No. 10
Washington, 29th December, 1819.
Sir: Your communication of the 30th ultimo reached me as I was on the eve of my departure for the north; whence I did not return till the 22d inst. It was my determination, on the receipt of your letter, not to notice it; but upon mature reflection, I conceive, that as I have suffered myself to be drawn into this unprofitable discussion, I ought not to leave the false colouring and calumnies, which you have introduced into your letter, unanswered. You state, that a much more laconic reply to your letter of 23d October would have served your purpose. Of this I have no doubt; and to have insured such an answer, you had only to make a laconic call. I had already informed you of the course I had felt myself bound to pursue respecting you, and of the reasons which induced my conduct, and that, if you required it, I would overcome my own disinclination and fight you. Instead of calling me out for injuries which you chose to insist that I have heaped upon you, you have thought fit to enter into this war of words.
I reiterate to you, that I have not challenged, nor do I intend to challenge you. I do not consider it essential to my reputation that I should notice any thing which may come from you, the more particularly, when you declare your sole object, in wishing to draw the challenge from me, is, that you may avail yourself of the advantages which rest with the challenged. It is evident, that you think, or your friends for you, that a fight will help you; but in fighting, you wish to incur the least possible risk. Now, sir, not believing that a fight of this nature will raise me at all in public estimation, but may even have a contrary effect, I do not feel at all disposed to remove the difficulties that lay in your way. If we fight, it must be of your seeking; and you must take all the risk and all the inconvenience which usually attend the challenger, in such cases.
You deny having made the communication to the British consul at Pernambuco, which captain Lewis and Mr. Goodwin have represented. The man capable of making such a communication, would not hesitate in denying it; and, until you can bring forward some testimony, other than your own, you ought not to expect that the testimony of those gentlemen will be discredited. As to the veracity of the British consul, I can prove, if necessary, that you have, yourself, vouched for that.
You offer, as your excuse for not returning to your country, during our war with England, that you had not been invited home by the then Secretary, notwithstanding you had written him, expressive of your wishes to be employed. You state, that, if you "had received the slightest intimation from the department, that you would have been employed on your return, you would have considered no sacrifice too great, no exertion within your power should have been omitted to obtain so desirable an object." From this, I would infer, that, in consequence of not receiving this intimation, you did not make the exertions in your power to return, and this I hold to be an insufficient excuse. You do not pretend to have made any attempt, except by the way of the cartel, the John Adams. You cannot believe, that reporting yourself to the Department, at the distance of 4000 miles, when the same conveyance which brought your letter would have brought yourself, will be received as evincing sufficient zeal to join the arms of your country; and besides, you say it was not believed, for a considerable time after the news of war arrived in Denmark, that the war would last six months. With those impressions, you must have known, that it would have occupied at least that time for your letter to have arrived at the Department, you to receive an answer, and then to repair to America. You deny that the opportunities of returning were frequent. The custom house entries at Baltimore and New York alone, from the single port of Bordeaux, will show nearly an hundred arrivals; and it is well known, that it required only a few days to perform the journey from Copenhagen to Bordeaux, by the ordinary course of post. You deny having been advised to return to this country, by your friends, during the war. Mr. Cook, of Norfolk, your relative, says he wrote to you to that effect; and Mr. Forbes, then our consul at Copenhagen, who is now at this place, says he urged you in person to do so.
You have charged the officers who concur with me in opinion respecting your claims to service, as being my satellites. I think I am not mistaken, when I inform you, that all the officers of our grade, your superiors as well as inferiors, with the exception of one who is your junior concur in the opinion, that you ought not to be employed again, whilst the imputations, which now lie against you, remain; nor have they been less backward than myself in expressing their opinions.
Your charge of my wishing to obtain your rank, will apply to all who are your juniors, with as much force as to myself. You never have interfered with me in the service, and, at the risk of being esteemed by you a little vain, I must say, I do not think you ever will. Were I disposed to kill out of my way, as you have been pleased to insinuate, those who interfere with my advancement, there are others, my superiors, who I consider fairly barring my pretensions; and it would serve such purpose better, to begin with them. You say, you were the means of obtaining me the first command I ever had in service. I deny it: I feel that I owe my standing to my exertions only.
Your statement, that your advice prevented me from resigning on a former occasion, is equally unfounded. I have never, since my first admission into the navy, contemplated resigning; and, instead of being ordered, as you state, from the 1st lieutenancy of the New York, to the 2d of the Chesapeake, Commodore Chauncy, who was then flag captain, can testify, that I was solicited to remain as 1st lieutenant of the flag ship: and I should have remained as such, had it not been for the demand which the government of Malta made, for the delivery of the persons who had been concerned in the affair of honour, which led to the death of a British officer. It was deemed necessary to send all the persons, implicated in that affair, out of the way; and I went home in the Chesapeake, as a passenger.