Star. — London, England, 1819-01-28 00:00:00

- l / I I t 1 A. 1 I •C .{ ~ ~., t ~. r ~ ~: 1 DOCUMENTS TR ANSMITTED to CONGRESS. TES SICIOTAIT Of Mgt Of TITS UNITED mans TO Tile DOWISTIR ViLTOPOTENTUAT Of Mt MUD OTATTS TO STADI, AT KAMM Deputment of State, Washington, Nov. se, ma. "Stn--Your dispatches, to No. 92, inclusive, with their enclosures, have been received at this Depart ment. Among these enclosures are the several notes addressed to you by Mr. Pizarro, in relation to the transactions during the campaign of General Jack. son against the Seminole Indians and the banditti of Negroes combined with them , and particularly to his proceedings in Florida, without the boundaries of the United States. 4 4 In the fourth and last of those Notes of Mr. Pi zarro he has given formal notice that the King, his master, has issued orders for the suspension of the negociation between the United States and Spain, until satisfaction shall have been made by the Ame rican Government to him for these proceedings of General Jackson, which he considers as acts of equivocal hostility.against him, and as outrages upon his honour and dignity ; the only acceptable atone anent for which is stated to consist in a disavowal of the acts of the American General thus complained of, the infliction upon him of a suitable punishment for his supposed miscouduct, and the restitution of the posts and territories taken by him from the Spanish Authorities, with indemnity for all the propetty taken, and all damages and injuries, public or pri vate, sustained in consequence of it. 44 Within a very few days after. this notification, , Mr. Pizarro must have received, with Copies of the Corfespondence between Mr. Onis and this Depart went, the determination which had been taken by then President to restore the place of Pensacola, with the fort of Barrancas, to any person properly autho rized on the part of Spain to receive them; and the Fort of St. Mark's to any Spanish force adequate to its protectiOn against the Indiens, by 'whom its forci ble occupationitad been threatened, for purposes of hostility against the United States. The Officer com- Mending at the post has been directed to consider 230 men as such adequate force; and in case of their appearance, with proper authority, to deliver it up to their Connuander accordingly. 4 4 From the last-mentioned Correspondence, the Spanish Government must likewise have been satis fied that the occupation of these places in Spanish Florida, by the Commander of the American forces, was not by virtue of any order received by him from this Government to that effect, nor with any view of wresting the Province from the possession of Spain, nor in any spirit of hostility to the Spanish Govern meet ; that it arcre from incidents which occurred in the prosecution of the war against the Indians—from the immineot danger in which the Fort of St. Mark's yes, of being seized by the Indians themselves, and fr,ms the manifestations of hostility to the United States by the Commandant of St. Mark's and the Governor of Pensacola, the proofs of which were made known tie General Jackson, and impelled him, from the necessities of seif-defence, to the steps of which the Spanish Government complains. It might be sufficient to leave the vindication of these measures upon those grounds, and to furnish, in the enelced copies of aneral Jackson's letters, and the vouchers by which they are supported, the evidence of the hostile spirit on the part of the Spa nish Commanders, bet for the terms in which Mre Pizarro speaks of the exec.nt:on of two British sub- , jects, taken, one at the Fort of St. Mark's, and. the other at Sownny, and intimation that these transac tions may lead to a change in the , relations between the two nations, which is do'tbtless intended to be tin derstool a, a menace of war. e . It may be, therefore. proper ,to remind the Go verament of his ).%itholic Malec...) , of the incidents in v-hich teis tecemeo:e war orii,inated, as troll as of the cireeenctances cenneet - ed with it, in the relations between Spain. end her Ally, whom she supposes to I:ave h,e i tejered by the proceedings of General Jackson, te give to the Spanish Cabinet some precise information of the nature of the business, pe-. celiarly interesting to Spain, in which these subjects of her Alik:, in whose favour she takes this interest, were engaged, when their projects of every kind were terminated, in consequence of their falling into the hands of _General Jackson. it. In the month of August, 1814, while a war exist ed between the United States and Great Britain, to which Spain hal formerly declared herself neutral, a British force, not in the fresh pursuit of a defeated and flying enemy—not overstepping an imaginary and equivocal boundary between their own eerntories aid those belonging, in some sort, as much to their enemy as to Spain, but approaching by sea, and by a %woad and open invasion of the Spanish province, at, a thousand miles, or an oceans distance from any British territory, landed in Florida, took possession of Pensacola and the Fort of Barrancas, and invited, brgublic proclamation, all the runaway Negroes— all the savage Indians—all the pirates, and all the traitors to their country, whom they knew or ima gined to exist within reach of their summons, to join &eh- standard, and wage an exterminating war against the. portion of the United States immediately bordering upon this neutral and thus violated terse= tory of Spain. The land Commander of , this British forte was a certain e Celonel Nicholls, who, dtiven from Pensacola by the approach. of General Jackson, actealh left, to be blown up,' the Spanish Fort of Ilareancas, when he found it could not afford him protection, and, evacuating that part of the province, landed at another,. established himself on the Appa- Inchicola river,, and there erected a fort, from which 5 44 sally forth, with his motley tribe of black, white, and red combatants, against the defenceless borders of the United States in'that vicinity. A part of this force consisted of ii corps of Colonial Marines, levied in ow British Colonies, in which George Woodbine was a Captain and Robert Chrystie Ambrister was, a tietnetra.nt. is As between the United State: and Great Britain, we should he willing . , to bury this transaction in the same grave of oblivion with other transactions of that war, had the hostilities of Colonel Nicholls ter minated with the war. But he did not consider the peace which ensued between the United States and Croat Britain, as having put an end either to his military occupations or to his negooiations with the Indians, against the United Soars: Several months after the ratification of the Treaty of Ghent, he 500.,' mined his post and his party-coloured forces in silk wry array, Dy the Ittb Alm}, of that Treasy United States h. 4 stipulated to put an end, immedi ately after its ratification , to hostilities with all the tribes or nations of Indians with whom they might be at war as the time of the ratification, and to re store to them all the possessions which they had en joyed in the year 1811. This article had no applica tion to the Creek nation, with whom the United States bad already made peace, by a treaty concluded on the 9th day of August, 1814, more than four months before the treaty of Ghent was signed. Yet, Colonel Nicholls not only affected to consider it as applying to the Seminoles of Florida, and the outlawed Red Sticks, whom he had induced to join him there, but actually persuaded them that they were entitled, by virtue of the Treaty of Ghent, to all the lands which had belonged to the Creek nation, within the United States, in the year 1814, and that the Government of Great Britain would support them in that pretension. " He asserted also this doctrine in a correspon dence with Colonel Hawkins, then the Agent of the United States with the Creeks, and gave him notice, in their name, with a mockery of solemnity, that they had concluded a treaty of alliance, offensive and de fensive, and a treaty of navigation and commerce with Great Britain, of which more was to be beard after it should be ratified in England. Col. Nicholls then evacuated' his fort, which, in some of the in closed papers, is called the Fort at Prospect Bluff, but which he had denominated the British Post on the Appalachicola ; took with him the white portion of his force, and embarked for England, with several 9f the wretched savages whom he was thus deluding to their fate ; among whom was the Prophet Francis, or Hillis Hadjo ; and left the Fort, amply Supplied with military stores and ammunition, to the Negto department of his allies: - "It afterwards was known by the name of Nego ,Fort. Colonel Hawkins immediately communicated -to this Government the correspondence between him and Nicholls, here referred to, (copies of which. mar ked No. 1 to 5, are herewith inclosed} upon which Mr. Munroe, then Secretary of State, addressed a letter (copy marked 0) to Mr. Baker, the British Charge d'Affaires, at Washington, complaining- of Nicholls's conduct, andshewing that his pretence, that the 9th =tide of the Treaty of Ghent could have any application to his Indians, was utterly destitute of 'foundation. Copies of the same correspondence were transmitted to the Minister of the United States then ' `in England, with instructions to remonstrate with the British Government against these proceedings of Nicholls, and to chew how incompatible' they were with the peace which had been concluded between the two nations. These remonstrances were accordingly made, first in personal interview with Earl Bathurst and Lord Castlereagh, and afterwards in written notes, addressed successively to them (copies of which, together with extracts from the dispatches of the American Minister to the Secretary estate, re porting what passed, at these interviews. are inclosed). Lord Bathurst, in the most unequivocal manner, confirmed the facts, and disavowed the misconduct of Nicholls ; declared his disapprobation of the pre tended treaty of alliance, offensive and defensive, which he had made; assured the American Minister that the British Government had refused to ratify that treaty, and would send back the Indians whom Nicholls had brought with him, with advice to make their peace on such terms as they could obtain.— Lord Castlereagh confirmed the assurance that the treaty would not be ramified ; and if ; at the same time that these assurances were given, certain distinctions isf public notoriety were shewn to the Prophet Hillis Hatijo, and he was actually honoured with a com mission, as a British Officer, it is tp be presnmcd that these favours were granted him as rewards of past services, and no) as encouragement to expect any support from Great Britain, in a continuance of sa s age hostilities against the United States, all inten don of giving any such support having been reprat cdly and earnestly disavowed. " 'The t;egro fort, however, abandoned by Colonel Nicholls, remained on the Spanish territory, occupied by the banditti to whom he had left it, and held by them as a post, from' whence to commit depreda tions, outrages, and murders, and as a receptacle for fugitive slaves and malefactors, to the great an noyance both of the United States and Spanish Flo rida. In April, 1816, General Jackson wrote a let ter to the Governor of Pensacola, calling upon him to put down this common nuisance to the peaceable inhabitants of both countries. That letter, together with the answer of the Governor of Pensacola, have already been communicated to the Spanish- Minister here, and by him, do,-.'Aless, to his Government,— Copies of them are, nevertheless, now again enclosed; particularly as the letter from the Governor explicitly admits, that this fort, constructed by Nicholls, in violation both of the territory and neutrality of Spain, was still no less obnoxious to his Government than to the United States ; but that he had neither sum cient force, nor an authority, without order from the Governor-General of the Ravenna's, to destroy it.— It was afterwards, on the 27th of July, 1816, den stroyed by a cannon-shot, from a gun-vessel of the United States, which, in its passage up the river, wale fired upon from it. It was bloivn up, with an lish flag still flying as its standard, and immedi atel y after the barbarous murder of a boat's stew belong ing to the navy of the United States, by the banditti left in it by Nicholls. ‘. In the yew' 1817, Alexander Arbuthnot, of the Island of New Providence, a British subject, first appeared, as an Indian trader is Spanish Merida; and as the successor of Colonel Nicholls, in the em ployment of instigating the Seminole and outlawed Red Stick Indians to hostilities against the United States, by reviving the pretence that they were en titled to all the lands which had been ceded to the Creek Nation by the United States, in August, I°B3. As a mere Indian trader, the intrusion of this man into a Spanish Province was contrary 10 the policy observed by all the European Powers in this hemis phere, and by none more rigorously than by Spain of excluding all foreigners finsis intercourse with il l ; Indians within their territories. Ii mast be known to the Spanish Government, whether Aphasiaice had a Spanish licence for trading with the issillaas' in Spanish Florida or not; but .thez also kitita„that Spain was botind by treatr ies t: by fora* hostilities on the part of t Citizens of the United States, lied 411 4 die explain how, consistently with tkre Spain could, contrary to an the nary policy, grant such a noises OD , I alltr o tainio diary, whose Alnripai if avt 14 anti. .r.. to have been to stinutlate thosehOstalties which ' pit had ezpiesaly stipulated by forte to restrain. In his infernal ' instigations he was but too successful. No iooner did he snake his appearance among the Indians, accompanied by' the Prophet-Hillis Hadjo, returned from his eapedition to England, thsm dr* peaceful inhabitants on the borders of the United States were visited with all the horrors of savage war the robbery of their property, and the barbarous and indiscriminate murder of woman, infancy, and age. " After the repeated expcistulations, warnings, and offers of peace, tbrough the summer and autumn of 1817, on the part of She United States, had been an swered only by renewed outrages, and after a de tachment of 40 men, under Lieutenant Scott, ac companied by seven women, had been way-laid and murdered by the Indians, orders were given to Ge neral Jackson, and an adequate force was placed at his disposal, to terminate the war. It was aster tanned that the Spanish force in Florida was inade qnate for the protection even of-the Spanish territory itself, against this mingled horde of lawless Indians and Negroes ; and, although their devastations were committed within the limits of the United States, they immediately sought refuge within the Florida line, and there only were to be overtaken. The ne tessity of crossing the line was oindisperimble ; for it was from beyond the line that the Indians made their murderous incursions within that of the United States. It was there that they had their abode, and the territory belonged in fact to them, although within the bordeis of the Spanish jnrisdiction. There it was that the American Commander n,et the prin cipal resistance from them ; there it was, that were found the still bleeding scalps of our citizens, freshly butchered by them ; there it was that he released die only wornao who had been suffered to survive the massacre of the party under Lieutenant Scott. But it was not anticipated by this Government, that the 'Commanding . Officers of Spain; in Florida, whose especial duty it was, in conformity to the solemn en gagements contracted by their natitn, to restrain by force those Indians from hostilities against the United States, would be found encouraging, aiding, and abetting them, and furnishing them n :•th supplies for carrying on such 'hostilities. The Officer in com mand immediately before General Jackson, was, therefore, specially instructed to respect, as far as possible, the Spaniih authority, wherever it was main tamed, and copies of these orders were also furnished to General Jackson upon his taking the command. In the course of his pursuit, as he approached St. Mark's, he was informed, direct from the Governor of Pensacola, that a party of the hostile Indians had threatened to seize that fort, and that he apprehended the Spanish Garrison there was not in strength suf6 cient to defend it against them. This information was confirmed from other sources, and by the evi dence produced upon the trial of Ambrister, it proved to have been exactly true. By all the laws of new. 'trality and of war, as well as of prudence and of hu manity, he was warranted iii anticipating Lis enemy, by the amicable, and that being Tensed; 'ay the for-' cible occupation of the fort. There will reed no tationi from printed Treatises •on international law, to prove the 'correctness of this principle. It is en graved in adamant on the common sense of man kind ; no writer upon the Laws of Nations ever pre-' tended to contra( ict it; none of any reputation or lauthority ever omitted to assert it. " At Fort St. Mark's, Alex. Arbuthnot, the British Indian trader from beyond the seas, the firebrand, by !whose torch this Negro Indian war against our bor ders had been rekindled, was found an inmate of the Commandant's family ; and it was also found, that by the Commandant himself Councils of War had been permitted to be held within it, by the savage chiefs and warriors ; that the Spanish store-houses had been appropriated to their use; that it was an open market for cattle, known to have been robbed by them from citizens of the United Stater, and which had been contracted for and purchased by the officers of the garrison; that information had• bees afforded from this fart, by Arbuthnot, to the enemy, .of the strength and movements of the American army; that the date of the departure of express bad beta noted by the Spanish Commissary, and ammu nitiea, munitions of war, and all necessary supplies, furnished to the Indians. The conduct of the Go vernor of Pensacola was not less marked by a dis position of enmity to the United States, and by an utter disregard to the obligations of the Treaty, by which he was bound to restrain, by force, the Indians from hostilities awainst them. When called upon to vindicate the territorial tights and authority of Spain, by the destruction of the Negro Fort, his predecessor had declared it to be no less annoying and pernicious to the Spanish subjects in Florida, than to the United States, but had pleaded his inability to subdue it. " He himself had expressed his apprehensions that Fort St. Mark's would be forcibly taken by the sa vages, from its Spanish garrison; yet, at the same time, he had refused the passage up the Escambia river, unless upon the payment of excessive duties, to provisions destined as supplies for the American army, which, by the detention of them, was subjected to the most distressing privations. He had permitted free ingress and egress at Pensacola to the avowed 'savage enemies of the United States. Supplies of ammunition, munitions of war, and provisions, had been received by them from thence. They had i been sevvived and sheltered there from the pursuit of the, American forces, and suffered again to sally thence, to enter upon the American territory, and commit Finall ntryin.up y tut i n : , i4 ttliil t ) k ethvriern e es a r p ntir p ro .stedory a n c t h shpoi o nla f finn G a e ole n critom er tnc al : nccakorminrcenitnogeritNnsah. entry m a z i n tbrea ding t h enin im in case of wi h th is d n ra nn w .c f n ro m m pi the ianc sz t e n , employ force to expel him. It became, therefore, in the opinion of General Jackson, indispensab ly necessary to .take from the Gown:nor of ola the means of carrying his dual into mention. Defore , the forces under his command, , sev.ve enemias, of his country had : but •he knew that the moment those fortes show be disbanded, it sheltered by Spanish feetresies s , * feweisbedvrithaenoutokions and supplies ir htimitiyaboa lkaal l gat if Wed and supported by en=ment, as he had be, they would redepean alp lat t addrtioiLto dseir ordinary fe reetvismistsoisidit for theschistisement they -4146 .81eat i.. , aftsadd again the b rush with the latib isto: orden,of • •tNN sue;,:' the United &WA and Mark 4v ty AM*, ' blood of their defenceless e,isiaens, " He tool possession, therefore, of Penu ct l a 2 of the fort of Barrancas, as he had don e of e. Mari's, not in a spirit of hostility to Spain, b ut a , necessary measure of self-defence; giving not i, that they should be restored whenever Sp ain shni f i place Commanders and a force there, able and , ling to fulfil the engagements of Spain towards, 4 United States, of restraining by force the 11 07 .4 1 Indians from hostilities against their citizens. " That the purpnses, as well of the Negro LA. • 1 banditti, with whom we have been contending, the British invaders of Florida, who first assscrSia and employed them, and'of the British intredirl a a pretending trader; since the peace, who L a v e i agt gated and betrayed them to destruction, lsz 7c not less hostile to Spain than to the Vaited F: 44 the proofs contained in the documents here,;. ; closed are conclusive. Mr. Pizarro's note cf August speaks of his Catholic Majesty's profcm indignation at the " sanguinary executions, es* j Spanish soil, of the subjects of Powers in amity y. j . the King"—meaning Arbuthnot and Ambrister. Mr. Pizarro's successor take the trouble of newer : the enclosed documents, and he will discover al Arbuthnot and Ambrister were, and what weietl, purposes : that Arbuthnot was only the successor Nicholls, and Ambrister the agent of Woodbine, • the subaltern of M , Gregor. Mr. Pizarro qu.11;.% General Jackson's necessary pursuit of a derma savage enemy beyond the Spanish Florida line as shanufid invasion of his Majolg's territory; yet tl territory was the territory also c•f the savage ewer., and Spain was bound to restrain them by force ft d hostilities against the United States ; and it was :1 k , failure of Spain to fulfil this ena:lgernont which h.. made it necessary for Genetal lackscn to ptasue savaae across the line. What then ;:-" , ,s Tit of Nicholles invasion of his Majesty's territory? ar, where was his Majesty's profound in digr.at'xr, Mr. Pizarro says, his Majesty's forts and pass ine been violently seized on by Gcncral 1.• they not been seized on, nay, had not the prisci. t 1 of his forts been blown up by Nicholls, and a Bs', ute fort on the same Spanish territory been erectsd d ing the war, and left standing as a li;ero for, defiance of ? Spanish authority, af.er the ileacc; sot Where was his Majesty's profound indignaticr. , that? Has his Majesty suYpeinled formally bd, gociation with the Sovereign, of Colonel Nicholls, the shameful invasion of his territory without c.'. of provocation, without pretence of necessity, out the shadow or even avowal of a pretext ? " Has his Majesty given solemn warning to British Government, that these were incidents transcendent moment, capable of producing an es . 2 tial and thorough change in the political relations the two countries?" Nicholls and Woodbine, in 4, invitations and promises to the slaves to run acv. from their ma:aers and join them, did not con: themselves to the slaves of the United States; tt received with as hearty a welcome, and employ - with equal readiness, the fugitives from their inn in Florida, as those from Georgia. Against this s t vial injury the Governor of Pensacola did earner . remonstrate with the British Admiral Cocklatra, • the document marked 25) ; but against the Arm . invasion of the territory—against the violent 5e;... , *ze of the forts and places—against the blowing up .w the Barrancas, and the erection and tnaintcn::: 'under British banners, of the Negro fort on Spr vt soil—against the negotiation, by a itritich Officer. the midst of peace, of pretended treaties, oar, 'a and defensive, and of navigation and commerce 0 1 Spanish territory, between Great Britain and nish Indians, whom Spain was bound to cony and restrain—if a whisper of expostulation vas c s: wafted from Madrid to London, it was notle - enough to be heard across the Atlantic, nor merge enough to transpire beyond the walls of the Pal from which it issued, and to which it was borne. la The connexion between Arbuthnot and N4' and between Ambrister, Woodbine, and Isl , Gr 'is established beyond all question, by the evid produced at the trials before the Court Martial. have already remarked to you on the very extra. nary circumstance, that a British trader, from A the sea, should be permitted by the Spanish An rities to trade with the Indians of Florida. From letter to Hambly, dated May 3,1817, (see the d, 6 ments marked G, in the proceedings of the C... Martial) it appears that his trading was but a I tence ; and that his principal purpose was to act • the Agent of the Indians of Florida. and outlaws the Creeks, to obtain the aid of the British Go ment in their hostilities against the United Stat He expressly tells Hambly there, that the Chief du those outlaws was the principal cause of his, A . not's, being in the country • and that he had c. with an answer from Earl iathurst, delivered to • by Governor Cameron, of New Providence, to . tain Indian talks, in which the aid of the British vernment bad been solicited. " Hambly himself had been left by Nicholls as agent between the Indians and the British Go - I 'went; but having found that Nicholls had failed his attempt to prevail upon the British Gov . to pursue this clandestine war, in the midst of and that they were not prepared to support his tence ; that half a dozen outlawed fugitives from Creeks were the Cree': nation—when Arbuthrot incendiary came, and was instigating them, by mises of support from Great Britain, to con their murderous incursions into the United M , Hambly, at the request of the Creeks them' , wrote to him, warning him to withdraw from ^^ ' that band of outlaws, and giving him a solemn boding of the doom that awaited him, from the At • of justice, if he prsevered the course that he p . sued. A rbuthnot, nevertheless, persisted ; ands dl he was deluding the wretched Indians with the mice of support from England, he was writing terefor them to the British Minister in the U' States, to Governor Cameron of New Providena Colonel Nicholls, to be laid before the British vernment ; and even to the Spanish Govern,. TS St. Augustine, and the Governor-General of the vannab, soliciting, in all quarters, aid and )up . N c arms and ammunition,. far the In:dians, against Os United States, bewailing the destruction of the fort, and charging the British Government with h. drawn the Indians into war with the Uhited r and deserting them after the be cor— s LONDON; hilted awl pubrahil by Lxvat. Anita TeitiitleAtri . • • i