26th May, 1814.
My Dear Sir,—I passed the last evening in company with the Emperor Alexander, who, however prepossessed in his favor, has surpassed my expectations. He really is a great, good, sensible, noble-minded man, and a sincere friend to the cause of liberty. We have long conversed upon American affairs. It began with his telling me that he had read with much pleasure and interest what I had sent him. I found ideas had been suggested that had excited a fear that the people of the United States had not properly improved their internal situation. My answer was an observation upon the necessity of parties in a commonwealth, and the assertion that they were the happiest and freest people upon earth. The transactions with France and England were explained in the way that, although the United States had to complain of both, the British outrages came nearer home, particularly in the affair of impressments. He spoke of the actual preparation and the hostile dispositions of England. I of course insisted on the rejection of his mediation, the confidence reposed in him by the United States who hastened to send commissioners chosen from both parties, which he very kindly acknowledged. He said he had twice attempted to bring on a peace. “Do, sir,” said I, “make a third attempt; it must succeed; ne vous arrêtez pas en si beau chemin. All the objects of a war at an end, and the re-establishment of their old limits can the less be opposed as the Americans have gained more than they have lost. A protraction of the war would betray intentions quite perverse and hostile to the cause of humanity. Your personal influence must carry the point. I am sure your majesty will exert it.” “Well,” says he, “I promise you I will. My journey to London affords opportunities, and I will do the best I can.” I told him I had received a letter from Mr. Gallatin, now in London, and we spoke of him, Mr. Adams, Mr. Bayard, and the two new commissioners. I had also other occasions to speak of America; one afforded me by the Swedish Marshal Stadinck, who mentioned my first going over to that country; another by a well-intentioned observation of Mme. de Staël that she had received a letter from my friend Mr. Jefferson, of whom he spoke with great regard. This led to observations relative to the United States and the spirit of monopoly in England extending even to liberty itself. The Emperor said they had been more liberal in Sicily than I supposed them. I did not deny it, but expressed my fears of their protecting Ferdinand against the cortes. His sentiments on the Spanish affairs were noble and patriotic. The slave-trade became a topic upon which he spoke with philanthropic warmth. Its abolition will be an article in the general peace.
You see, my dear sir, I had fully the opportunity we were wishing for. If it has not been well improved, the fault is mine. But I think some good has been done. And upon the promise of a man so candid and generous I have full dependence. If you think proper to communicate these details to Mr. Gallatin, be pleased to have them copied. He spoke very well of him, and seemed satisfied with the confidence of the United States and the choice of their representatives to him. By his last accounts Mr. Adams was at St. Petersburg. The particulars of this conversation ought not, of course, to be published; but you will probably think it useful to communicate to the commissioners.
The obstinate determination of England to isolate the United States and cut off all means of co-operation between her and the Baltic powers became more and more evident as the season advanced, and stimulated Gallatin’s efforts. On the 2d June he wrote to Mr. Monroe from London: “I have remained here waiting for the answers of our colleagues at Gottenburg, and will depart as soon as I know that they and the British commissioners are on their way to the appointed place. The definitive treaty of European peace being signed and ratified, Lord Castlereagh is expected here this day, and the Emperor of Russia in the beginning of next week. I enclose copy of an extract of a letter of Mr. Crawford to me. I may add that I have ascertained that the exclusion of all discussions respecting maritime questions and of any interference in the American contest was one of the conditions proposed at the Châtillon conferences, and I have reason to believe that, with respect to the first point, a positive, and in the other at least a tacit, agreement have taken place in the late and final European negotiations at Paris.”
Doubtless one of Mr. Gallatin’s objects in remaining so long in London was to have a personal interview with the Emperor. La Fayette wrote to him from Paris on the 3d of June, recounting briefly the incidents of his own interview with the Emperor at the house of Mme. de Staël, and urging Mr. Gallatin to see him: “You may begin the conversation with thanking him for the intention to do so [to serve us] to the best of his power, which he very positively expressed to me. Our friend Humboldt, who has already spoken to him on the subject, would be happy to receive your directions for anything in his power. I hasten to scribble this letter to be forwarded by him.”
The Emperor Alexander came to London, and Mr. Gallatin had his interview on the 17th or 18th June. Of this interview Mr. C. J. Ingersoll, in his History of the War of 1812, has given a somewhat dramatic account, derived perhaps from Mr. Levett Harris, who had been secretary to the mission at St. Petersburg, and who, being now in London, accompanied Mr. Gallatin to the audience. Mr. Ingersoll has in that work so seldom succeeded in stating facts with correctness, that to quote him is usually to mislead. All Mr. Gallatin ever recorded on the subject of the interview is contained in his despatch of June 20 to Mr. Monroe: “Mr. Harris and myself had on the 17th an audience from the Emperor of Russia. His friendly dispositions for the United States are unimpaired; he earnestly wishes that peace may be made between them and England; but he does not give or seem to entertain any hope that he can on that subject be of any service. I could not ascertain whether he had touched the subject since he had been here; only he said, ‘I have made two—three attempts.’ If three, the third must have been now. He added, ‘England will not admit a third party to interfere in her disputes with you. This is on account of your former relations to her (the colonial state), which is not yet forgotten.’ He also expressed his opinion that, with respect to conditions of peace, the difficulty would be with England and not with us. On the whole, this conversation afforded no reason to alter the opinions expressed in my letter of 13th inst.[124] I yesterday, with his permission, sent him a note, ... which contains nothing new to you, and which will not probably produce any effect.”[125]
To these facts Mr. Ingersoll adds some details. According to him, the interview took place on the 18th, the day when the city of London gave its great banquet to the allied sovereigns at Guildhall. The time appointed by the Emperor for his audience was the hour before he left his residence in Leicesterfields to attend the entertainment; and Mr. Gallatin and Mr. Harris drove in “a mean and solitary hackney-coach, with a permit,” through the shouting crowd, unknown and unnoticed, except by an occasional jeer and a hail as “old Blucher” from the throng. The Emperor’s words are not given, but the substance was that Mr. Gallatin and his associates should take a high tone and outbrag the British.
The reader may safely assume that the Emperor said nothing of the kind, for Alexander was not a man to indulge in impertinence. He earnestly wished for peace, and he saw how small a chance there was of obtaining it. He doubtless spoke to Mr. Gallatin with perfect sincerity of his wishes and his acts; he may have hinted that America would gain little by showing too great eagerness for peace, but he would certainly have said nothing which, if repeated, could possibly have offended England. Indeed, he had gone to the extreme verge of civility in giving any audience at all to an American agent while he was himself the guest of the country with which America was then at war.
The result of all Mr. Gallatin’s efforts in this direction was, therefore, apparently a complete failure. The power of England was supreme in Europe, and whatever irritation the continental sovereigns may have felt under the extravagant maritime pretensions of Great Britain, not one of them ventured to lisp a word of remonstrance. Yet it is by no means certain that Mr. Gallatin was so unsuccessful as he seemed. The fate of the negotiation at Ghent hung on Lord Castlereagh’s nod, and among the many influences which affected Lord Castlereagh’s mind, a desire to preserve his friendly relations with Russia was one of the most powerful. The moment came when the British ministry had to decide the question whether to let the treaty fail or to abate British pretensions, and it can hardly be doubted that the repeated remonstrances of Russia had some share of influence in causing England to recoil from a persistent policy of war. At the crisis of the negotiation, on the 27th September, Lord Liverpool wrote to Lord Castlereagh, who was then at Vienna, advising him of the capture of Washington and the state of affairs at Ghent, and adding: “The Americans have assumed hitherto a tone in the negotiation very different from what their situation appears to warrant. In the exercise of your discretion as to how much you may think proper to disclose of what has been passing to the sovereigns and ministers whom you will meet at Vienna, I have no doubt you will see the importance of adverting to this circumstance, and of doing justice to the moderation with which we are disposed to act towards America. I fear the Emperor of Russia is half an American, and it would be very desirable to do away any prejudice which may exist in his mind or in that of Count Nesselrode on this subject.”[126]
While Mr. Gallatin was engaged in arranging the preliminaries of negotiation and in bringing to bear on the British ministry such pressure as he was able to command, he did not neglect to act the part of diplomatic agent for the instruction of his own government. The time was long gone by when Mr. Gallatin and his party had declaimed against the diplomatic service. Mr. Madison had now sent abroad nearly every man in America whose pretensions to civil distinction were considerable. There were six full ministers between London, Holland, and Paris, and among them were included two Senators, the Speaker of the House, and the Secretary of the Treasury. The position of Mr. Gallatin in London was particularly delicate, since he was in a manner bound not to betray the confidence which Lord Castlereagh had placed in him by permitting his residence in England; but he knew little more of military movements than was known to all the world, and within these limits he might without impropriety correspond with his government. Thus his well-known despatch of June 13 was written.[127] In this letter he gave a sketch of the whole field of diplomatic and military affairs. Beginning with the announcement that England was fitting out an armament which, besides providing for Canada, would enable her to land at least 15,000 to 20,000 men on the Atlantic coast; that the capture of Washington and New York would most gratify them, and the occupation of Norfolk, Baltimore, &c., might be expected; this letter continued: