Gerry left Congress for the last time in 1793 and retired for 4 years. During this time, he came to mistrust the aims of the Federalists, particularly their attempts to nurture an alliance with Britain, and sided with the pro-French Democratic-Republicans. In 1797 President John Adams appointed him as the only non-Federalist member of a three-man commission charged with negotiating a reconciliation with France, on the brink of war with the United States. During the ensuing XYZ affair (1797–98), Gerry tarnished his reputation. The French foreign minister duped him into believing that his presence in France would prevent war, and he lingered on long after the departure of the other disgusted commissioners. Finally, the embarrassed Adams recalled him, amid Federalist vituperation.
In 1800–03 Gerry, never very popular among the Massachusetts electorate because of his aristocratic haughtiness, met defeat in four bids for the Massachusetts governorship, but finally triumphed in 1810–12. Near the end of his two terms, scarred by partisan controversy, the Democratic-Republicans passed a devious redistricting measure to insure their domination of the State senate. In response, the Federalists heaped ridicule on Gerry and punningly coined the term “gerrymander” to describe the salamander-like shape of one of the redistricted areas.
Despite his advanced age, frail health, and the threat of poverty brought on by neglect of personal affairs, in 1813 Gerry accepted the Vice-Presidency in James Madison’s Democratic-Republican administration. In the fall of 1814, the 70-year-old politician was stricken fatally while on the way to the Senate. He left his wife, who was to live until 1849, the last surviving widow of a signer, as well as three sons and four daughters. Gerry is buried in Congressional Cemetery at Washington, D.C.
Button Gwinnett
GEORGIA
Tempestuousness and ill-fortune marked the destiny of uniquely named Button Gwinnett, whose forename is that of a branch of his mother’s family. The second signer to die, he met a tragic end in a duel while only in his forties. The only highlight of his brief tour in the Continental Congress was signing the Declaration. Even in Georgia, where he rose to the acting governorship, controversy and failure usually dogged him. Financial misfortunes were continual distractions, and he found that his paltry rewards as a merchant and planter matched his disappointments in politics.
Gwinnett was likely born in 1735, at the village of Down Hatherly, Gloucestershire, England. The second male in a family numbering at least seven, he was the son of an Anglican vicar of Welsh ancestry and a mother with English ties. He probably learned trade and finance from an uncle, a Bristol merchant, and in 1757 moved to Wolverhampton, Staffordshire. He married a grocer’s daughter, who was to bear three girls, and for a time he joined her father in a partnership. In 1759, however, Gwinnett entered the export shipping business and built up an extensive trade with the American Colonies, possibly sometimes visiting them himself.
The date of Gwinnett’s emigration to Savannah, Ga., is not known but in 1765 he purchased a store there. Later that same year, for some reason, he sold it and abruptly switched vocation. Apparently dazzled by visions of a planter’s life on a great estate but undeterred by his lack of capital, experience, and training, he borrowed £3,000 and purchased large St. Catherine’s Island. It was located off the Georgia coast not far from the busy mainland port of Sunbury, a rival of Savannah. At this time, he probably erected a home on the island. Before long, though already deep in debt, he also purchased some coastal lands on credit and received grants of others from the colony; and bought large numbers of slaves to work his holdings. Poachers aggravated his problems by raiding the island’s livestock.