Chapter III: Section 453: declares that the Commissioner of the General Land Office (1)

shall perform under the direction of the Secretary of the Interior all executive duties in anywise respecting such lands. There can be no question that this statute lays upon the Department of the Interior and the General Land Office the obligation to protect the archæological remains that are upon the public lands as definitely as it does the timber and other values.

In the exercise of the power thus conferred a policy has grown up in the Department of the Interior that should be more widely understood. This policy mobilizes, so to speak, the entire force of forest supervisors, rangers, special agents, Indian school superintendents and teachers, Indian agents, farmers and police, and even the Indians themselves, in the protection of these ruins as one of their regular duties, for the avowed purpose of preserving them for scientific investigation. It establishes the liberal policy that any competent scientist who desires to place the material secured in a public museum will be authorized by the Department of the Interior to examine ruins, but that no person will be permitted to excavate them for the purpose of acquiring specimens for traffic or private gain, and that wilful destruction of historic and prehistoric landmarks must cease. The most zealous archæologist must admit that this leaves little to be desired. The main thing, a system of governmental protection for archæological remains, is an accomplished fact. All the available forces of the Department are being wisely utilized. The scientific branch of the Government is lending its aid by furnishing as called upon the needed information concerning sites that are of value to science. Especially noteworthy is the emphasis habitually laid by the Commissioner of the General Land Office on “_the importance of furthering in every way possible researches with a view to increasing the knowledge of such objects and aiding in the general advancement of archæological science_.” This is administrative policy that every scientific man can uphold with most cordial enthusiasm.

Let us now consider the question of legislation relative to archæological remains. Three bills touching this subject will receive attention at the hands of the present Congress. Two of these are bills for the creation of national parks. One embraces the famous pueblo-like cliff dwellings of Mesa Verde, Colorado; the other includes the great district of pueblo ruins and excavated cliff dwellings known as Pajarito Park near Santa Fe, New Mexico. These bills are worthy of the strongest support, not only from the standpoint of historic and scenic preservation, but because of the educational value of the opening up of these interesting districts to the traveling public. Both bills are thoughtfully prepared, provide for the preservation and care of the ruins, and that, with the permission of the Secretary of the Interior, excavations may be conducted by properly qualified persons in the interests of science. These are districts of magnificent scenery, embracing less than two townships each, of non-mineral, non-agricultural lands. No rights whatever will be encroached upon, not a settler disturbed. I know of no reason whatever for opposition to either of these bills. They have the support of the people of Colorado and New Mexico, and their passage is urged by the Department of the Interior, the General Land Office having officially examined and favorably recommended both districts for the purposes specified.

The other bill referred to is of much greater importance since it is a general measure touching not only the preservation of archæological remains but affecting the whole field of archæological research. Such bills should receive the most critical scrutiny of those who are engaged in archæological work and know the field. This bill was introduced at the last session of Congress as H. R. 13478 by Congressman John F. Lacey of Iowa. The bill originated in the Department of the Interior. It grows out of the practical experience of the General Land Office in dealing with this subject. It is based on a knowledge of the situation and all the administrative problems involved. It is technically well drawn and exactly along the broad commendable lines of the policy of the department as above set forth. It is in fact an outgrowth of the operation of that policy, the crystalization of which into legislative enactment is now prayed for. Through repeated official declarations and acts we know in what manner the powers conferred in the bill will be administered. The reasons for desiring this enactment are set forth in the Annual Report of the Commissioner of the General Land Office for 1904. Since it is clear that the measure has for its motive the advancement of archæological science and since it emanates from the department that has learned the necessities of the case by long experience and will be charged with its administration, it manifestly should receive the support of the scientific forces unless on examination it is found inadequate. It has been widely published and is the only bill that has been drawn for the purpose that has not met with pronounced objections. I trust that this Society[47] will give serious consideration to the measure and, if it meets with your approval, send at the proper time a strong expression of that approval to the National Congress.

EDGAR L. HEWETT.

NATIONAL MUSEUM, WASHINGTON.

JOHN PAUL JONES’ FELLOW OFFICERS

So much public interest has been aroused in the United States by the discovery of the body of John Paul Jones in Paris, and so many misleading and confusing statements have been published about his career that it is desirable to understand just what was the part he played in the naval struggle for independence, and what is the value of his services as compared with those rendered by his compatriots on the high seas. Jones, unquestionably, stood head and shoulders over his brother officers in the service of the Revolution; yet there were some who pressed him rather closely in the award of honors concerning whose deeds comparatively little is known.

[It was our hope to have printed an account of the finding of John
Paul Jones’ body, written by General Horace Porter, but the General
wrote us from Paris May 22:

“I knew very well Mrs. Lamb’s Magazine, and would be very happy to
be a contributor to yours, but am so pressed by the winding up of my
duties here, and the finishing of the translations of French experts
and scientists, etc., on the Paul Jones matter, that I really have
not a moment I can call my own. Assuring you of my appreciation of
the interest you have manifested in the subject, and regretting very
much that I cannot answer you more favorably.

Yours very truly,
HORACE PORTER.”

We have, however, much pleasure in quoting from the New York
_Evening Post_ the article by Edgar Stanton Maclay.—ED.]

Captain Jones was a prolific chronicler of his own doings and left invaluable records of his truly brilliant achievements. This is mentioned not in the least to detract from the credit so justly due him (for it is the more to his honor that, in the rough-and-tumble calling he espoused, he found time to cultivate one of the “polite arts,” then generally deemed unnecessary in his profession), but to explain why it is that so little is known of what his brother captains accomplished in the same period. Our navy officers of the Revolution were bred, as a rule, in the hard school of experience, and, to most of them, the task of writing was about as distasteful as taking a dose of unpalatable medicine. The result has been that, while the world for one hundred and twenty-five years has been fully informed of the superb heroism of John Paul Jones, it has been kept in comparative ignorance of what his contemporaries accomplished.

This is regrettable for more reasons than one, chief among which is that, while Jones will be found to have suffered nothing by the comparison, these humbler heroes of his day have not received the recognition so justly due them. Of the twenty-nine officers who held the rank of naval captain in our service during the Revolution, only a few emerged from obscurity. They, like the great majority in all services, were destined to perform that hardest of all professional work, the monotonous routine duty incident to the carrying on of naval war.

There were a few, however, who had the good fortune to emerge from the oblivion of naval drudgery, and, perhaps, the greatest of these is Nicholas Biddle, of good Pennsylvania stock. He commanded the _Andrea Doria_ in the first naval expedition of the war, Captain Jones (then a lieutenant) serving in the same squadron aboard the flagship _Alfred_. Jones shortly afterward won the immortal distinction of taking the _Serapis_ while his own ship went down.

A year before the _Bonhomme Richard_-_Serapis_ fight, Biddle had the unique distinction of both “going up” and “going down” in his ship, the thirty-two gun frigate _Randolph_, in her engagement with the ship-of-the-line _Yarmouth_. Jones’ bravery of Flamborough Head was superb, but it does not equal the patriotism and noble sacrifice of Biddle, who, in order to save his convoy of seven rich merchantmen laden with goods indispensable to the American cause, unhesitatingly ran alongside the monster ship-of-the-line and was blown up, 311 of the _Randolph’s_ complement of 315 perishing, including Biddle—but the convoy was saved. This was the noblest act of self-sacrifice on a large scale, in the annals of the American navy. Earlier in the war Biddle, while in command of the _Andrea Doria_, in a cruise of four months captured ten English vessels, which, with the exception of two, reached port in safety—two of the prizes containing 400 soldiers of a Highland regiment.

While the immortal distinction of being the first man to hoist our national colors aboard an American warship belongs to Captain Jones, the by no means small honor of showing the American flag for the first time on a regularly commissioned American warship in European waters belongs to Captain Lambert Wickes, who crossed the Atlantic in the sixteen-gun war brig _Reprisal_. Lambert made a cruise in the Bay of Biscay, and in two circuits of Ireland took some twenty prizes.

Nor should the daring cruises of Captain Gustavus Conyngham in the _Surprise_ be overlooked. One year before Captain Jones appeared on the other side of the Atlantic as commander of an American warship, Conyngham scoured the coast of England and picked up prizes in the very chops of the English Channel. Our commissioner in Europe, Silas Deane, wrote:

“Conyngham, by his first and second bold expeditions, is become the terror of all the eastern coast of England and Scotland, and is more dreaded than Thurot was in the late war.”

Then there were Captains Thomas Thompson and Elisha Hinman, who one year before Captain Jones’ appearance in English waters, executed a dash against a British fleet which is second in audacity only to Jones’ attack on the British fleet off Spurn Head. On the night of September 2, 1777, the thirty-two-gun frigate _Raleigh_, and the twenty-four-gun ship _Alfred_, commanded by Captains Thompson and Hinman, while on their way across the ocean, discovered a fleet of merchantmen, escorted by four British warships, among them the _Druid_. Availing himself of the cover of night, Thompson worked his way into the fleet undetected, and getting alongside the _Druid_ opened a terrific fire on her so that in a short time she was reduced to a sinking condition. Realizing the folly of fighting the combined escort, Thompson then made good his escape, and arrived safely in France with the _Raleigh_ and _Alfred_.

Nor should the daring of an American privateer be overlooked, which, very much after the manner of Jones at Whitehaven, sent a force of men ashore on English soil and made prisoners of a lieutenant and an adjutant of a British regiment, as the following extract from the private letter of an English gentleman will show:

“An American privateer of twelve guns came into this road [Guernsey] yesterday morning, tacked about on the firing of guns from the castle, and, just off the island, took a large brig bound for this port, which they have since carried into Cherbourg. She had the impudence to send her boat in the dusk of the evening to a little island off here called Jetto, and unluckily carried off the lieutenant of Northley’s Independent Company with the adjutant, who were shooting rabbits for their diversion.”

Not only in English home waters were American naval efforts being expended with conspicuous advantage to the cause before Jones appeared on the scene, but in British colonial possessions our hardy mariners created unprecedented havoc in the enemy’s commerce, which did much to bring the mother country to terms. An English correspondent writing from Jamaica under date of May 2, 1777, said that in one week upward of fourteen English ships were carried into Martinique by American warships. Another Englishman, writing from Grenada, April 18, 1777, said:

“Everything continues excessively dear here, and we are happy if we can get anything for money by reason of the quantity of vessels that are taken by American privateers. A fleet of vessels came from Ireland a few days ago. From sixty vessels that departed from Ireland, not above twenty-five arrived in this and neighboring islands, the others (it is thought) being all taken by the American privateers. God knows, if this American war continues much longer, we shall all die of hunger. There was a Guineaman that came from Africa with 450 negroes, some thousand-weight of gold dust, and a great many elephant teeth; the whole cargo being computed to be worth twenty thousand pounds sterling, taken by an American privateer a few days ago.”

Captain Jones’ brilliant career does not suffer by a comparison with these extraordinary achievements on the high seas. On the contrary, his record is the more resplendent by the contrast. These incidents are mentioned only to show that while Jones was the brightest star in the galaxy of our naval heroes, “there were others” who contributed to the lustre of American naval renown in the Revolution.

Having shown, briefly, the work done by other distinguished sea fighters in our struggle for independence, we can better estimate the worth of the truly great achievements of Captain John Paul Jones while in the service of the United States. They suffer no diminution by having Captain Jones shorn of the false title of “Admiral.” There have been only three “Admirals” in the United States navy: Farragut, Porter, and Dewey. The nearest approach to an admiral in our navy of the Revolution was the title conferred upon Esek Hopkins, who was made “commander-in-chief” of our sea forces, a rank intended to correspond to that held by Washington on land. On the escape of the British warship _Glasgow_, in Long Island Sound, 1776, Hopkins was unjustly blamed for the mishap, and the title of “commander-in-chief of the navy” was dropped.

Neither is it necessary to call Jones the “father of the American navy.” If such a title could be properly applied to any one, that person is John Adams, who, from the beginning, strenuously advocated the need of a navy, and worked harder than any one man of his time for its establishment on a permanent basis. The fame of Captain Jones needs none of these artificial bolsters for its support. It stands on the solid foundation of personal merit and nothing can add to or detract from it. We have ample evidence of this in the extraordinary manifestation of popular interest in the removal of his remains from a foreign soil to a final resting place in America.

What has been said here about the exploits of other naval heroes in the Revolution is used merely as a foil for the better setting off of the great central figure of the navy of that period. What Biddle, Wickes, Conyngham, Thompson, Hinman, and the American privateersmen did separately, Jones did as one man.

After taking as commendable a part as a subordinate could in the successful expedition to New Providence, he commanded the warship _Providence_, and performed some of the most remarkable feats in seamanship on record, besides inflicting serious losses on the enemy. As commander of the _Alfred_, in which he began his American career as lieutenant, he added to his reputation as a daring and successful skipper. In the _Ranger_ he cruised in the Irish Sea with a boldness and success that has never been surpassed, while his extraordinary career in the _Bonhomme Richard_ stands unsurpassed in the annals of the world’s naval history. Within the scope of his necessarily limited naval activities, he has set a standard of professional excellence that present and coming generations of naval aspirants will find difficult to surpass.

EDGAR S. MACLAY.

_Evening Post_, N. Y.

THE MOONLIGHT BATTLE

We have much pleasure in presenting our subscribers with the first
engraving of Thomas Birch’s painting of John Paul Jones’ greatest
sea-fight.

It illustrates the desperate encounter at the moment when a
hand-grenade has been dropped from the _Bon Homme’s_ mainyard down a
hatchway of the _Serapis_, causing a terrible explosion.

In the distance can be seen the British merchant vessels, under the
protection of the guns of Scarborough Castle, as also the conflict
between the _Pallas_,—the only other ship of Jones’ squadron
actively engaged,—and the _Countess of Scarborough_, which also
ended in the defeat of the British vessel.

For the use of the plate we are indebted to the kindness of Mr. S.
V. Henkels, Philadelphia.

BURLEIGH—AND JOHNSON’S ISLAND

It is safe to surmise that several elderly Americans have watched the news from Manchuria during the past winter with a half expectation of reading of some wild adventure on the part of Bennet Burleigh, correspondent of the London _Daily Telegraph_. Among these were Mr. Justice Brown of the United States Supreme Court, who just forty years ago secured his extradition from Canada on a nominal charge of robbery, but really on account of his participation in the Johnson’s Island conspiracy. Among them also was James Lattimore, once sheriff of Ottawa County, O., from whose custody he escaped, but who seems to have very pleasant recollections of his whilom prisoner, in spite of the fact that his private purse was somewhat depleted in efforts to recover the fugitive whose society he had found so agreeable that he had been in the habit of taking him about the village of Port Clinton with him. There may be living in Texas some of Burleigh’s journalistic associates prepared for almost any deed of daring on his part. The sketch of his career in “Who’s Who” reads as follows:

“Burleigh, Bennet, war correspondent, on the staff of the _Daily
Telegraph_ since 1882; b. Glasgow; married. Fought in American war
(twice sentenced to death); Central News correspondent throughout
first Egyptian war (present at Tel-el-Kebir); correspondent French
campaign Madagascar; as _Daily Telegraph_ correspondent accompanied
desert column from Korti to Metammah, 1884 (present at Abu Klea,
despatches); Ashanti expedition; Atbara expedition; Egyptian war
(present at Omdurman); South African war, 1899–1902. Address: 95 North
Side, Clapham Common, S. W.”

“Who’s Who” omits mention of several books of which he is the author—“Desert Warfare,” “Two Campaigns: Madagascar and Ashantee.” “Khartoum Campaign, 1898; or the Reconquest of the Soudan,” “Sirdar and Khalifa,” and “Natal Campaign.” In _Harper’s Magazine_ for July, 1900, Fred A. McKenzie says that for Burleigh to spend a day in battle and then ride sixty miles, afterwards write a long and brilliant dispatch and get it first through, is a trifle. He also says Burleigh is an ardent Socialist and has several times been a labor candidate for Parliament in Glasgow, that his favorite drink is soda-water, and that he abjures tobacco. He adds: “When every outlet from the Transvaal was closed, he boarded the train of the Boer General Joubert and traveled with him, securing a long interview with him and full details of the Boer intentions. He so won Joubert that the old general lent him a conveyance to go over into British territory.” But, as the country editor said of another brilliant newspaper correspondent, “Alas, not for him the glittering hatchet, not for him the fruitful cherry tree.” It is not true that Burleigh, or as he was then called, Bennet G. Burley, was twice sentenced to death during the American Civil War, though it might be said that twice he stood in some danger of being hanged by the Federals, into whose hands he had fallen and against whom he had waged irregular warfare. And both times he succeeded in escaping from custody.

Judge Daniel B. Lucas of Charlestown, W. Va., in his anonymously published “Memoir of John Yates Beall,” says Burley was the son of a Glasgow master mechanic and that when he first appeared in Richmond he had in his pocket the plan of a submarine battery invented by his father. He had also a plan for a torpedo that could be attached to the side of a vessel by screws and then ignited with a fuse. Judge Lucas asserts that Burley actually assisted one John Maxwell to fasten such a torpedo to a Union war vessel, but the fuse refused to ignite, no damage was done, and the torpedo found its way to New York, where it was exhibited at the corner of Fulton and Nassau streets. At a later date a Northern newspaper printed a story that before coming to America Burley had fought in Italy both with the Garibaldians and against them: but whether this be true or not, there is no question that he was engaged with Beall in certain small privateering enterprises in the waters of Eastern Virginia, or that he took part in a raid across Chesapeake Bay under Capt. Thad Fitzhugh in March, 1864, when the raiders captured the steam tug _Titan_ and destroyed another vessel. May 12, Burley was himself wounded and captured near the mouth of the Rappahannock River by a skirmish guard of the 36th United States Colored Infantry, and he had to surrender to black men, for no officers came up until the fighting was over. On his person were found papers authorizing him to go beyond the Confederate lines, and it was suspected that he had on foot some adventure as a spy. He was taken to Fort Delaware, forty miles below Philadelphia, whence he and five others attempted their escape through a sewer, the water in which came up to the log sleepers supporting the plank cover. The fugitives had to make their way for a distance of about twenty-five yards along this sewer, diving under each sleeper as they came to it, and upon reaching its mouth to swim the Delaware River for a distance of a mile and a half, with a tide running that more than doubled the effort necessary to cover the distance. Two of them were captured at the mouth of the sewer, and two were drowned in the river, but Burley and a companion, thanks to the Scotchman’s extraordinary physical powers, got away safely, being picked up in mid river by a vessel whose master professed to accept their story that they had been upset while on a fishing excursion, and took them to Philadelphia. Burley thence made his way to Canada, and in Toronto he fell in with his old associate in Eastern Virginia, John Y. Beall. Judge Lucas, who narrates these adventures, probably got his account of them from Burley himself.

Unlike the other Great Lake cities, Sandusky, O., lies not on a narrow creek, but upon the shore of a broad bay which encloses Johnson’s Island, about 300 acres in extent. The island and the surrounding waters present a very pleasing aspect, and the Sandusky people are grievously disappointed that this site was not selected for the Great Lake naval training station by the board which recently decided upon a point on Lake Michigan. It is worth noting that the convincing objection to any site on Lake Erie, its ease of access from a foreign and possibly hostile country, was the very cause of much official anxiety at the only time Johnson’s Island was used for a national purpose. For in October, 1861, the Government established here a dépôt for captured Confederate officers, whose numbers after the surrender of Vicksburg and Port Hudson ran up to between two and three thousand. They were confined within a stockade enclosing an area of fifteen acres, being housed in thirteen two-story barracks and guarded by two blockhouses, one at a corner of the palisade and one at the gate, so situated that it looked down the street between the two rows of barracks. One of these blockhouses, with the prison cemetery and the ruins of two earth forts, now forms the only relic of the island’s occupation by the Confederates. The cemetery contains 206 uniform marble slabs erected after the war by the Southern people. The whole number of Confederates buried here was about 230, five at least of whom were executed by the Federal authorities for atrocious treatment of Southern Unionists, enlisting troops within the Federal lines, and similar offenses. The graves on the island have for years been regularly decorated with flowers by the Sandusky Grand Army men when they were paying the same tribute to the memory of their comrades buried on the mainland, and they have even been subjected to some criticism for this display of magnanimity. One sometimes sees statements that none of the prisoners ever succeeded in escaping from Johnson’s Island, but in the Burley extradition proceedings Capt. Robert C. Kennedy, who was afterwards hanged for his part in the plot to burn New York, swore that he had effected such an escape.

Almost from the establishment of this dépôt for prisoners of war there were rumors of threatened attacks upon it by Confederates from Canada, though the first actual plan for a Rebel raid on the Great Lakes of which we have any official evidence, seems to have been directed primarily against the _Michigan_, the only Union war vessel in these waters, while she still lay at Erie. In February, 1863, Lieut. William Murdaugh, of the Confederate navy, laid before his superiors a plan for capturing the _Michigan_ and destroying the lake cities. He proposed, with a small steamer and fifty men armed with cutlasses, revolvers, and small iron buoys to be used as torpedoes, to surprise and capture the Union vessel by boarding and then, before news of the affair had reached the Canadians, to send the smaller vessel back through the Welland Canal, to work destruction along the New York shore of Lake Ontario, and especially to the Erie Canal aqueduct at Rochester, while he himself proceeded, in the _Michigan_, to treat in a similar fashion the locks and shipping at Buffalo, Cleveland, Chicago, Milwaukee, and the Sault Ste. Marie, finally running the _Michigan_ ashore in Georgian Bay and destroying her. The Confederate Cabinet approved of the scheme and set aside $100,000 for its consummation, but Murdaugh says that when everything was ready for a start Jefferson Davis, while deeming the enterprise practicable, caused it to be laid aside for a time, lest such a storm should be aroused over the violation of the British neutrality laws as to put a stop to the building of Confederate ironclads then on the stocks in England. Just six months later Secretaries Seddon and Mallory suggested to Lieut. R. D. Minor, also of the Confederate navy, a similar undertaking having for its main purpose the release of the Confederates confined at Sandusky. The proposition was eagerly embraced, and a party of twenty-two naval officers, who undertook to carry it out, reached Montreal about October 21 and announced to the Johnson’s Island prisoners, through the personal column of the New York _Herald_, that “a carriage would be at the door a few nights after the fourth of November.” The original plan contemplated taking passage on a lake steamer at Windsor, opposite Detroit, and seizing her when fairly out on Lake Erie. The prisoners were expected to overcome their rather scanty guard, and their rescuers were simply to receive them on board for transportation to Canada. But on learning that the lake steamers seldom and at irregular intervals stopped at any Canadian port, and possibly because the conspirators had ascertained that the _Michigan_ now lay in front of the prison, a different method was adopted. Passage was to be taken at St. Catherines on one of a line of steamers running from Ogdensburg to Chicago, for the party, as mechanics and laborers who were to be employed on the waterworks of the latter city. With numbers increased to fifty-four from escaped prisoners found in Canada, the conspirators assembled at St. Catherines armed with revolvers, butcher knives, and two small nine-pounders, a store of dumb-bells having been laid in to serve as cannon balls. A private named Conelly went to Ogdensburg and paid the passage money for twenty-five men, with an agreement that as many more laborers should be taken as he could secure. The weapons were to be boxed up and marked “Machinery,” and the plan was, after seizing the vessel, to arrive at Sandusky about daylight, come into collision with the _Michigan_ as if by accident, board and carry her, turn her guns on the prison headquarters, and demand the surrender of the island, the reputation for humanity of the commander, Col. William S. Pierson, being one of the factors relied on for the success of the plot. The Confederate prisoners were to be taken to Canada by some of the steamers lying at Sandusky, while the _Michigan_, her crew reinforced by some fifty rebel officers from the island, was to lay waste the shore of Lake Erie, paying especial attention to Buffalo. But on November 11, Lord Monck, Governor-General of Canada, warned the Washington authorities of the plot, at the same time taking precautions to prevent its execution. Two days before, the military officials at Detroit had sent word that an attack was to be made on the prison, and the guard had been considerably strengthened; but Lord Monck’s message caused general alarm among the lake cities. While Gen. Jacob D. Cox was fortifying Cedar Point, at the entrance of Sandusky Bay, Gen. Dix was recommending the removal of the prisoners from Johnson’s Island, so greatly was he disturbed over the undefended condition of Buffalo, whither he had hurried. A month later Gen. Halleck expressed the belief that there was “no real foundation for the pretended raid,” but the foregoing story of the preparations is taken from a letter to Admiral Buchanan from Lieut. Minor, who attributes the failure of the enterprise wholly to its betrayal to Lord Monck, which he charges to one McCuaig, a Canadian sympathizer with the South.

The connection is not clear between the inchoate Murdaugh-Minor plot of 1863, and the actual Beall-Burley-Cole attempt of 1864. But the advent in Canada, as a Confederate emissary, of Jacob Thompson, President Buchanan’s Secretary of the Navy, probably explains the revival of the scheme. At any rate Thompson reports to Secretary Benjamin that he sent Capt. Charles H. Cole around the lakes as a lower deck passenger to study the various harbors and to learn all he could about the _Michigan_, in order to devise some plan for her capture. Cole had belonged to Forrest’s command, had been taken prisoner, and had been released on taking an oath of allegiance to the United States. Maj. Robert Stiles, of Richmond, who had the misfortune to be confined in the same casemate with Cole at Fort Lafayette at a later date, regards him as an unmitigated villain and says it was believed that he had belonged to both the Union and Confederate armies and had deserted from both, and Judge Lucas, whom he once visited, entertains an almost equally unfavorable opinion of the man who now established himself in Sandusky and, professing to be engaged in the oil business, proceeded to cultivate acquaintance with military and naval officers, his tactics being based chiefly on the hypothesis that they suffered from a perennial and unconquerable thirst. He was accompanied by a woman whom he sometimes introduced as his wife, but who was regarded by some of the _Michigan’s_ officers as a person of doubtful character. Cole did succeed in establishing terms of intimacy with some army and navy officers, and in a newspaper article of 1882, purporting to be based on his revelations, it was asserted that he got two Confederates enlisted on board the _Michigan_ and ten in the troops guarding the prison; but the article contains such absurdities as an account of a visit to the _Michigan_ by Jacob Thompson disguised in petticoats, and is otherwise so palpably fictitious as to render it practically worthless. There are Sandusky traditions that he won over some of the vessel’s engineering force, with the result of disabling her temporarily, but these stories are scouted by the one surviving officer of the ship, Capt. James Hunter, of Erie, then an acting ensign, and they do not find the slightest support in the official documents of the time. The naval officer with whom Cole was most intimate was transferred to the Atlantic coast before anything happened, on account of his habits, and Capt. Hunter, whom Cole had tried to induce to leave the service, remembers his indignation with the conspirator because the latter criticised this transfer and otherwise presumed upon his acquaintance. Hunter suspected him of being a counterfeiter.

The real leader of the enterprise, John Yates Beall, was the opposite of Cole in every respect, being a young man of strong religious convictions and of serious character throughout. He was a graduate of the University of Virginia, belonged to an old family in the Shenandoah Valley, and owned one of the best farms there. Having been wounded in October, 1861, while serving as a private under Stonewall Jackson, he had spent some time with a brother in Dubuque County, Ia., and on the discovery that he was a Confederate had fled to Canada, thence returning South, and, under a commission as an acting master in the Confederate navy, embarking in those Chesapeake Bay privateering enterprises to which reference has been made and in which Burley was associated with him. His biographer claims for him the original suggestion of the Lake Erie undertaking, but he is here without support from the official records. Beall’s operations in Eastern Virginia caused the Federal authorities so much annoyance that a considerable effort was made to end them, with the result that he was captured on board a schooner he had just taken in November, 1863. He and his companions were detained at Fort McHenry in irons for over a month, with the idea that they should be regarded as pirates, but Gen. Butler finally ordered them to be placed on the footing of prisoners of war, and in May, Beall was exchanged. Returning to Richmond, he participated in the fighting around Mechanicsville as a volunteer, but a little later left the army, discouraged, his biographer says, both by the neglect of his superiors and by the condition of his health. He proceeded by way of Baltimore and New York to Canada, where on applying to Jacob Thompson for the command of a privateer on Lake Huron, he was told of a plan to capture the _Michigan_ and release the Johnson’s Island prisoners, and at once volunteered his services. His diary says that he also went to Sandusky and had a consultation there with Cole, returning thence to Windsor, opposite Detroit, where Thompson made his headquarters, to collect his men.

Sunday evening, September 18, 1864, Burley stepped on board, at her wharf in Detroit, the small steamer _Philo Parsons_, which ran between Detroit and Sandusky. He asked the clerk, Walter O. Ashley, to stop the next morning at Sandwich, on the Canadian side of the river, to take on three friends of his, one of whom was lame and could not well cross the ferry. Ashley consented on condition that Burley should himself come aboard at Detroit. On Monday morning, accordingly, Burley was one of the passengers who started with the boat, and at Sandwich three men, one of whom was Beall, jumped aboard. Later at Amherstburgh, or Malden, also on the Canadian side, sixteen roughly dressed men, with an old trunk tied with a rope, took passage. They appeared to have no relations with the Beall and Burley party, and were supposed to be returning Americans who had run away from the draft. At Middle Bass Island, which was the home of Capt. Atwood, commanding the steamer, he went ashore, leaving her in charge of the mate and Ashley, who was a part owner. After leaving Kelly’s Island, which is about six miles from the Ohio shore, Beall, who had been talking with the mate at the wheel, drew a pistol and declared that as a Confederate officer he took possession of the steamer. At the same time three others leveled revolvers at Ashley, and Burley ordered him into the cabin, whither the passengers, some fifty in number, were also driven, a guard being placed at the door. The old trunk was opened, and proved to contain hatchets and revolvers, with which the captors of the boat armed themselves. Burley proceeded to smash a trotting sulky that stood on deck and throw overboard the pieces, together with the rest of the deck load, consisting of iron, household goods, and tobacco. He and Beall then took the clerk to his office and compelled him to give up the steamer’s papers, later in the day taking also what money he had, amounting to some $90. These events occurred between four and five o’clock in the afternoon, and the boat had run down the lake to a point from which, as the mate, Dewitt C. Nicholls, afterwards testified, the _Michigan_ was plainly visible in Sandusky Bay. He was asked many questions about her, and when it was learned from him that the _Parsons_ had not enough fuel to take her much farther, he was ordered to turn her about and head for Middle Bass Island, where wood could be taken on board. While she was still lying at the wharf there, the _Island Queen_, a smaller boat which plied between this group of islands and Sandusky, came up, having on board about twenty-five unarmed Union soldiers, who were on their way to Toledo to be mustered out. As she unsuspiciously moored alongside, some of Beall’s men jumped on board and took possession. A dozen pistols were fired, and the engineer of the _Queen_ was shot in the face, but not seriously injured. Gen. Dix, who made an official report on the whole affair, says that several persons were knocked down and that some injuries were suffered from blows with hatchets, one of which caused a profuse loss of blood, but this was the limit of personal suffering inflicted by the raiders. The passengers of both boats, after some detention in the cabin and hold of the _Parsons_, were put ashore on the island, as were most of the two crews, a few men being retained on the _Parsons_ to handle her. The soldiers were paroled not to bear arms against the Confederacy until regularly exchanged, and the civilians were required to promise that they would say nothing of what had happened for twenty-four hours. Then the two steamers, lashed abreast, got under way, but after going about five miles, the _Queen_ was scuttled and set adrift, after wards sinking on Chickanolee Reef. The _Parsons_ continued on her way toward Sandusky for a time, but owing to a failure to receive at Kelly’s Island a messenger from Cole, all the party except Beall, Burley, and two others, weakened at the prospect of attacking the _Michigan_ with hatchets and revolvers. Beall regarded their prudence as mutiny, and required from them a written statement, which was drawn up on the back of a bill of lading and can be found with the names of the signers in Capt. T. T. Hines’s account of the affair in vol. 2 of the _Southern Bivouac_. With great reluctance on the part of Beall, the boat’s head was turned toward the Detroit River, and the residents of Middle Bass, who were out burying their valuables, saw her steaming by in the darkness, “like a scared pickerel.” On the way a Confederate flag was hoisted, the mate, Nicholls, being required to assist in the unpleasant task of getting it up, and there was some talk of attacking a vessel or two that were passed and of robbing the island home of a Detroit banker named Ives. A boat load of plunder was landed near Malden, and at Sandwich the _Parsons_ was abandoned, some of her furniture being put ashore and her injection pipes being cut, so that she would fill and sink. The raiders then disappeared, a couple of them who were later arrested by the Canadian authorities being discharged by a justice of the peace after a detention of two hours.

Beall’s plan of attack on the _Michigan_ is not intelligible. Cole intended to have some of her officers ashore that evening participating in a revel, and perhaps there was some basis for the later talk of drugged wine to be sent aboard. Captain Hunter remembers two occasions when Cole did send wine to the officers. The prisoners knew some scheme for their release was on foot, for Archibald S. McKennon, of South McAlester, I. T., the present counsel for the Seminole Nation, who was then on the island, tells the writer: “We were organized into companies and regiments and had armed ourselves with clubs, which were made of stovewood and other material at hand, with which to make the fight. I think I was a captain of the organization. Anyhow, I occupied some position by which I had information of the contemplated movement, for I remember I had several conferences with the colonel of the organization as to my duties, and we were in constant expectation of orders to make the fight, which never came. It surely would have been a pitiable affair, for the undertaking was wholly impracticable.” Capt. Hunter has an ingenious theory that Beall intended that just as the _Parsons_ entered the Bay, she should burst into flames, and when the _Michigan_ sent her boats to rescue the passengers, the conspirators could get possession of these and with them gain the deck of the warship without arousing suspicion. Gen. Dix did find on the _Parsons_ some combustible material, but he was probably right in supposing that it had been prepared for the purpose of burning Banker Ives’s house or the _Parsons_ when she was abandoned. It looks as if Beall was trusting largely to luck, which, as the case turned out, was overwhelmingly against him. For on Saturday, two days before he boarded the _Parsons_, a man professing to be a Confederate refugee in Canada called at the military headquarters in Detroit and gave such information that the following telegram was sent to the _Michigan’s_ commander:

DETROIT, _September 17, 1864_.

CAPT. J. C. CARTER:

It is reported to me that some of the officers and men of your steamer
have been tampered with, and that a party of rebel refugees leave
Windsor tomorrow with the expectation of getting possession of your
steamer.

B. H. HILL,
_Lieutenant-Colonel, U. S. Army, Military Commander_.
FREDERICK J. SHEPARD.

BUFFALO, N. Y.

(_Conclusion next month._)

ORIGINAL DOCUMENTS

LETTER OF ROBERT STUART, INDIAN AGENT, TO JOHN C. SPENCER,

SECRETARY OF WAR.

[Secretary Spencer was the father of the unfortunate Midshipman Philip
Spencer, of the brig _Somers_, who was hanged for mutiny by the
orders of Captain Mackenzie. The letter is about incursions of
Canadian halfbreeds. The endorsement is by General Winfield Scott,
then Commander of the Army. It is interesting as referring to the
now almost extinct buffalo, then found in enormous herds, and as
showing the widely scattered posts of the “Old Army,” and their
various duties. General Scott’s endorsement is in a hand as minute
as he himself was large.]

Washington, _February 19, 1842_.

HON. JOHN C. SPENCER,
Sec’y of War.

SIR:

I have the honor to communicate in writing, the substance of the verbal information I gave you some time since, relative to the annual hunting expeditions which are made by the British half breeds of Red River, into the territory of the United States. These keen & expert hunters usually leave the colony in the month of June, after having made the necessary preparations for curing the meat of the large numbers of Buffalo which they annually slaughter. Their route is in the direction of Devil’s Lake, & thence diagonally across towards the Missouri River, the very region which abounds with Buffalo. From the information which I have received on this point 15 to 20,000 of these animals are destroyed annually by them. They also each Fall, divide into small parties and carry off much valuable furs. The bands of Sioux Indians, who are the possessors of this region are conciliated by presents of Liquor, &c.—and do not consequently attempt to molest them, nor would it be easy to prevent these incursions, if the Indians were so disposed; for the halfbreeds usually number 300 or 400 men, well armed & united under a species of discipline. * * * * * *

If measures were taken to put a stop to these expeditions, the Hudson Bay Company would be cut off from their supplies of pimegan (pemmican—ED.) (dried and pounded Buffalo meat) upon which they rely much for subsistence; and the halfbreeds, deprived of a lucrative trade, would soon be compelled to separate into smaller bands, and remove farther into the North. Ohio & Michigan would then be resorted to by the agents of the Co. to obtain provisions, and the States would be so far benefitted in furnishing supplies, in lieu of those of which our own Indians & Traders are now so improperly deprived.

The halfbreeds of the North are for the most part a fierce & turbulent race, impatient of control, & so much feared by the Hudson Bay Co. that they are said to keep in pay some of their leading men, with a view to prevent outbreaks. They are not nearly so numerous as they have been represented, probably not exceeding 600 to 800 men, in all, and the white settlers, who numbered 1000 to 2000 a few years since, are mostly dispersed. I would suggest whether it might not be well to send a force, not less than 300 to 400 Dragoons, at the proper season, which would at once overawe both halfbreeds & Indians.

Sir, Your Obd’t serv’t,
ROBERT STUART,
Act’g Sup’t Ind. Affairs.

_Endorsement_: When the 5 troops of the 2d. Dragoons, now in Florida, shall join the headquarters of the reg’t., in the So. West (say in June) the 1st Dragoons may be concentrated, or nearly so, on the Upper Missouri, & thus furnish the detachment of two or three troops wanted for the within purpose. Three troops would be sufficient—Mr. Stuart does not give the southern limits of the halfbreeds. Feb. 20, 1842.

_Postscript_: Of the 1st Dragoons, one troop is now at Fort Atkinson (Nebraska—ED.), 6 are at Ft. Leavenworth, & 3 on the Arkansaw. I still think 3 or 4 troops of horse, say even 150 men, enough.

WINFIELD SCOTT.

_Feb’y 25, 1842._

AUTOGRAPH LETTER OF EDGAR ALLAN POE.

[Addressed to his uncle, William Poe, of Augusta, Ga. Dated
Philadelphia, August 15, 1840. Valuable for its details of plan of a
proposed new magazine, and his past connection with others.]

DEAR WILLIAM,

Owing to a temporary absence from town I did not receive your welcome letter of the 28th July until this morning. I now hasten to reply, and in the first place let me assure you that, if I have not lately written, it is rather because I have been overwhelmed by worldly cares which left me scarce a moment for thought, than that I do not feel for you the kindest affection as well as deep gratitude for the services yourself and brothers have so often rendered me.

Herewith I send you a prospectus of my contemplated Magazine. I believe you know that my connection with the _Southern Messenger_ was merely that of editor. I had no proprietary in it and my movements were therefore much impeded. The situation was disagreeable to me in every respect. The drudgery was excessive, the salary was contemptible. In fact, I soon found that whatever reputation I might personally gain, this reputation would be all. I stood no chance of bettering my pecuniary condition, while my best energies were wasted in the service of an illiterate and vulgar, although well-meaning man, who had neither the capacity to appreciate my labors nor the will to reward them. For this reason I left him and entered first into an engagement with the _New York Review_ and afterwards with the _Gentleman’s Magazine_, writing occasionally for [both] journals; my object being merely to keep my head above water as regards money until a good opportunity [should arrive] of establishing a Magazine of my own in which I should be able to carry out my plans to full completion and at the same time have the satisfaction of feeling that my exertions were to my own advantage. I believe that the plans I here speak of and some of them you will find detailed in the Prospectus, are well devised and digested, and will meet with the hearty support of the most desirable and intelligent portion of the community, should I be able to bring them fairly before the public I feel assured that my fortune is made. The ambition which actuates me I know to be no ordinary or unworthy sentiment and knowing this, I take pride in earnestly soliciting your support, and that of your brothers and friends. If I fully succeed in my purpose I shall not fail to produce some lasting effect upon the growing literature of this country, while I establish for myself individually a name which that country ‘will not willingly let die.’...

It is upon the South that I chiefly rely for aid in the undertaking, and I have every hope that it will not fail me in my need. Yet the difficulties which I have to overcome are great, and I acknowledge to you that my prospects depend very much upon getting together a subscription list previously to the first of December. If by this day I can obtain 500 names, the work cannot fail to proceed, and I have no fears for the result. The friendship you have always evinced, the near relationship which exists between us, and the kind offer in your last letter, all warrant me in hoping that you will exert your whole influence for me in Augusta. Will you oblige me by acting as my agent for the _Penn Magazine_ in your city, this letter being your authority? If I am not mistaken, you already act in that capacity for the _Messenger_.

I will write a few lines also by this mail to your brother Robert, with a Prospectus, as you suggest—and also to Washington [Poe] at Macon.

Mrs. Clemm, my aunt, is still living with me, but for the last six weeks has been on a visit to a friend in the State of N. Jersey. She is quite well, having entirely recovered her health. Respecting the letter from Mr. Bayard I am quite at a loss to understand it. It is however possible that the letter was written by Mr. B. at a period when we were all in much difficulty in New York and that Mrs. C(lemm) concealed the circumstance from me through delicacy.

Yours truly,
E. A. P.

AUTOGRAPH LETTER OF PRESIDENT LINCOLN

[Relating to a soldier who had deserted. An interesting memento of the
traditional kind-heartedness of the great President, even in such a
serious matter as the desertion of a soldier in time of war, the
almost invariable penalty for which is death. This letter sold for a
high price in New York lately.]

EXECUTIVE MANSION

WASHINGTON, _July 25, 1864_.

Thomas Connor, a private in the 1st. Veteran New York Cavalry, is now imprisoned at hard labor for desertion. If the Colonel of said Regiment will say in writing on this sheet, that he is willing to receive him back to the Regiment, I will pardon, and send him.

A. LINCOLN.

LETTER OF WASHINGTON

[Ordering the execution of a soldier. In marked contrast to Mr.
Lincoln’s. It is addressed to Col. Tucker at Albany.]

HEADQUARTERS, _20th May, 1782_.

Sir:

I have rec’d your Letter of the 11th instant and another without date the former inclosing the proceedings of a Court Martial held for the Trial of Shem Kentfield,—

Inclosed you have copy of the General Order approving the proceedings and a Warrant for the Execution of the Prisoner—the place of Execution is left to you.

The necessity of the Contractors furnishing Lard Bread when required has been represented to Mr. Morris[48] who will doubtless take measures accordingly.

I am Sir Your very humble Servant
G. WASHINGTON.

LETTER OF COLONEL BARNARD BEEKMAN, S. C. ARTILLERY (STATE TROOPS.)

[He was taken prisoner at the capture of Charleston in 1780. Zubley’s
Ferry was across the Savannah River to the Georgia shore. As General
Moultrie was then the senior officer in South Carolina this letter
was probably meant for him.]

CAMP AT SHELDON (S. C.)

_23d October, 1779._

DR. GENERAL