Raynors HCA 2015-02
This lot is closed for bidding. Bidding ended on 2/19/2015
A fine lot of six United States Military letters, ca. 1840, most in the hand of Bvt. Maj. John L. Gardner, 10pp. 4to., mainly from Fort Gratiot, Michigan, Jan. 21 to Apr. 20, 1840 concerning Americans deserting to the British frontier in Canada. During much of the nineteenth century tensions along the Canadian border were frequent. This archive documents one of many small incidents that took place along the border during the Jacksonian era, triggered by an American soldier -- perhaps a thief as well -- who deserted the army by fleeing across the St. Clair River. These letters are detailed and remarkably revealing of the strained relations between the U.S. and Canada, the temptations the border offered as a means of escape for wrong doers, and its potential for igniting conflict. In January 1840, American Maj. John L. Gardner, stationed at Fort Gratiot, Michigan, informed his British counterpart, Col. J. Love, that five American soldiers had crossed to the Canadian side while in hot pursuit of a deserter, arresting the man. Gardner admitted that the pursuers had done so probably and certainly without authority...To account for this larger party than that directed by the officer, having gone in pursuit of the deserter it is necessary to say that the deserter had played the part of thief also and they probably felt an unusual zeal in his apprehension. Accompanying Gardner's letter is a deposition from Wellington Davis, a citizen of Port Huron, who states that the incident began when to two ne'er do well Canadians were seen urging American soldiers to desert. Davis confesses that he and several other citizens chased and arrested the men as they attempted to flee to the St. Clair River, but in an addition that tells more about the incident than he may have intended, Davis adds: I further swear that no soldier, trooper, or citizen from Canada was chased or followed with or without sticks by any American soldier -- that the soldiers were arrested by us because we believed they were about to desert the American service & the two Canadian citizens were told to come back by us, because we believed they had induced the soldiers to desert. From the Canadian side, Col. Love replied on Jan 21, 1840, to acknowledge that the five American pursuers had been apprehended in Port Sarnia after having violently entered several houses in search of a deserter, though he offered a little conciliation, in part: "…I am inclined to consider such a violation of the Territory of her Majesty to have been accidental, and without the sanction of the commander of Fort Gratiot, I do not hesitate a moment in directing the prisoners to be released…". While from Malden, Ontario, Lt. Col. Richard Airey of the 34th Regt. wrote that a possibly unrelated deserter, Edward Armstrong now enlisted at Fort Niagara, was a two-fold Blackguard, he first deserted from the British Service, and enters into that of the United States, which not finding so much to his tastes, proposes deserting again from that with his comrade of the same stamp, George Bailey. Back at Fort Gratiot, Maj. Gardner insisted that he would not surrender the man they had apprehended, a man named Robison, stating that as the man has been guilty of an act of theft I believe there exists a right in the Governor of Michigan to demand his surrender, to answer under our Laws, for his crime -- and it is accordingly my intention, without involving the military authorities on either side, to ask his interposition in this way. Condition is overall VG to near fine.
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