the Yazooists. To lawyers it would be neither necessary nor
complimentary to enter here into the long and intricate de-
tails of the case with its artistically concocted pleadings and
laboriously constructed special verdict ; for they are to be
Mr. Justice Johnson, in delivering his opinion, made the following remarks
at the close : "I have been very unwilling to proceed to the decision of this
case at all It appears to bear strong evidence upon the face of it of being a
mere feigned case. It is our duty to decide on the rights but not on the specu-
lation of parties. My confidence, however, in the respectable gentlemen,t
who have been engaged for the parties, have induced me to abandon my
scruples, in the belief that they would never consent to impose a mere feigned
case upon this Court. Crunch 1 s Rep., 6th Vol., p. 147-8.
| And yet Robert Goodloe Harper was one of those gentlemen, whose name, as
one of the large, original Yazoo partners, was in thousands of Congressional
documents with which the country was then flooded. Thirty years ago, in a
book store in Washington. I picked up a bound second hand copy of oue of
them, which I now have, printed by order of Congress in 1809.
136 THE YAZOO FRAUD.
supposed acquainted with them already. To the laity such
a recital would certainly be alike irksome and unprofitable.
Suffice it, then, to say that the Circuit Court of Massachu-
setts in which the feigned suit was started, gratified fully the
wishes of the claimants, deciding every point as they desired,
and perfectly validating their title from beginning to end.
Nevertheless, they carried the case up to the Supreme Court
at Washington, in order that it might be there affirmed
and clinched forever. And it was securely clinched by that
tribunal. With the exception of poor Johnson, all the
Court, from a regard to decency and appearances, made
itself voluntarily blind to the staring fact that it wan a
feigned case, and consequently one which it was highly dis-
creditable and criminal for the Court to entertain and
decide at all. Moreover, the whole Court persistently shut
its eyes to the grand, vital principles on which Washington
had so decidedly combated and nullified the first Yazoo
Sale, that of 1*789, and on which he had equally come forth
denouncing and ready, if need there should be, to combat
and nullify likewise this second Yazoo Sale of 1*795, when-
ever it should put forth its head so as to be within reach of
the National arm. Overlooking all these vast and weighty
considerations, so important with the Father of his Country,
the Court studiously narrowed its view to the points to
which the Yazooists for their own purposes chose to solicit
its attention. The result was a judgment delivered at the
February term, 1810, going the full length for the title of
the Yazoo claimants, pronouncing it just as good as if the
Rescinding Act of Georgia had never been passed, invulner-
able, indeed, by tiny act of the State either singly or in
combination with the United States, and consequently better
than the younger title the State had conveyed to the
United States by the cession of April, 1802. In fine, it
was a judgment which fully verified and reduced to an
absolute certainty all the little credited vaticinations, the
possibility of which turning out true had led the Commis-
sioners to recommend the five million compromise as a
THE YAZOO FRAUD. 137
thing for the interest of the United States and the interest
and tranquility of the future settlers on the contested terri-
tory.
And now Congress, seeing itself in vinculis, and very
much at the tnercy of the claimants in regard to
all the Yazoo lands, upon well revolving the matter thought
it best to come to terms with them, and finally, after a moody
interval of some four years, passed the Act of 31st of March,
1814, appropriating the sum of five million of dollars to he
raised by sales of the lands, to the perpetual quieting and
extinguishment all the Yazoo Claims, which being agreed
at once to be accepted by the claimants, there was an end at
last of a matter which I have essayed to trace Irom its origin
and through all its vicissitudes, and which with a better
handling than I have been capable of giving it, would be
found forming a chapter in the history of Georgia and of the
United States interesting and important, as well as multi-
farious, complicated and long.
FINIS.
ERRATA IN PART I.
On page 34, 16 line from top, read post instead ot peat.
On page 36, 5th line from bottom, read fury instead of fray
PART III.
GENERAL JAMES JACKSON.
GENERAL ANTHONY WAYNE.
CIIAJPTER 1.
GEN. JAMES JACKSON GEN. ANTHONY WAYNE.
As when the laborious husbandman whose daily bread is
sweetened by the sweat of his brow and by the holy sense
of providing by his toil for his wife and children, has been all
the week long, with measured stride and stalwart arms, swing-
ing the scythed cradle here and there over his field wherever
the nodding harvest looked ripest and most tempting; wearied
atlength he pauses from his task at the near approach of the
sacred day of rest, surveys his work, eyes gratefully his
thick-standing sheaves, and taking note of what there still is
for his industrious hands to do, beholds, well pleased, the
rich, retiring nooks and deep, fertile hollows that yet await
his blade : so do I, having in an irregular, desultory man-
ner, treated of the development, fortunes and affairs of Geor-
gia during a considerable lapse of time next after the Revo-
lutionary war, now looking back perceive in the period I have
thus traversed not a few things which although interesting
and well worthy of notice, have as yet remained untouched
by my roving pen.
And first of Gen. Jackson himself it is meet and would
be both grateful and rewarding that something further
should be said and told, even though it carry us back be-
yond the Revolutionary era. For it is attended alike with
pleasure and profit to follow and observe such a man
from his early beginnings and through all his vicissitudes.
What we have already had occasion to see and know about
him naturally excites curiosity to know more, and we would
4 GENERALS JACKSON AND WAYNE.
fain get a full view of one so marked and superior, so much
above the world's ordinary standard and requirements, so
much a pride and honor to our common nature ; one whom
suchajudgeas Thos. Spalding, himself assuredly a mostnohle
man and who enjoyed the amplest opportunities, in his long
and honorable life, of knowing men of distinction in Eu-
rope and America, advisedly pronounced, forty odd years
after his death, "the noblest man with whom it had been
his lot to be*acquainted."*
He landed on our shores from his native England in 1772:
a lone lad of fifteen years. Of virtuous and respectable pa-
rentage, breeding and connexions, we cannot but suppose
that he had at that immature age already strongly evinced
safe and superior qualities of mind and character and given
evidences of high future promise ; otherwise his father
would hardly have consented, nor would such a man as Mr.
Wereat, a name of great note and respect in our Colonial
and Revolutionary annals and at one time Acting Governor
of the State, have advised him to consent to his son's com-
ing to America under his Mr. Wereat' s, auspices, to make
his own way and build up his fortunes in this remote and
then wild part of the earth. We are told that his father
* Bench and Bar of Georgia vol 2, page 102. Titic, John Houston. See
there a letter from Mr. Spalding to Maj. Miller, of the IWch October, 1850,
from which the following is an extract :
"It gives me pleasure to state that Gen. James Jackson, the noblest man
with whom it has bean my lor to be acquainted, when. I called upon him as
Governor to give me a letter to Mr. King, our then Minister in London, kept
me to dine with him ; and asked me what were Mr. Gibbons' receipts from his
profession." I replied, "Three thousand pounds per annual." "My own were
about that amount when I unwisely left my profession foi politics. Mr. Gib-
bons, as a whole, was the greatest lawyer in Georgia." Let me say to you that
Gen. Jackson and Mr. Gibbons had exchanged three shots at nach other. They
were considered the bitterest enemies by the public. A high minded man
knows no enmity."
I had intended to add here a few words of my own about Mr. Spalding.whom
I knew, revered and held in the highest honor. But on turning to the notice
of him in White's Hirtorical Sketches of Georgia, I prefer it to any thing I
can write. It will be found in full as a note at the end of thii chapter.
GENERALS JACKSON AND WAYNE. 5
was a etrenous lover of freedom and free Government and
of the rights of the people as against arbitrary power,- and
particularly that he was a warm sympathiser with the Colo-
nies in their as yet bloodless quarrel with the mother coun-
try for their rights and liberties. These principles and sen-
timents young Jackson had deeply imbibed before quitting
the paternal roof and indeed they largely influenced his em-
igration and casting his lot here. Accordingly, it was not
long after reaching his new home in Georgia, before they
shone out in his warm participation in the feelings and pro-
ceedings which were even then beginning to herald the ap-
proaching Revolution.
The very pursuit to which his father and Mr. Wereat had
destined him in Georgia is proof of their high opinion of
his capacity and endowments. For although so young, he
was, upon his arrival in Savannah, at once put to the study
of law in the office of Samuel Farley, Esq., applying him-
self at the same time to such other studies as were necessary
to the completion of his general education. With what en-
thusiasm, industry and success he applied himself, some
idea may be formed from the fact handed down from his
own lips by Mr. Spalding, that after the Revolutionary
war and before embarking in politics, he practiced law so
prosperously that his professional earnings at their acme
reached to the sum of 3,000 per annum a prodigious
amount when we consider the small population and the still
smaller wealth, commerce and resources of Georgia in those
times.
Before, however, finishing his studies and coming to the
Bar, and whilst yet a mere stripling, he, like that other
glorious young genius of the day-spring of the Revolution,
Alexander Hamilton, betwixt whom and himself there are
not wanting strong points of resemblance, obeyed the im-
pulse of courage, ambition, patriotism and a passionate love
of liberty and hastened to exchange his books and seclusion
for arms and the din of war.
It comports not with my plan to enter into the minute
GENERALS JACKSON AND WAYNE.
details of the young soldier's Revolutionary career, and
indeed nothing could be more unnecessary. For are they
not to be found written in every book of the chronicles of
Georgia? where, among the many things in relation to
him, it is recorded that his first feat of arms (a very daring
and purely volunteer affair of himself and a little band of
otherpatriots, resulting in their burningseveral of the enemy's
armed vessels which had grounded in proceeding up the river
against the city) won for him much applause and a lieuten-
ancy. Soon a captaincy rewarded his rapidly developing
martial merits And so he continued to rise, never failing
to justify his promotions by his performances until at
length we see him before the end of the war by Gen.
Green's appointment and the confirmation of Congress, the
commander, in his 24th year, of a mixed Legion of cavalry
and infantry. On every occasion and in every position
throughout the long, harsh struggle, he added to his steadily
growing reputation. Victory brought him laurels which, so
fine was ever his. conduct, no adversities or reverses that
befel him could take away or dim. For alike in distress and
in good fortune he exhibited fertile and brilliant capacity,
an unflinching devotion to duty, indefatigable activity and
a heroism not to be cowed by wounds, perils, fatigues ; nor
by hunger, thirst and nakedness, nor all the other nameless
discouragements and sufferings of ill-provided war and cam-
paigning in the woods and swamps of lower Georgia and
Carolina against an enemy entrenched and under cover in
Augusta, Savannah and Charleston, and continually sally-
ing out from these strongholds as assailants, pursuers, ma-
rauders, devastators and then rushing back again to their
shelter when routed or endangered or wearied out or sated
with spoliation. Such an impression did his extraordinary
merits and services in the closing scenes of the war in Geor-
gia make on his General, that renowned soldier and com-
mander, Anthony Wayne, that on the occasion of the final
surrender of Savannah by the British to our arms in July,
1782, he honored him by ordering that the formal surrender
GENERALS JACKSON AND WAYNE. 7
should be made into his hands. And accordingly it was so
done by the keys of the city being delivered up to him by
the evacuating British commander in presence of both armies.
One of those remarkable incidents which, by reason of be-
falling men of celebrity, often become canonized in history,
is related to have occurred during the gloomiest period of
the Revolution to him and his young friend, John Milledge,
the same who afterwards became a Representative and then
a Senator in Congress, and Governor also of the State in
honor of whom likewise Milledgeville was named, destined
as the permanent capital of the State a destiny, however,
not permitted to stand, but to the mortal shame of Georgia
set aside now by her submission thus far to an ephemeral
satrap's wanton, dishonoring edict. During the utter pros-
tration of our cause in lower Georgia, consequent on the fall
I of Savannah, in 1778, these undaunted youthfnl patriots
repaired together to South Carolina to seek service. Whilst
on their way to join Gen. Moultrie's standard "barefoot and
in rags, these sons of liberty," we are told, "were appre-
hended as spies by some American soldiers and condemned
to be hung. The gallows was actually prepared, and but
for the timely arrival of Maj. Devaux, who accidentally
heard of the transaction, the two young patriots would have
been executed."* Behold here in our own annals an
authentic fact which taken in connection with the subsequent
eminence and illustriousnes.s of both the men, surpasses any
thing in history, nay, even excels that famous antique fiction
of Belisarius, old and blind, begging a penny, f victim,
of Justinian's imperial ingratitude and cruelty after a life-
time of the hardships and dangers of war in his service, and
an hundred victories won for him and declining Rome.
The long revolutionary struggle being at last ended and
the occupation of arms at an end with it, peace found Col.
Jackson standing amidst the ruins of the recent war like
* White's Statistics of Georgia, page 337. National Portrait Gallery. Title
James Jackson.
t "Da Belisario obolum."'
8 GENERALS JACLSON AND AVAYNE.
thousands of his brother officers and soldiers in utter pov-
erty houseless, penniless, without means or employment
with no resources but such as existed in his own mind and
character, and in the boundless love and admiration of his
fellow-citizens, a love and admiration heightened by a sense
of gratitude for his services all which was well attested
by legislative resolutions of thanks and honof, and the gift
to him by the State of a house and home in the city of
Savannah.
But by nothing could he be paralysed or rendered a
cypher. It was a necessity of his nature and character that
he should cherish and pursue high aims under all circum-
stances, adverse or prosperous, of peace or of war. He
went instantly to work in the arduous, aspiring profession
to which he had been early dedicated. As we have already
seen, he had stored and trained his mind by juridical and
miscellaneous studies before the Revolution, and during
it not in arras alone was he developed and exercis-
ed. Led by duty and martial ardor to harrangue his com-
mands on many a trying occasion, he found out and culti-
vated that rare talent of ready, effective, stirring eloquence
with which nature, study, self-discipline and practice com-
bined gradually to endow him in a distinguished manner.
This bright, crowning talent coming in aid of his general
mass of ability and knowledge, and of his great energy,
uprightness, industry and enthusiasm, he rose rapidly at
the Bar and won the triumphant success there to which
allusion has been made. So striking was his success and
such the impression he made of possessing qualifications
equal to any, the highest, spheres of public service, that his
fellow-citizens soon looked forward with pride to his future
career and foresaw the honors of the patriot statesman clus-
tering on his brow along with those, already won, of the
forum and the field. It was at this stage, in 1788, that the
office of Governor was tendered him, but which his modesty
declined, on the ground of the want of age and political expe-
rience. For though his ambition was high and mettlesome,
GENERALS JACKSON AND WAYNE.
yet it was far from being prurient and self-blinding, and
did not lead him to think that what service he had seen in
our Legislature, and which was all the political apprentice-
ship he had then had, was sufficient to fit one so young for
the chief magistracy of the State.
There was, however, another great and interesting politi-
cal theatre just opening at that time, better suited to his
years, his genius, and his training and for which he felt a
predilection that may have had some subtle influence, for
aught we know, in disinclining him to the Governorship.
For the new Federal Constitution had been now adopted, and
in apportioning the representation of the States in Congress,
there had been given to Georgia three members in the Lower
Ilnuse, and the Legislature at its first meeting afterwards
had divided the State into three Congressional Districts for
the election of those members. Gen. Jackson became a can-
didate and a successful one in the First or Eastern District,
composed of the counties of Chatham, Liberty, Effingham,
Glynn and Camden. In the Second or Middle District,
Abraham Baldwin was chosen, and in the Third or Western,
George Mathews. All over the United States, likewise, the
people rallied in their respective States to make choice of
their Representatives in this their First Congress under the
new Federal system, and the Legislatures of the several
States proceeded also to elect their first National Senators.
Slowly and not without a seeming of backwardness and dif-
fidence did the great historic body get together and go about
its mighty task of building up from the very bottom, on a plan
prefixed and wholly novel, a vast and complex Republican
Empire. On the appointed day of meeting, the 4th of
March, 178U, only eight Senators and thirteen Representa-
tives were in attendance. Gradually other members came,
but so scatteringly that it was as late as the first of April
before a quorum appeared in the Lower House, and five days
later still before there was one in the Senate, nor was it
until the 30th of the month that Washington was installed
und the new Government ready to go to work.
10 GENERALS JACKSON AND WAYNE.
In the illustrious assemblage of tried, picked men with
whom Gen. Jackson now saw himself associated in the
National service, there was not a younger politician to be
found than himself. So he himself tells us in 'one of his
speeches. * And yet those who will follow him, as I have
done, through the volumes containing the debates of that
memorable, three-sessioned Congress, will perceive that he
carried with him into that body not only the exalted manly
fervor and public-spirit appropriate to bis age, temperament
and patriotic character, but also such thorough and various
preparation of mind and knowledge, such accurate acquain-
tance with the subjects that had to be discussed, and such
sense, talent and readiness in discussing them, in fine, such
a judicious activity and such sound, enlightened views, as
would have done honor to gray hairs and veteran statesman-
ship and soon secured to him rank and consideration
among his fellow members. Keeping attention closely upon
him throughout this, his two-years' Congressional novitiate,
we at times cannot help feeling wonder, as in the very
parallel case of Alexander Hamilton, tli at under all the
actual circumstances of his whole preceding life he should
have been able to make himself what he was in mental
culture and discipline, and to have amassed such intellectual
stores, especially of the political kind, as he showed himself
to possess. Nothing but a very superior constitution of mind
and nature combined with high ambition and indefatigable
energy, industry and application can explain the rare and
interesting phenomenon.
But whilst he was thus devoting himself to his country's
service and acquiring a proud name in Congress, intelli-
gence reached him there towards the end of his term, of an
event at home for which he was unprepared and which was
well calculated to sting him to the quick and rouse all the
lion in his nature. The 3d of January, 17'Jt, was the time of
the election for the next Representative term. Though
* Gales' Debates of the First Congress, vol. 1, page 1,266.
Benton's Abr. Debates, vol. 1, page SIR.
-KNKRALS JACKSON AND WAYNE. 11
standing again as a candidate, yet with a noble conscien-
tiousness and full of trust in his strength with the people,
he stirred not from his distant post of duty, but faithfully
remained there leaving his election to the care of his con-
stituents. That care happened not to be adequate to the
needs of the case. It did not prevent frauds and lawless
irregularities, the result of which was that he was superseded,
and Gen. Anthony Wayne, now become a citizen of Georgia,
the famed hero of Stony Point, the recoverer of Savannah
and Lower Georgia from the British, the winner also of
countless laurels at Brandywine, Germantown, Monmouth,
and on other hard fought fields of the Revolution, was re-
turned in his stead.
Perfectly characteristic was Gen. Jackson's dealing with
the criminalities of this election, and particularly with the
two most conspicuous criminals. His investigations, his
denunciations and his vengeance were prompt and severe.
The most outrageous villainy was that enacted in Camden
county by Osborne, Judge of the Superior Court, who, after
the close of the regular election in the day-time, not satis-
fied with the result, got possession of the legal returns and
substituted therefor during the night the forged returns of
a sham election. Short breathing time had he to exult over
the success of this foul perpetration. The very next Legis-
lature saw him arraigned for the crime, impeached by the
House of Representatives, dragged before the Senate, tried,
convicted and expelled from office, the only precedent of
the kind in any case higher than that of a Land Lottery
Commissioner that has ever occurred in the State. The
other worst iniquity was practiced in Effingham county. It
consisted of illegal management of the election and some
illegal voting besides, under the inimical counsel and influ-
ence of Thomas Gibbons, a man of very strong, determined
character and great courage and ability, and much noted
throughout a long and prosperous after-life, though never
engaged in any but private and professional pursuits. He
quitted Savannah, where he lived, and repaired to Effing-
12 GENERALS JACKSON AND WAYNE.
ham for the purpose of working therein the election against
Gen. Jackson. It was the terrible denunciations which the
part he thus acted brought down upon him from Gen. Jack-
son in his speech before the House of Representatives contest-
ing the election, that, doubtless, led to the duel and 'the three
shots' between them of which Mr. Spaldiug makes mention.*
* For a report of all The facts touching this election and of Gen. Jackson's
speech, see Clarke's Book of Congressional Contested elections p. p. 47-^8
Among the curious things contained in this report is the number of voters
in each county. According to the statement furnished to the Committee on Elec -
tionsby Gen Jackson, the poll, 'if all the returns had V>oen received and had been
proper'. would have been just f>51 votes in the whole district. Chatham county 2.">9
Liberty 69. Effingham 107, Glynn 27, Camden 89. At that time there were in
the whole State but eleven counties, and according to the census of 1790, the