Hay called Peter Taylor, Blennerhassett's former gardener, and Jacob Allbright, once a laborer on the eccentric Irishman's now famous island. Both were illiterate and in utter terror of the Government. Allbright was a Dutchman who spoke English poorly; Taylor was an Englishman; and they told stories equally fantastic. Taylor related that Mrs. Blennerhassett had sent him to Kentucky with a letter to Burr warning him not to return to the island; that Burr was surprised at the people's hostility; that Blennerhassett, who was also in Kentucky, confided they were going to take Mexico and make Burr king, and Theodosia queen when her father died; also that Burr, Blennerhassett, and their friends had bought "eight hundred thousand acres of land" and "wanted young men to settle it," and that any of these who should prove refractory, he [Blennerhassett] said, "by God, ... I will stab"; that Blennerhassett had also said it would be a fine thing to divide the Union, but Burr and himself could not do it alone.
Taylor further testified that Blennerhassett once sent him with a letter to a Dr. Bennett, who lived in Ohio, proposing to buy arms in his charge belonging to the United States—if Bennett could not sell, he was to tell where they were, and Blennerhassett "would steal them away in the night"; that his employer charged him "to get [the letter] back and burn it, for it contained high treason"; and that the faithful Taylor had done this in Bennett's presence.
Taylor narrated the scene on the island when Blennerhassett and thirty men in four boats fled in the night: some of the men had guns and there was some powder and lead.[1076]
Jacob Allbright told a tale still more marvelous. Soon after his employment, Mrs. Blennerhassett had come to this dull and ignorant laborer, while he was working on a kiln for drying corn, and confided to him that Burr and her husband "were going to lay in provisions for an army for a year"; that Blennerhassett himself had asked Allbright to join the expedition which was going "to settle a new country." Two men whom the Dutch laborer met in the woods hunting had revealed to him that they were "Burr's men," and had disclosed that "they were going to take a silver mine from the Spanish"; that when the party was ready to leave the island, General Tupper of Ohio had "laid his hands upon Blennerhassett and said, 'your body is in my hands in the name of the commonwealth,'" whereupon "seven or eight muskets [were] levelled" at the General; that Tupper then observed he hoped they would not shoot, and one of the desperadoes replied, "I'd as lieve as not"; and that Tupper then "changed his speech," wished them "to escape safe," and bade them Godspeed.
Allbright and Taylor were two of the hundreds to whom the Government's printed questions had been previously put by agents of the Administration. In his answers to these, Allbright had said that the muskets were pointed at Tupper as a joke.[1077] Both Taylor and he swore that Burr was not on the island when Blennerhassett's men assembled there and stealthily departed in hasty flight.
To the reading of the deposition of Jacob Dunbaugh, Burr's counsel strenuously objected. It was not shown that Dunbaugh himself could not be produced; the certification of the justice of the peace, before whom the deposition was taken, was defective. For the remainder of the day the opposing lawyers wrangled over these points. Marshall adjourned court and "took time to consider the subject till the next day"; when, in a long and painfully technical opinion, he ruled that Dunbaugh's affidavit could not be admitted because it was not properly authenticated.[1078]
LUTHER MARTIN
May 28, when the court again convened, was made notable by an event other than the reading of the unnecessarily long opinion which Marshall had written during the night: the crimson-faced, bellicose superman of the law, Luther Martin, appeared as one of Burr's counsel.[1079] The great lawyer had formed an ardent admiration and warm friendship for Burr during the trial of the Chase impeachment,[1080] and this had been intensified when he met Theodosia, with whom he became infatuated.[1081] He had voluntarily come to his friend's assistance, and soon threw himself into the defense of Burr with all the passion of his tempestuous nature and all the power and learning of his phenomenal intellect.
After vexatious contendings by counsel as to whether Burr should give additional bail,[1082] Marshall declared that "as very improper effects on the public mind [might] be produced," he wished that no opinion would be required of him previous to the action of the grand jury; and that the "appearance of colonel Burr could be secured without ... proceeding in this inquiry." Burr denied the right of the court to hold him on bail, but said that if Marshall was "embarrassed," he voluntarily would furnish additional bail, "provided it should be understood that no opinion on the question even of probable cause was pronounced by the court."[1083] Marshall agreed; and Burr with four sureties, among whom was Luther Martin, gave bond for ten thousand dollars more.[1084]