USA > Louisiana > History of Louisiana, the Spanish domination > Part 31
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401
MORALES' DESPATCH.
"the Governor thinks himself superior in nautical know- ledge to the best marine officers. These things have produced between us sufficiently bitter and disagreeable discussions, and the Governor goes so far as to pretend, that the Intendant must submit to all his caprices, with- out having one word to say, when he, the Governor, treats with contempt all the reasons which are laid be- fore him to avoid drawing his Majesty into fruitless expenses. For these reasons, I think it indispensably necessary that the King should do one of these two things: either confine the powers of this Governor within the limits which his Majesty may deem proper to pre- scribe, or, taking into consideration the information I have given as to the condition of the royal treasury in this colony, supply me with the means of satisfying the exigencies of this officer."
Morales, among the sources of unnecessary expenses which he enumerates, mentions the establishment* of couriers between Pensacola and Savannah, the costs of which he has not as yet been able to ascertain. "But, so far," says he, "they have been of no further use than procuring gazettes from that section of the country ; and we all know what faith is to be put in the news to be found in the northern gazettes, in which any one may insert what he pleases for four reals."
On the 30th of April, 1799, Morales wrote to his government to acknowledge having received from the Viceroy of New Spain $434,238, to pay the expenses of the preceding year, 1798, and also $50,000, which were due for the budget of 1797.
The misunderstanding between Gayoso and Morales
Los correos que van y vienen de Pansacola á Savannah, que aun no sé á quanto asciende el gasto. Solo produjó hasta ahora gacetas de aquel parage, y es sabido al credito que puede darse á las noticias de las gacetas del norte, donde por qua ::: reales cada uno puede poner lo que mas acomoda á sus ideas.
26
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402
MORALES' COMPLAINTS.
went on daily increasing, and, in a despatch of the 31st of May, the Intendant observed,* that, considering it was no longer possible for him to continue to be in a state of open warfare against the Governor, he found himself under the necessity of supplicating his Majesty to relieve him from discharging the functions of Inten- dant, and to transfer him to some other point of his Ma- jesty's dominions in America. He then goes on giving " minute and positive proofs," as he says, " of the violence and tyranny exercised towards him by the Governor, who transgresses that moderation and urbanityt with which those in authority ought to be treated, who insults and threatens the intendancy, and commits all the ex- cesses which are recited."
The Federal Government had ordered Wilkinson to Washington, to confer with him upon all the important matters relating to the West and to Louisiana, on which he was supposed to possess the most extensive informa- tion. He accordingly descended the Mississippi from Natchez, and departed from New Orleans for New York. In a despatch of the 10th of July, Morales speaks of Wil- kinson's late visit to that town, and communicates to his government all the intelligence he has been able to ob- tain in relation to the political views of the United States concerning Louisiana, by pumping the American general. " Concealing," says Morales, " what we know of his reprehensible deportment towards us, we have given him as kind and as favorable a welcome as his
* Dice que no siendole posible por mas tiempo el continuar en pugna abierta con aquel gobernador, se ve en la precision de suplicar á S. M. se sirva relevarle del cargo de intendente y trasladarle á otro punto de los dominios de America.
+ Contraviniendo á lo que prescriben la moderacion y urbanidad con que deben ser tratadas las personas constituidas en mando, insultando y amenazando á la intendencia, y cometiendo los demas excesos que refiere.
¿ - Disimulandolo que sabemos su reprensible manejo con respeto á nosotros, lo hemos obsequiado en los mejores terminos que permite el pais, y exigia su ca. racter, &c., &c.
403
MORALES AND WILKINSON.
rank required and our means permitted in this country. On the eve of his departure, I prevailed upon him to furnish me with a copy of the instructions which he had left with Major Cushing, his successor, as to the manner in which this officer was to demean himself towards the Spaniards. They simply amount to this,-that the American officers are, by all possible means, to cultivate our friendship and to preserve the good understanding which so fortunately exists between the two powers.
" It would not be justifiable to draw favorable or un- favorable conclusions from the mere outward show of such demonstrations .* But, as there are certain moments when the individuals of that nation are in the habit of opening their hearts, I will not conceal from your Excel- lency, that, in those moments of effusion, when the General was with persons who possessed all his confi- dence, he manifested the same sentiments which I com- municated in my confidential despatch of the 31st of May last, No. 23. In a few words, the policy of the United States may be said to be reduced to these two points : 1º-to prevent France and England taking pos- session of this province by cession, or by the force of arms ; 2º-to repress any scheme of separation which may be entertained by the States of Kentucky and Ten- nessee. The General gave it even to be understood, that he thought it proper, and therefore would propose to the President-that he should return with full author- ity to help us with all the forces under his command in case the English should invade the colony, provided we do not, in the mean time, declare war against them, the
* Nó puede formarse juicio, ni deducir consequencias adversas ni favorables de semejantes exterioredades; pero con todo, como los individuos de esta nacion suelen tener momentos en que su corazon se difunde, no ocultaré á V. E., que en los que ha tenido dicho general con personas que juzgaba de su confianza, ha ma- nifestado lo mismo que expuse á V.E., en mi representacion reservada del 31 Mayo ultimo, No. 23.
404
FINE IMPOSED ON CARONDELET.
Americans, because it is more to the interest of the United States that this province remain under the do- mination of Spain. But, to accomplish the two objects they have in view, the forces which they possess at the posts they have occupied are very limited."
According to the provisions of the Spanish Jurispru- dence, and to time-honored custom, Gayoso had received the commission of Judge of Residence to inquire into the acts of his predecessor. It seems that, on this occasion, it did not turn out to be an idle and unmeaning for- mality, and Judge Martin, in his History of Louisiana, records as follows the result of the investigation : "One act of the Baron's administration was deemed reprehen- sible. He had been deluded by an excess of zeal for what he conceived to be the public good, into taking upon himself the responsibility of condemning to death a slave, who had killed his owner. The fact was proved, but Vidal, the assessor of government, conceived that the circumstances which attended it, did not bring the case under any law authorizing a sentence of death, and had recommended a milder one. At the solicitation of a number of respectable planters, and of the owner of the slave, Marigny de Mandeville, a knight of St. Louis and a Colonel of the Militia, who represented to the Baron that an example was absolutely necessary, espe- cially so soon after the late insurrection, he disregarded the opinion of his legal adviser, and ordered the execu- tion of the slave. It was thought the life of a human being, although a slave, ought not to depend on the opinion of a man, in any case where its sacrifice was not expressly ordered by law. A fine of five hundred dol- lars was imposed on and paid by the Baron."
In a despatch of the 25th of July, Morales informed his government of the death of Gayoso, in the following
405
GAYOSO'S DEATH.
terms : "On the 18th inst., it pleased God* to put an end to the life and government of Brigadier-General Don Manuel Gayoso de Lemos. He died of a malignant fever, of the nature of those which prevail in this country during the summer, and the dangerous character of which was known only a few hours before it terminated fatally. He had no time to lose in fulfilling the last duties of the Christian, and in making his testamentary dispositions. A short time before expiring, he reconciled himself with me, and we exchanged a reciprocal pardon for the causes of complaint we had given to each other in the accom- plishment of what we had thought our respective duties."
Governor Gayoso died extremely poor, leaving nothing to his heirs but a large amount of debts. He was a spendthrift, in the full sense of the word. Having been educated in England, he had adopted some of the habits peculiar to that country, particularly that of indulging too much in the pleasures of the table. It is said that Wilkinson's last visit to New Orleans proved fatal to Gayoso. They had long been on a footing of intimacy strengthened by a similarity of tastes; and, on their recently coming together, they had carried to an excess their convivialities, which had predisposed Gayoso to the disease that carried him off in his forty-eighth year. On his sudden death, Don Francisco Bouligny, who was the Colonel of the regiment of Louisiana, assumed the mili- tary administration of the colony, and the auditor, Don Jose Maria Vidal, the civil and political government.1.
* El 18 del corriente fué Dios servido poner fin al gobierno del Brigadier Don Manuel Gayoso de Lemos. Una calentura maligna de las que ofrece este pais en la estacion de verano, no conocida por los facultativos hasta algunas horas antes de su fallicimiento le quitó la vida, habiendo sido forzoso andar de priesa para que cumpliese con las obligaciones de christiano y que hiciera testamento. Poco antes de expirar se reconciliò conmigo, y quedaron reciprocamente remitidas las quejas personales á que dió lugar el cumplimiento de la que cada uno entendia ser su obligacion.
t Morales' despatch of the 25th of July, 1799.
406
CENSUS OF UPPER LOUISIANA.
The post of New Madrid was, this year, annexed to Upper Louisiana, of which a census was made by order of its commandant-general, Charles Dehault De Lassus, which presented the following results :
St. Louis,
925
Carondelet,
184
St. Charles,
875
St. Fernando,
276
Marais des Liards,
376
Maramec,
115
St. Andrew,
393
St. Genevieve,
949
New Bourbon,
560
Cape Girardeau,
521
New Madrid,
782
Little Meadows,
72
Total,
6,028
The white population* numbered 4,948 souls ; the free colored 197 ; the slaves 883.
The commerce of that part of the country had also increased in proportion to the augmentation of the popu- lation. Its crops amounted to 265,047 bushels of wheat, about the same of Indian corn, and 28,627 pounds of tobacco. Thirteen hundred and forty quintals of lead were produced from the mines, and about one thousand barrels of salt from the salt wells. The fur trade, which was carried on entirely through New Orleans, gave an- nually about $75,000.
On being informed of Gayoso's death, the Marquis de Someruelos, Captain-General of the island of Cuba and of Louisiana, sent over the Marquis de Casa Calvo to be the governor ad interim of the colony. This gentleman entered on his functions in the fall of the year.
On the 15th of October, Morales wrote to his govern- ment that, having heard of the appointment of Don
Martin's History of Louisiana, vol. ii., p. 172.
407
CASA CALVO APPOINTED GOVERNOR.
Ramon de Lopez y Angullo to the office of Intendant in Louisiana, which he, Morales, had filled ad interim for three years and a half, and considering himself no longer capable of discharging the duties of his own office of contador, he begged his Majesty to allow him to retire with such a grade and pension as his Majesty might think proper to favor him with.
Casa Calvo, a short time after his arrival, transmitted to the Captain-General of Cuba, who, in his turn, for- warded it to Madrid, a petition from several proprietors of landed estates, soliciting that the unlimited introduc- tion of negroes be again permitted, which Casa Calvo recommended as being required by the agricultural inte- rest. On the 23d of November, the cabinet of Madrid answered: "that, permission having lately been given to the French citizens Cassagne, Huguet, Raimond & Co., to introduce into the colony five thousand negroes free of duty, it had been resolved in council not to go farther."
I shall close what relates to this year (1799) with a despatch of the Bishop of Louisiana, Don Luis de Pe- ñalvert y Cardenas, on the state of religion and morals in the colony. "The emigration from the western part of the United States and the toleration of our govern- ment," said he, "have introduced into this colony a gang of adventurers who have no religion and acknowledge no God, and they have made much worse the morals of our people by their coming in contact with them in their trading pursuits. A lodge of freemasons has been formed in one of the suburbs of the city, and counts among its members officers of the garrison and of the civil admi- nistration, merchants, natives and foreigners. Their se- cret meetings on fixed days, on which they perform their functions, as well as other circumstances, give to this association a suspicious and criminal appearance.
408
BISHOP PENALVERT'S COMPLAINTS.
"The adventurers I speak of have scattered themselves over the districts of Attakapas, Opeloussas, Ouachita and Natchitoches in the vicinity of the province of Texas in New Spain; they employ the Indians* on their farms, have frequent intercourse and conversations with them, and impress their minds with pernicious maxims in har- mony with their own restless and ambitious temper, and with the customs of their own western countrymen, who are in the habit of saying to such of their boys as are distinguished for a robust frame, whilst patting them on the shoulder: you will be the man to go to Mexico.
"Such is the case with the upper part of the Missis- sippi, with the district of Illinois and the adjacent terri- tories, in which there has been a remarkable introduc- tion of those adventurers, who penetrate even into New Mexico. This evil, in my opinion, can only be remedied by not permitting the slightest American settlement to be made at the points already designated, nor on any part of the Rio Colorado.
"The parishes which were religiously disposed are losing their faith and their old customs; the number of those Christians who receive the sacrament at Easter decreases; and the people turn a deaf ear to the admo- nitions of their clergy.
"It is true that the same resistance to religion has always manifested itself here, but never with such scan- dal as now prevails. The military officers and a good many of the inhabitants live almost publicly with colored concubines, and they do not blush at carrying the ille- gitimate issue they have by them to be recorded in the parochial registries as their natural children."
* Arman sus caserias con los Indios, tienen confabulaciones, les imprimen maximas prejudiciales conforme á su caracter inquieto, ambicioso, y á los vincu- los que observan con sus paisanos del Oeste, quienes tienen la costumbre de palmear el hombro de sus niños quando son muy robustos, diciendoles you will go to Mexico.
409
DESIGNS OF THE AMERICANS CIN LOUISIANA.
The Bishop goes on saying that the magistrates, whose duty it ought to be to give a good example to the peo- ple, are the first to violate all the precepts of religion and morality.
On the 1st of January, 1800, the new Intendant, Don Ramon Lopez y Angullo, entered on the duties of his office. He was a knight pensioner of the royal and dis- tinguished order of Charles III.
This year had, it seems, been intended by Providence to be the beginning of a new era for Louisiana, since it gave rise to a series of events and negotiations which ultimately terminated her existence as an European colony, and raised her to the dignity of a Sovereign State by her incorporation with the great American confederacy. This new power had determined on the acquisition, by force if necessary, of New Orleans at least, if not of the whole of Louisiana. But it was felt that, to conduct this enterprise successfully, it was indis- pensable to refrain from awakening the suspicions of Spain ; and therefore, under cover of preparing for the difficulties which might arise from its differences with France at the time, the American government had added twelve regiments to the army, and had ordered three of them, as I have already stated, to the mouth of the Ohio, with instructions to have in constant readi- ness a sufficient number of boats, to carry down the contemplated expedition to New Orleans. But this plan was abandoned, or postponed, on account of the evident determination of the people not to reelect as president the individual who had been at the head of the government for nearly four years. It was thought more prudent to leave to his successor, who would come fresh from the people, and to the unimpaired vigor of a new administration, the management of so important an undertaking
410
BONAPARTE AND LOUISIANA.
In the meantime, the extraordinary man who ruled the destinies of France had fixed his eyes on Louisiana, which he resolved to acquire, as one of the elements of the great system he had devised to carry to the highest degree of splendor the commerce, navigation and manu- factures of the country he had made so illustrious by war. In furtherance of the views which he had con- ceived, he had ordered his ministers to collect from all valuable sources the most minute information on the resources of Louisiana. There is extant on this subject a very remarkable memoir, submitted to the First Consul of the French republic by M. de Pontalba, who had long resided in the colony and occupied in it a dis- tinguished official position. He gives a very accurate topographic description of the Western country, and then says of its inhabitants: " All this proves that the only commercial outlet for their produce is the Missis- sippi ; that Louisiana can never cease to be the object of their ambition, as they depend upon her in the most absolute manner; that their position, the number of their population, and their other means, will enable them to invade this province whenever they may choose to do so, and that, to preserve her, it is necessary to conciliate and control them by keeping up intelligences with the most influential men among them, and to grant them privileges, until this province be sufficiently strong to defend herself with her own resources, against the torrent which threatens her. Should its waters be let loose, there is no doubt but that they would sweep every thing on their passage; for the Kentuckians, single handed, or allied with the inhabitants of the neighboring districts, may, when they choose, reach New Orleans with twenty or thirty thousand men, trans- ported on large flatboats which they are in the daily habit of constructing to carry their produce to market,
411
PONTALBA'S MEMOIR.
and protected by a few gun-boats loaded with more provisions than they would need. The rapidity of the current of the Ohio and of the other rivers which dis- charge themselves into it, makes it an easy undertaking, and the paucity of their wants would accelerate its execution. A powder horn, a bag of balls, a rifle, and a sufficient provision of flour-this would be the extent of their military equipment; a great deal of skill in shooting, the habit of being in the woods and of endur- ing fatigue-this is what makes up for every defi- ciency.
"More or less extraordinary means, in accordance with the degree of importance attached to Louisiana, must be resorted to, in order to save her from the irrup- tion by which she is threatened. Should she be appreciated in proportion only to the revenue she now yields to the metropolis, it will be found out that the 6 per cent. duty on exports and imports, which is the sole one existing in the colony, does not produce one hundred thousand dollars a year, and that the annual expenses of the King of Spain for that province rise up to five hundred and thirty-seven thousand dollars.
" What entitles Louisiana to peculiar attention is the fact of her being a port in the Gulf of Mexico, where no other power than Spain has any; but what gives her still more value, is her position in relation to the king- dom of Mexico, whose natural barrier is the Mississippi.
" It is necessary to make this barrier an impenetrable one. It is the surest means of destroying for ever the bold schemes with which several individuals in the United States never cease filling the newspapers, by designating Louisiana as the high road to the conquest of Mexico, particularly ever since the occurring of dif- ferences with regard to its limits.
" The long discussion relating to those limits between
412
PONTALBA'S MEMOIR
the United States and Louisiana, which was terminated in 1797, proceeded from an equivocation in the treaty of peace of 1783, which equivocation was, no doubt, purposely introduced by England, in order to breed a . subject of discord between Spain and the United States. Otherwise it would have been necessary to express, that his Catholic Majesty should order the surrender to the United States of the district and fort of Natchez, which he then occupied by right of conquest.
" When England possessed her thirteen colonies and part of the province of Louisiana, the limits of Georgia being marked in the maps as running east and west from the sea to the Mississippi, the district of Natchez was included within them; but the inhabitants of that post having represented that, on the appeal cases from their courts, they were obliged to resort to Georgia, his Britannic Majesty declared that the district of Natchez would henceforth be placed under the jurisdiction of the Governor of Pensacola, and be incorporated with Western Florida, which was under the government of that officer. In this way, that province became extended to the Chaterpé line, which had been drawn by the English, the Chickasaws and Choctaws, from the terri- tory of Mobile, at 135 miles from the fort of that name on the western bank of the Tombecbee, to the Yazoo River, at fifteen miles from its junction with the Missis- sippi. So that, Western Florida, having been ceded to his Catholic Majesty by Great Britain in the peace treaty of 1783, was thus transferred away in all its integrity, and with all its dependencies at the time of the cession, of which Spain, however, was already in posses- sion by the right of conquest, and which she had never agreed to surrender.
" The English, in the same peace treaty which they concluded at the same time with the United States,
413
PONTALBA'S MEMOIR.
abandoned to them all that was marked in the old maps as a part of the United Provinces, as far as the Missis- sippi, without excepting that part of it which his Britan- nic Majesty had already detached and annexed to Western Florida; and the line which was determined in that treaty, by running in the middle of the Mississippi to the 31st degree of latitude, surrendered to the United States all the east side of that river as far as the spot lying opposite the mouth of the Red River, 36 miles below Natchez, and by running west and east from that point to the river St. Mary, left to them all the district of Natchez, which was the most populous portion of Louis- iana, thus restricting the possession of Spain towards Mobile to a sandy territory which did not extend beyond six miles, and reducing the country back of Pensacola to thirty miles of barren soil.
" Ever since the year 1785, the United States had aimed at taking possession of Natchez and all the terri- tory which was assigned to them by the said treaty. Spain had constantly opposed such pretensions, and had succeeded, through her intelligences with the western provinces of the United States and through her negotia- tions, in suspending the hostilities with which she had often been threatened, and in eluding the unfounded claims of the United States down to the year 1797, when she was obliged to accede to them in order not to expose herself to the loss of the whole province.
" As the Americans therefore are in possession of these new frontiers, it becomes more urgent than ever to secure a barrier for the protection of Mexico. There are two ways to accomplish this object. The first is, to establish in Louisiana a population sufficiently large to defend her against all attacks ; the second is, to form a union with Kentucky and the other districts of the Western Country, with the obligation on their part to
414
PONTALBA'S MEMOIR.
serve as a rampart against the United States ; and, until it be possible to execute one or the other of these pro- positions, my opinion is, that, by all possible means, peace must be preserved with the United States.
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