A. E.
Natchez, June 5, 1797.
Sir: I have this moment received private information that Mr. Power, who I have mentioned to you in my communication of yesterday, is, by order of the Baron de Carondelet, to proceed immediately through the wilderness, to the State of Kentucky. There is every reason to believe that his business is to forward the views of Spain, by detaching the citizens of Kentucky from the Union. It has been hinted to me that Mr. Power will, in the first instance, pay a visit to General Wilkinson, who, we are informed, is now in Cincinnati.
I am, sir, your obedient servant,
ANDREW ELLICOTT.
Hon. Secretary of State.
Darling’s Creek, November 8, 1798.
Sir: On the 10th of last month, having opened the boundary between the United States and His Catholic Majesty, from the Mississippi River to the thin pine country, we ceased carrying the line on in that accurate scientific manner in which it was begun, and from the end of the line, designated in the report which accompanies this, the work will generally be done with a common surveying compass, and corrected at the different navigable water-courses which it may happen to cross.
The line mentioned in the report is opened sixty feet wide, and passes through a country impenetrable to any but Americans. The labor has been equal to what would in our country have opened at least one hundred miles. The business, it is evident, will not go on with that rapidity we could wish; nothing, however, will be wanting on our part, and I think it will be completed the ensuing season. Governor Gayoso has evidently been brought into a co-operation very reluctantly, and certainly has no desire of having it pushed. Mr. Power, a gentleman well known for his intrigues in Kentucky and other parts of the United States, is the surveyor on the part of the Crown of Spain; he has attended but one week on the line, and I do not believe that he will attend another, during the execution of the work. He has, however, employed a deputy, who is Mr. Daniel Burnet, the same person who carried Mr. Hutchins’s papers to Congress last winter; he has yet behaved very well. The others employed, Major Minor excepted, are of little consequence, except to disorganize and talk politics. The acting commissary is a Mr. Gensack; he was taken by the British at the Cape, and carried to Jamaica, from whence he made his escape to the United States, where he found safety, but, in the true character of his nation, he equally hates both Americans and British: he is sullen, reserved, and intriguing. There are no Spaniards concerned in the business, and but a few of the common soldiers. Major Minor and Mr. Burnet are Americans; the others, including the laborers, are generally French, or descended from French ancestors, or Roman Catholic Irish. When I look over this strange heterogeneous collection, I cannot help asking this question: “Can the Spaniards really be serious in carrying the treaty into effect?” If they are, it is very extraordinary that there is not one of that nation employed above the rank of a common soldier.
I have always been of opinion that it was a happy circumstance for both countries that Major Minor was appointed Commissioner on behalf of the Crown of Spain; his prudence and sound judgment will, in all probability, enable us to carry the work through, which I am confident would not have been the case, had Mr. Power been appointed to that trust, as was proposed by Governor Gayoso, and to which I pointedly objected, as did Mr. Dunbar also.