Sword and Olive Branch – 1791 to 1793 (pages 121-128)
(page 122, par. 3, line 1) General ‘Mad Anthony’ Wayne (1745-1796). Biographical details gleaned from a recent biography by Mary Stockwell, Unlikely General – Mad Anthony Wayne and the Battle for America. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2018.
(Page 123, par. 2, line 8) Horatio Gates (1727-1806). Gates had overall responsibility for Continental troops at the Battle of Saratoga, forcing an entire British Army under General John Burgoyne to surrender into captivity on October 7, 1777. Gates afterward enjoyed widespread recognition for that victory. In late 1777 and early 1778 a minor general on Washington’s staff advocated to some members of the Continental Congress replacing Washington with Gates. James Wilkinson was a part of that “Cabal.” It fizzled and Gates apologized. For an overview of Gates’ military contributions and interactions with other American army leaders, see article by Nelson, Paul David in ANB.
Gates’ subsequent career is interesting in conversation with themes in Ill-Fated Frontier. His military standing was tarnished by his 1780 defeat and rout at Camden, South Carolina by the British. Like Generals Nathaniel Greene and Anthony Wayne, all hailing from Northern states, Horatio Gates’ experiences in the Continental Army’s Southern Department during the Revolutionary War attracted him to return to the region to become a post-war slave-based plantation owner. Gates resided on such a plantation in Virginia for a time. Becoming disenchanted with that life, he returned to New York State. Unlike the others, he freed his enslaved African Americans when departing the South. For a general biography of Gates see Paul Nelson, General Horatio Gates: A Biography and Nelson’s article in ANB. For an overview of Continental Army generals’ experiences as black slave owners, see: Proknow, Gene. “Slavery Through the Eyes of Revolutionary Generals” Journal of the American Revolution, November 7, 2017, https://allthingsliberty.com/2017/11/slavery-eyes-revolutionary-generals/, last accessed June 6, 2021.
(page 123, par. 4, line 5) “more afraid of him than the Indians” Stockwell, Mary. Unlikely General – Mad Anthony Wayne and the Battle for America, p. 164.
(page 124, par. 2, line 5) Increase their firepower Winkler, John F. Fallen Timbers, p. 15 “Wayne’s ‘improved musketeers’ could fire their modified muskets with buckshot without needing to charge the pans.” This unusual innovation increased the rapidity of firing the 9-shot loads of 30 caliber, capabilities neutralizing the Indians’ penchant for rushing soldiers while reloading the unwieldy muzzle-loading flintlock muskets, while the scattering buckshot could wound unseen enemies lurking in the bushes.
(page 124, par. 4, line 6) dignity and ceremonies of Indian diplomacy Calloway, Colin G. The Indian World of George Washington, pp. 1-7 enumerates a number of Indian delegations visiting George Washington at the capital in Philadelphia during the early 1790s.
(page 126, par. 2, line 1) “final Indian offer at Sandusky” Calloway, Colin G., Ibid, p. 420; General Benjamin Lincoln, “Journal of a Treaty held in 1793, with the Indian Tribes North-west of the Ohio, by Commissioners of the United States,” Collections of the Massachusetts Historical Society, 1836, 3rd Series, Vol. 5: pp. 109-176.
(page 126, par. 3, line 4) “Impertinent and insolent” John Heckewelder as quoted by Calloway, ref. 115.
(page 128, par. 1, line 3) Authorities in Philadelphia William Hogeland argues that Alexander deliberately provoked “the kind of violence that would justify federal military suppression” to assert a strong national government, raise revenue for it, and assure financial success of wealthy Eastern creditors. See: Hogeland, William. The Whiskey Rebellion: George Washington, Alexander Hamilton, and the Frontier Rebels Who Challenged America’s Newfound Sovereignty; and Slaughter, Thomas P. The Whiskey Rebellion: Frontier Epilogue to the American Revolution.
(page. 139, par. 6, lines 3-4) cargo of tobacco, cotton, and furs Samuel S. Forman Papers in: Fairchild Collection, New York: NYPL, Ms Coll 969, box 3, Samuel S. Forman’s Spanish passport signed by Luisiana governor Estavan Miro, and account spreadsheet dated December 20, 1792, detailing Samuel S. Forman’s cargo from New Orleans to Philadelphia transported on account of General David Forman.
(page 140, par. 2) marred by storms and heavy seas. Samuel S. Forman was concerned about the “danger of being cast away on the Florida reefs” Forman and Draper, Journey Down the Ohio and Mississippi 1888, p. 63. He additionally complained to the captain about the ruined furs damaged by dampness during the rough passage, but was unable to recover any monetary damages. Samuel S. Forman Papers, NYPL, Op. cit., Receipt from William McFadden to Samuel S. Forman dated July 7, 1791, listing Forman’s cargo transported to Philadelphia. The actual Spanish land grant of 800 prime acres in the Natchez District is not known to have survived, a circumstance coming to Samuel S. Forman’s attention during his lifetime, and much to his consternation.
(page 140, par. 3-4) Philip Freneau (1752-1832) Soldier, poet, publisher, and politician, of the Early Republic. A sympathetic biographer stated that he was a man before his time, “who failed at everything he did.” Though known in his time and to modern students of American literature as an early nationalistic, distinctly American voice, there was no market for such writings as would later emerge in the 19th century. Freneau’s romanticized view of Native Americans as a force no longer to be reckoned with, must have contrasted with experiences of the Forman immigrants, probably shared by Samuel S. Forman with his family and friends, of formidable Native presence in the Northwest Territory during then then-ongoing war with Chief Little Turtle and his allies. Samuel S. Forman’s further recollections of brother-in-law Freneau: “He had in early life been a college mate with James Madison at Princeton, and has been aptly called the “patriot poet” of the Revolution, his effusions having been useful to the cause of the country during its great struggle for Independence….” “He lost his life in a violent snow-storm, in December 1832, in his eighty-first year, near Monmouth, New Jersey.” p. 12.
Freneau on Westward expansion: “On the Emigration to American and Peopling the Western Country” The Norton Anthology of American Literature., pp. 742-743.
(page 140, par. 3, line 7) In short order, Samuel S. hired on as an employee of Freneau’s print shop Samuel S. Forman thought Freneau was “much abused by the opposite party and poorly supported by his own” Forman Travels, NYHS manuscript c. 1850.
(page 140, par. 4, lines 4-7) second inauguration of George Washington Forman and Draper, Op. cit., p. 16. In his State of the Union Address to Congress that year, George Washington had to admit that the disordered state of the Western frontier, still unresolved, remained his and the nation’s focus of attention. Opining on the failed treaty negotiations at Sandusky and General Wayne’s decision to stay in garrison over the winter “has been in itself deemed preferable to immature efforts.” Meanwhile, Congressional inquiry into St. Clair’s defeat dragged on. Washington invoked a novel concept of executive privilege to shield from Congressional and public scrutiny some of his own appointees’ actions contributing to St. Clair’s defeat.
In the beginning of his second administration Washington judged a deliberate regrouping and pursuit of a peace overture with the Indians was “preferable to immature efforts” to counteract the Northwest Indian Confederation too soon after St. Clair’s defeat. George Washington, State of the Union Address, November 8, 1792, LOC. And held counseled against an “opinion of impotency or irresolution in the Government” George Washington, State of the Union Address, November 19, 1794, LOC, Op. cit.
(page 140, par. 5, line 5) But he did employ Samuel S. to represent him as agent on some small business matters between New York City and Philadelphia. These matters apparently included David Forman’s unresolved claim to be compensated for counterfeit New York bonds her had received Samuel S. Forman Papers, NYPL, Op. cit., Spreadsheet accounting for General Forman.
(page 141, par. 4, line 1) John Lincklaen (1768 – 1822) For a biographical sketch and a journal of his travels in the U.S. his endeavors in upstate New York, see: Helen L. Fairchild, ed. Travels in the years 1791 and 1792 in Pennsylvania, New York and Vermont: Journals of John Lincklaen.