Dear Sir:—Though disagreeable to appear in any manner in a personal dispute; yet I cannot, in justice to you, refuse to comply with the request contained in your note. I have delayed answering it, to endeavour to recollect, with more precision, the time, place and circumstances of the conversation, to which you allude. I cannot, however, remember with certainty more than this: that some time in the campaign of seventy-seven, at head-quarters in this State, you mentioned to me and some other gentlemen of General Washington's family, in a confidential way, that at some period in seventy-six, I think after the American army crossed the Delaware in its retreat, Mr. Reed had spoken to you in terms of great despondency respecting American affairs, and had intimated, that he thought it time for gentlemen to take care of themselves, and that it was unwise any longer to follow the fortunes of a ruined cause, or something of a similar import. It runs in my mind, that the expressions you declared to have been made use of by Mr. Reed were, that he thought he ought no longer to "risk his life and fortunes with the shattered remains of a broken army:" but it is the part of candour to observe, that I am not able to distinguish with certainty, whether the recollection I have of these words arises from the strong impression made by your declaration at the time, or from having heard them more than once repeated within a year past.
I am, dear sir, with great esteem, your obedient servant,
A. HAMILTON.
To General Cadwalader.
At the time I communicated the contents of Colonel Hamilton's certificate to him, in confidence, it appears by your own acknowledgment, that[G] "no party or prejudices existed, (at least as to you,")—"the intercourse arising from these mingled duties and services, which were continued until the army went into winter quarters, at the Valley Forge, soon did away the coolness which had for some years subsisted, and in no small degree revived our former habits of friendship;"—"but it was our lot to meet again, a few days before the battle of Monmouth; here we were again united in confidence and danger. After the battle, we left the army together, and that period closed our friendly intercourse forever." From these, (your expressions,) you affect to believe, and wish the world to think, that our former friendship was restored. It was not so; I cannot call it friendship. The transaction I have mentioned occasioned the dissolution of that intimacy, contracted in early life, which but little accorded with my notion of perfect integrity. From that time, and owing solely to that cause, I took the resolution to avoid your company, as a private gentleman, and which I constantly adhered to. Meeting in the army, where we served most of the time in the character of volunteers, I did not think it right to suffer former dislikes to interrupt the duties and services required of us by the commander-in-chief, so necessary for mutual and general safety. If, then, my dislike to you did not proceed from such motives as sometimes induce men to seek for opportunities of gratifying their resentments, for what purpose could I have invented such a "tale?" or if my resentment was such as you represent, why did I not gratify it by making it public immediately? at that time, my mind could not have been "inflamed by party;" because you admit, that no parties then existed, ("at least as to you;") nor could my ambition have been disappointed,—because, being commanding officer of the Pennsylvania Militia, (the council of safety, who then held the powers of government,) could not gratify me further. I could not have "mistaken a conversation with some other person," because there was not that "distance of time," which you suppose, nor can it be conceived by the most credulous to be "some jocular expression;" because the situation of affairs rather suppressed than excited in you the appearance of mirth. Having mentioned this conversation long before parties were formed here, it must appear to every impartial person, that it could not have been the mere invention of my own "brain," suggested in the spirit of party; and it is still more absurd to suppose, that I could have foreseen that you, who then thought as I did concerning the essential objections to the constitution of Pennsylvania, should refuse the appointment of Chief Justice, because you could not, in conscience, take the oath of office; that Mr. Wharton (the first President,) should die; and yet that you should afterwards accept the chair of government. It is, however, incontestibly proved, that the conversation alluded to was spoken of by me at an early period, and long before your appointment to the chair of government; and yet you say, "the prosecution of General Arnold, I have no doubt, gave rise to it." If I was to leave it to your ingenuity to explain to the world my motives for inventing such a "tale," to what purposes could you possibly impute my design? It could not be to gratify my resentment for the injury you attempted upon my property; because I did not then make it public; it could not be occasioned by any personal offence taken in 1777, (when I privately mentioned it to Colonel Hamilton,) because you contend that our "former habits of friendship" were revived, and acknowledge, that I never made it public for several years afterwards. Here, then, the man of humanity may ask me, why did you, at so late a date, publicly mention a circumstance injurious to General Reed's reputation, as adjutant-general of the army and a patriot, which after-services ought to have consigned to oblivion? The question is a natural one, and I will give it an answer. The first occasion of my mentioning this matter publicly was this: soon after our return to the city, in the year 1778, among the victims selected for public examples, there was a young gentleman, with whom I had formed an intimacy in early life. I considered him, as he was by many, (and his acquittal justified the opinion,) as unjustly persecuted; but General Reed, who had resumed his original profession, voluntarily aided the prosecution, and with all the force of declamation, labored to inflame his judges and jury against him. It was then, recollecting how near he once appeared to the commission of the same offence which he charged upon the other, or at least to a defection from the cause, that my indignation broke out at the trial, saying to those around me, that "it argued the extremity of effrontery and baseness, in one man to pursue another to death, for taking a step which his own foot had been once raised to take!"[H] This was anterior to his elevation to the Presidency, and whilst his powers of doing mischief, were he so inclined, were circumscribed by the narrowness of his sphere of action; at such a time, could I think his loss of fame so essential to the public good, or, if he will, to the purposes of party, as to be willing to attempt it, at the expense of my private veracity, my honour and conscience.
The inconsistency of such ostensible conduct, and the baseness of a meditated defection, is not irreconcilable to those who have had opportunities of knowing that he is not incapable of such vast extremes; who have seen him at the bar of the assembly he himself disqualified by the non-compliance with the test of laws, as since fully appears by a publication signed Sidney, unblushingly attempt to set aside the famous Chester election, upon the suggestion of its having been carried by electors disqualified from the like circumstances.
It is thus I would have answered the question, why I have mentioned publicly your meditated defection, and I trust that such provocation merited those reflections which might otherwise have remained in my own breast.
The objection to the force of my single testimony thus obviated, did no other offer to corroborate it, I should not hesitate to submit it, under such circumstances, to the judgment of the public, resting their determination upon the credit of my veracity against yours. Having supported an unblemished character, I dare defy any person to produce an instance where I have even been suspected of an untruth, or of a base or dishonourable action. Conscious of the truth of what I have asserted, I have no fears that my conduct will ever "dishonour me with the wise and virtuous."
The reason I have assigned for the dissolution of our intimacy antecedent to the war, will afford a better proof of your ingenuity than your integrity; and further, (with respect to your veracity,) if any other instance is necessary, let me add one which happened at camp, (at head-quarters,) in the year 1777, soon after the battle of Germantown, when in my hearing, and in the presence of three officers of the first rank in the army, you was charged to your face with a falsehood, and which was fully proved the next day, by the general officer who made the charge.
And now, before I introduce the concurrent testimony in support of my assertion, I shall take but a momentary notice here of those disrespectful expressions with which you have decorated your pamphlet. Weakness of head, is an accusation of a kind which it would equally puzzle the fool and the wise to reply to; but against that of badness of heart, my known tenor of conduct, in private and public life, must be my defence; if that fails, it must be needless in me to set up any other.