FREE BOOKS

Author's List




PREV.   NEXT  
|<   59   60   61   62   63   64   65   66   67   68   69   70   71   72   73   74   75   76   77   78   79   80   81   82   83  
84   85   86   87   88   89   90   91   92   93   94   95   96   97   98   99   100   101   102   103   104   105   106   107   108   >>   >|  
of the disturbance, it would have been no more than they deserved. But the guilty had signed the amnesty, or had left the county before the army approached." Dallas, the secretary of state, Gallatin's friend, was one of this troop. Gallatin saw him soon after his return. In a letter to his wife of December 3, Gallatin relates the experience of the trooper who had little stomach for the work he had to do. "I saw Dallas yesterday. Poor fellow had a most disagreeable campaign of it. He says the spirits, I call it the madness, of the Philadelphia Gentlemen's Corps was beyond conception before the arrival of the President. He saw a list (handed about through the army by officers, nay, by a general officer) of the names of those persons who were to be destroyed at all events, and you may easily guess my own was one of the most conspicuous. Being one day at table with sundry officers, and having expressed his opinion that, if the army were going only to support the civil authority, and not to do any military execution, one of them (Dallas did not tell me his name, but I am told it was one Ross of Lancaster, aide-de-camp to Mifflin) half drew a dagger he wore instead of a sword, and swore any man who uttered such sentiments ought to be dagged. The President, however, on his arrival, and afterwards Hamilton, took uncommon pains to change the sentiments, and at last it became fashionable to adopt, or at least to express, sentiments similar to those inculcated by them." Randolph was, perhaps, not far out of the way in his fear of a civil war should blood be drawn, and in his conviction that the influence of Washington was the only sedative for the fevered political pulse. On November 17 general orders were issued for the return of the army, a detachment of twenty-five hundred men only remaining in the West, under command of General Morgan. There were no further disturbances. The army expenses gave a circulating medium, and the farmers, having now the means to pay their taxes, made no further complaints of the excise law. The total expense of the insurrection to the government was $800,000. Mr. Gallatin returned with his wife from his western home early in November. He had been again chosen at the October elections to represent Fayette in the Pennsylvania Assembly. Moreover, at the same time, he was elected to represent the congres
PREV.   NEXT  
|<   59   60   61   62   63   64   65   66   67   68   69   70   71   72   73   74   75   76   77   78   79   80   81   82   83  
84   85   86   87   88   89   90   91   92   93   94   95   96   97   98   99   100   101   102   103   104   105   106   107   108   >>   >|  



Top keywords:

Gallatin

 

Dallas

 

sentiments

 
officers
 
general
 

November

 
President
 

arrival

 

represent

 

return


fevered
 

political

 

sedative

 

conviction

 

influence

 
Washington
 

Hamilton

 

dagged

 

similar

 
express

inculcated

 
Randolph
 

fashionable

 

orders

 

change

 

uncommon

 

Morgan

 
returned
 

western

 

expense


insurrection

 

government

 

Moreover

 

elected

 

congres

 

Assembly

 

Pennsylvania

 

chosen

 

October

 

elections


Fayette

 

excise

 

complaints

 

command

 

General

 

uttered

 
remaining
 

detachment

 

twenty

 

hundred