New Orleans were true indications of the irritation that prevailed in Ken- tucky. Navarro rightly estimated the sentiments of the population that looked southward for its mart. It was a race
I Navarro's Despatch of 10th October, 1787, as quoted by Gayarre, History Louis- iana, Spanish Domination, pp. 189, 190.
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of men inured to war, skillful in the use of arms, accustomed to campaigns in which the care of the quartermaster counted as the very least, and characterized by a singular and prac- tical mixture of individual self-reliance and mutual support. It was accurately described in Navarro's despatch as
" Una nacion inquieta, pobre, ambiciosa, y arriscada."1
To this apprehension of incursion, which Wilkinson adroitly fanned, was added another fact that disquieted the Spaniard.
Already John Fitch had demonstrated the principles of steam navigation, and by practical test upon the Delaware had shown that the current of great rivers could be sur- mounted. He had joined his old comrade of Valley Forge, Jacob Yoder, at Bardstown, and discoursed with him of the great stream of the Mississippi, and the possibility of stem- ming it with returning boats. His experience of 1782 led Yoder to flatly deny that the dream of his inventor friend could ever be realized in a boat propelled by any mechanism against the current of the great river. It was, he said, like darting straws against the wind.2 But Fitch, in the inter-
1 Navarro, Despatch of 10th October, 1787.
2 Fitch and Yoder had known each other in the army. The settlement of his friend at Bardstown probably attracted Fitch to that place, and they remained closely intimate till Fitch's death. Yoder's slave, Harry (who died at a great age), remembered Fitch well, and often related to the present writer stories of his eccentricities. Fitch's temperament was very variable; he was alternately elated with hope and profoundly depressed. He became in his later years quite intemperate. He was unmarried; had simple habits and few wants, even for those simple times, and it is a mistake to suppose that he suffered want or neglect in his last days. His grave is at Bardstown, Ky.
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vals of his work as a surveyor, eked out with mill-building, became convinced that the necessary power could be applied through paddle-wheels, and he hastened eastward to vend a map of the West, which he had himself engraved, and printed with the rude appliances of a cider press. Supported by this, he devoted himself to the problem of navigation. It was in September, 1785, that this uncouth, intelligent, and self- reliant man presented himself to Gardoqui, the Agent of the Spanish King near the United States, and then at Philadel- phia. It is evident that if he had indeed then perfected his idea of applying steam to the propulsion of vessels, he sin- gularly failed to communicate it to Gardoqui, though the occasion would naturally have brought it under discussion.
The intelligent account of the western country and its resources given by Fitch, and the maps he exhibited, enlisted Gardoqui's attention. The scheme of navigation by power applied to paddle wheels struck him as of sufficient impor- tance to be brought to the consideration of his government, and in his next despatch an account of the invention, and two copies of Fitch's map were sent to Spain."
I The Spanish Minister, Gardoqui, in his despatch to Marquis La Sonora, President of the Council of the Indies, No. 19, of 3d September, 1785, writes: "By chance I have met a person named John Fitch. a native of these States; a landed proprietor, and resident in the new settlement of Kentucky, with whom I have had much conver- sation. I inclose two copies of map, which he has engraved, of the ten new States that are contemplated." In a later despatch ( No. 30, 21st October, 1785) he adds, con- cerning Fitch : " From his conversation and the replies he made to my numerous inqui- ries, I clearly perceive that these new populations (in Kentucky) depend upon the free
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One of the two copies of Fitch's map thus transmitted was, along with a copy of Gardoqui's despatch, promptly forwarded from Madrid to Count Galvez, just promoted from Governor of New Orleans to the splendid rank of Viceroy of Mexico and Captain General of Louisiana and the Flori- das. The significance of the new idea was at once recog- nized by that truly great man, and impressed itself upon his subordinates, Miro, Navarro, and others, and the announce- ment not long delayed that Fitch had perfected his applica- tion of steam power confirmed the already accepted omen that the day was passing for occluded streams. The restless people of Kentucky were now furnished with the coming solution of their commercial isolation.
All things were ripe for Wilkinson's fortunate experiment in trade. Every consideration of policy forbade confiscation of his goods or molestation of his person. Though he was but an unofficial personage, he preserved the military air of former service, and magnified his importance by every art of
navigation of the Mississippi, although they are confronted by their inability to over- come the current, for in certain seasons of the year it is impossible. . . . . The same person from whom I have derived this information has invented a vessel that, by means of a wheel fixed in its center (which, according to his explanation, resembles a Spanish 'noria' in its plan), and worked by a horse, moves against the current." From this it would seem questionable whether Fitch had made his application of steam to navi- gation in September, 1785, else he would certainly have mentioned the fact to Gardo- qui. If the invention had been made he could hardly have valued it. The improve- ment of "navigation of boats by horses" was apparently the project of Fitch. He memorialized the Kentucky Legislature for aid in 1798, describing his invention in those words. (Journal, H. R. of Kentucky, January 12, 1798, p. 35.)
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