Thomas Benton - Thirty Years' View (Vol. I of 2)

"Nay, it is certain that the existence and contents of this letter were about that time communicated to Mr. Lacock: that he conversed freely and repeatedly with Mr. Calhoun upon the whole subject: that he was informed of all that had passed: the views of the President, of Mr. Calhoun, and the cabinet, and that Mr. Calhoun coincided with Mr. Lacock in all his views .

"These facts are stated upon the authority of Mr. Lacock himself .

"The motives of these secret communications to Mr. Lacock by Mr. Calhoun cannot be mistaken. By communicating the contents of the confidential letter, and withholding the fact that an approving answer had been returned, he wished to impress Mr. Lacock with the belief that General Jackson had predetermined before he entered Florida, to seize the Spanish posts, right or wrong, with orders or without. Acting under this impression, he would be prepared to discredit and disbelieve all General Jackson's explanations and defences, and put the worst construction upon every circumstance disclosed in the investigation. By this perfidy General Jackson was deprived of all opportunity to make an effectual defence. To him Mr. Calhoun was all smiles and kindness. He believed him his friend, seeking by all proper means, in public and private, to shield him from the attacks of his enemies. Having implicit confidence in Mr. Calhoun and the President, he would sooner have endured the tortures of the inquisition than have disclosed their answer to his letter through Mr. Rhea. The tie which he felt, Mr. Calhoun felt not. He did not scruple to use one side of a correspondence to destroy a man, his friend, who confided in him with the faith and affection of a brother – when he knew that man felt bound by obligations from which no considerations short of a knowledge of his own perfidy could absolve him, to hold the other side in eternal silence. General Jackson had no objection to a disclosure of the whole correspondence. There was nothing in it of which he was ashamed, or which on his own account he wished to conceal. Public policy made it inexpedient that the world should know at that time how far the government had approved beforehand of his proceedings. But had he known that Mr. Calhoun was attempting to destroy him by secretly using one side of the correspondence, he would have been justified by the laws of self-defence in making known the other. He saw not, heard not, imagined not, that means so perfidious and dishonorable were in use to destroy him. It never entered his confiding heart that the hand he shook with the cordiality of a warm friend was secretly pointing out to his enemies the path by which they might ambuscade and destroy him. He was incapable of conceiving that the honeyed tongue, which to him spake nothing but kindness, was secretly conveying poison into the ears of Mr. Lacock, and other members of Congress. It could not enter his mind that his confidential letters, the secrets of the cabinet, and the opinions of its members, were all secretly arrayed against him by the friend in whom he implicitly confided, misinterpreted and distorted, without giving him an opportunity for self-defence or explanation.

"Mr. Calhoun's object was accomplished. Mr. Lacock made a report far transcending in bitterness any thing which even in the opinion of General Jackson's enemies the evidence seemed to justify. This extraordinary and unaccountable severity is now explained. It proceeded from the secret and perfidious representations of Mr. Calhoun, based on General Jackson's confidential letter. Mr. Lacock ought to be partially excused, and stand before the world comparatively justified. For most of the injustice done by his report to the soldier who had risked all for his country, Mr. Calhoun is the responsible man .

"As dark as this transaction is, a shade is yet to be added. It was not enough that General Jackson had been deceived and betrayed by a professing friend; that the contents of his confidential correspondence had been secretly communicated to his open enemies, while all information of the reply was withheld: it was not enough that an official report overflowing with bitterness had gone out to the world to blast his fame, which must stand for ever recorded in the history of his country. Lest some accident might expose the evidences of the understanding under which he acted, and the duplicity of his secret accuser, means must be taken to procure the destruction of the answer to the confidential letter through Mr. Rhea. They were these. About the time Mr. Lacock made his report General Jackson and Mr. Rhea were both in the city of Washington. Mr. Rhea called on General Jackson, as he said, at the request of Mr. Monroe, and begged him on his return home to burn his reply. He said the President feared that by the death of General Jackson, or some other accident, it might fall into the hands of those who would make an improper use of it. He therefore conjured him by the friendship which had always existed between them (and by his obligations as a brother mason) to destroy it on his return to Nashville. Believing Mr. Monroe and Mr. Calhoun to be his devoted friends, and not deeming it possible that any incident could occur which would require or justify its use, he gave Mr. Rhea the promise he solicited, and accordingly after his return to Nashville he burnt Mr. Rhea's letter, and on his letter-book opposite the copy of his confidential letter to Mr. Monroe made this entry: —

" 'Mr. Rhea's letter in answer is burnt this 12th April, 1819.'

"Mr. Calhoun's management was thus far completely triumphant. He had secretly assailed General Jackson in cabinet council, and caused it to be publicly announced that he was his friend. While the confiding soldier was toasting him as 'an honest man, the noblest work of God,' he was betraying his confidential correspondence to his enemy, and laying the basis of a document which was intended to blast his fame and ruin his character in the estimation of his countrymen. Lest accident should bring the truth to light, and expose his duplicity, he procures through the President and Mr. Rhea the destruction of the approving answer to the confidential letter. Mr. Rhea was an old man and General Jackson's health feeble. In a few years all who were supposed to have any knowledge of the reply would be in their graves. Every trace of the approval given beforehand by the government to the operations of General Jackson would soon be obliterated, and the undivided responsibility would forever rest on his head. At least, should accident or policy bring to light the duplicity of Mr. Calhoun, he might deny all knowledge of this reply, and challenge its production. He might defend his course in the cabinet and extenuate his disclosures to Mr. Lacock, by maintaining before the public that he had always believed General Jackson violated his orders and ought to have been punished. At the worst, the written reply if once destroyed could never be recalled from the flames; and should General Jackson still be living, his assertion might not be considered more conclusive than Mr. Calhoun's denial. In any view it was desirable to him that this letter should be destroyed, and through his management, as is verily believed, it was destroyed.

"Happily however for the truth of history and the cause of public justice, the writer of the reply is still alive; and from a journal kept at the time, is able to give an accurate account of this transaction. He testifies directly to the writing of the letter, to its contents, and the means taken to secure its destruction. Judge Overton, to whom the letter was confidentially shown, testifies directly to the existence of the letter, and to the fact that General Jackson afterwards told him it was destroyed.

"These, with the statement of General Jackson himself, and the entry in his letter-book which was seen by several persons many years ago, fix these facts beyond a doubt.