The age-herald., 1897-10-03
GEN. JAMES WILKINSON.

From the St. Louis Globe Democrat. It has been the fate of one man in
 American history to be tried. twice for
 treason, once by court-martial and once by the supreme court of the United States. That he was guilty both times of all and more than was charged is
 now certain; but circumstances led to | his neauittal. and he who should twice over have been hanged died peaceably 1 in his bed. 1t will be a pleasant task | to gbbbet him as the meanest man ever | brought prominently forward In our na- tional career. This man was James | Wilkinson, born in Maryland in 1757, and living through the whole most | eventful and formative period of our | nation-making. By curious coincidences he was never out of sight from the time
 he first became a captain with Benedict | Arnold in the first revolutionary army i until the close of the second war with England. Rising; by the blunders of his l rivals, with a singular shrewdness in
 the way of making steppingstones of | trifles; capable as few men ever were | of glorifying himself; not apparently | comprehending truth from faisehood, truly accomplished liar, considering the times; he became a major general of the l United States army a position that en- I abled him to sell himself to Spain, from l whose monarch he drew the pay of a 1 traitor for twelve years; to lead Aaron 1 Burr into irretrieVable blunders and fin- 1 al treason in the southwest, and then I to betray him; and besides innunierable
 lesser tricks and treasons, to betray our 1 armies in Canada during the war of 1872 | by his sengelesS conceits and quarrels | and lack of both ability and patriotism. | Gen. Scott aptly defined him as that | unprincipled imbecile.'
 In the early care:r of Wilkinson there | seems to have been nothing eminently 1 disgTaceful except a readiness to push 1 himself into prominence and to prate | with the reasonable. In December of 1 1776 he was bearer of dispatches from l Gates to Lee, who was at Vealtown, in the Jerseys. Lee was plotting, like l Gates, to secure Washington's place. l While boasting to Wilkinson of the | prowess and consumate ability to com
 mand, the British troopers dashed up l and made him prisoner. He was car l Iied off sputtering about being the l American commander-in-c chief; while ] Wilkinson, who had first seen the | dragons. slipped away. Lee left this | note for Wilkinson to carry back to his l commander: My dear Gates-elptre
 nous-a certain great man Is most dam 1 nably deficient.'' It was not yet folded | when the troopers caught him. Gates | and Arnold and Lee form peculiarly | tfylIP If1O. llne aSSOclatlOn or w lklD- i son with these three as special aid and | messenger is at least suspicious. But 1 no one could be safe from his excessive l readiness to belong ito all parties, and
 to treachery. That the cabalists believ- | ed him to be one with them is evident, l not only from the confidences of Lee, l but from the fact that in TIT he was | able to betray Conway to Washington. 1 His betrayal of Burr to Jefferson was not a spontaneity. He had trained him. ho 4JY-ffea ttN hi l out his whole career. It was getting l to Ee quite certain that Conway Gates 1 and Miff1n would fa.l of destroying Washington, when Wilkinson, who was | Conway's private secretary, went to Washington and told him all he had 1 heard his employer say in private.
 When Conway resigned, Wilkinson, | who had secured brevets as high as | brigadier general, was rewarded for his 1 last treachery with the office of clothier l general of the armies. This was a con | genial post, and we hear little more or | him until the close of the war. His l tactics eoof a mercantile sort, and 1 out. of army contracts he made enough l to establish himself as a man of prop efty ill Kentucky. While carrying on store he was still advancing in military l rank; and we soon hear of him as major general. About the tiple Of Gen. St. Clairs horrible disaster in the north west, Wilkinson raided some Indian vll- lages of the Wabash, and ravaged some cornfields. This sort of business at short distances was safe, inglorious and useless. In fact, he was one of those men who along the frontier have never ceased to inbroil the country in unjust wars with a weaker race, making large capital for himself out of petty skirn- ishes carried on in savage fashlon. Commanding under Wayne, httle iat- CT, in his campaign at Maumee Rapids, Wilkinson was soon our senior major general If we except the campaign with Wayne, he had never performed a single deed worthy of the least recogni- dion from his country. Ills pIItI prohl9Itlton was owing to the friendship of cabalists, with whom he regularly broke friend ship after reaping what benehts ne could by trueulency.
 In 17SS WIlk HIS m began to expio't Tn The AIasstsrilp Nailey. The g.'ealt 1lVer wsls heM closed against commerce by Spain, WihSJolh courl.ry elaamed all the ,.errftory crn bolth banks as far north as the Ohio. It had secret intention II favorable opportuLH- y afford d of ciadn- tns, Kentucky airftb Tennessee These ter- ritloiAes, iban known as Kemtuaky a d Franklin, were rrllt less deeply intaIes ed tin .tl.e opening of the river than WSre Cll!.o and Indialta. Wllkinsoai, to try the Itenfped. Of the Spadl1all6s, dispa tched faiIAgal loaded with four, 'liolJacco and other farm produce, for New OrleaIs. Following it hfnDseff at a safe distance, ara founA1 1t In ,dhe hands of the SpanaafcS 2it Ma chez fLndlnS 'uirdil '.llS UOdt SIA VI was Jhe prope-ity of General WfllanrsSn, tI1as Span.sh giove1lrlor ma de this singular treaty with him: Wilkinson pledged him self to do hts uunlicst 10 create Span sh sen;fmsnt in Kefrtucky, and to bring EJlts people over to prefer to be under Spanish rule and crt looIe from tihe states In reiturn W5lk.htson might freely send boats 10 New Orleans for trade Tine profits on all cargIost5 wculd be four fold at least. What Tttle was known of ithtase affairs at Washington was fa- vorable to tl1e man who had opened tIhe Mississippi a.'afflc. No. hing was known of the reasonable designs of the arch pHotter. Whsn JeffeIs-ip sNcceeded fin purchasing Louisiana frum Napoleon, aflber the tranGifenanGa of the 'tellrtory ito he French. he very natu ally SC ect- ed Wilkinson as one of itlie commlssfcn- CTS to formally take pos5eeisfnu; en1 in 1895 he was crliaife governor. In 1908 he was ordered to take comm and of the whole Mississippi Valley and of such I07c rix