Details
JACKSON, Andrew. Autograph letter signed ("Andrew Jackson") with autograph postscript signed ("A. J."), as President, to John Overton, Washington, 12 February 1831. 2½ pages, 4to, seal holes repaired, silked.
"MR. CALHOUN IS ABOUT TO COME FORTH...WITH A PUBLICATION OF SOME KIND"
JACKSON BRACES FOR POLITICAL COMBAT WITH A DETESTED FOE. "Had I any other friend in whom I could confide," Jackson says to this long-time Nashville confidante, "I should not trouble you with the request I am about to make. It is said that Mr. Calhoun is about to come forth on the rise of Congress with a publication of some kind. To be prepared I wish the date of my confidential letter to Mr. Monroe, to which Mr. Rheas' was an answer, & in which Mr. Rhea is spoken of as a confidential friend. This will be found in my letter book, I think, of 1817, and in summer months of that year, although it may be in Sept. or October."
That crucial letter to Monroe was in fact dated 6 January 1818. In it, Jackson told him of his intention to attack Pensacola and drive the Spanish out of Florida. Understanding that Monroe might not want to go on record endorsing such an undiplomatic course, Jackson suggested the President signify his approval "to me through any channel (say Mr. J. Rhea," who was then a Tennessee Congressman. Jackson guides Overton to its location, in a trunk "locked in my bedroom..." He urges Overton "to go as soon as convenient to the Hermitage, open the trunk...& send me a copy of any confidential letter referred to. The date of that letter is what is wanted most."
In February 1831 Calhoun published under the imprint of Duff Green, the Democratic publisher of The Telegraph, the Correspondence between Gen. Andrew Jackson and John C. Calhoun...on the occurrences in the Seminole War. "Jackson," writes biographer Robert Remini, "was pathologically sensitive about his actions in Florida and any publication of documents that failed to support all his claims about the adventure was guaranteed to invite a cataclysmic explosion" (Life of Andrew Jackson, [1988] 201). Calhoun's octavo pamphlet was nothing less than a declaration of war against Jackson after a long period of skirmishing that began with the Peggy Eaton Affair and escalated sharply during the South Carolina nullification crisis. Now the breach was irreparable. "They have cut their own throats," Jackson said of Calhoun and Green, "and destroyed themselves in a shorter space of time than any two men I ever knew" (Ibid., 202).
"MR. CALHOUN IS ABOUT TO COME FORTH...WITH A PUBLICATION OF SOME KIND"
JACKSON BRACES FOR POLITICAL COMBAT WITH A DETESTED FOE. "Had I any other friend in whom I could confide," Jackson says to this long-time Nashville confidante, "I should not trouble you with the request I am about to make. It is said that Mr. Calhoun is about to come forth on the rise of Congress with a publication of some kind. To be prepared I wish the date of my confidential letter to Mr. Monroe, to which Mr. Rheas' was an answer, & in which Mr. Rhea is spoken of as a confidential friend. This will be found in my letter book, I think, of 1817, and in summer months of that year, although it may be in Sept. or October."
That crucial letter to Monroe was in fact dated 6 January 1818. In it, Jackson told him of his intention to attack Pensacola and drive the Spanish out of Florida. Understanding that Monroe might not want to go on record endorsing such an undiplomatic course, Jackson suggested the President signify his approval "to me through any channel (say Mr. J. Rhea," who was then a Tennessee Congressman. Jackson guides Overton to its location, in a trunk "locked in my bedroom..." He urges Overton "to go as soon as convenient to the Hermitage, open the trunk...& send me a copy of any confidential letter referred to. The date of that letter is what is wanted most."
In February 1831 Calhoun published under the imprint of Duff Green, the Democratic publisher of The Telegraph, the Correspondence between Gen. Andrew Jackson and John C. Calhoun...on the occurrences in the Seminole War. "Jackson," writes biographer Robert Remini, "was pathologically sensitive about his actions in Florida and any publication of documents that failed to support all his claims about the adventure was guaranteed to invite a cataclysmic explosion" (Life of Andrew Jackson, [1988] 201). Calhoun's octavo pamphlet was nothing less than a declaration of war against Jackson after a long period of skirmishing that began with the Peggy Eaton Affair and escalated sharply during the South Carolina nullification crisis. Now the breach was irreparable. "They have cut their own throats," Jackson said of Calhoun and Green, "and destroyed themselves in a shorter space of time than any two men I ever knew" (Ibid., 202).