The American Chronicle 1 - Burr (24 page)

I was shocked by her response. Although I have spent many pleasant hours in establishments like Mrs. Townsend’s, I must, at heart, be very innocent or perhaps simple is the word. There is so much going on that I know nothing of. This was not the magic
sad
ending I had in mind for our evening.

I HAVE READ several hundred pages of M. L. Davis’s memoirs of Aaron Burr and have learned almost nothing that I did not know. He might have outlined the material as follows:

After the British left New York City, the Tory lawyers were disbarred, leaving an opening for Whig lawyers, particularly heroes of the Revolution. But the rule in New York state is that one must have read law three years before being admitted to the bar. Burr was in a hurry. He went to Albany, presented himself to the three justices of the state supreme court, got them to bend the rule for him (particularly helpful was Justice Robert Yates) and on January 19, 1782, he was admitted to the bar. Among his first clients were his old commander, Colonel Malcolm, the DePeysters of Albany, and Robert Livingston.

April 12, 1782, he became a counsellor-at-law.

July 6, 1782, he married Theodosia Prevost at Paramus, New Jersey. He was twenty-six. She was thirty-six.

June 21, 1783, their daughter Theodosia was born at Albany. In November the Burrs moved to New York City, arriving just as the British army departed.

The Burrs lived first at the Verplanck house two doors from City Hall. Then they moved to the corner of Maiden Lane and Nassau Street (their back yard was famous for its grape-vines and arbours, their household for a drunken maid named Hannah). In 1791 they moved to 4 Broadway. As a summer house, the Colonel took a lease on the mansion at Richmond Hill.

From the beginning Colonel Burr was a successful lawyer. With his first partner, William T. Broome, he began to make and spend the first of several fortunes. As a lawyer he was—is—meticulous. Yet he has a certain contempt for the whole business. “The law,” he likes to say, “is simply whatever is boldly asserted and plausibly maintained.”

Burr’s rivalry with Hamilton began in those days. It was inevitable. Both were heroes, both were ambitious, both were lawyers. Of the two Hamilton was considered to be the more profound philosophically as well as the more long-winded, with a tendency to undo his own brief by taking it past the point of successful advocacy.

Burr was the more effective in a court-room because his mind was swifter than Hamilton’s; also, of an entire generation of public men, Burr was free of cant: he never moralized unless to demonstrate a paradox. As a result the passionate believers thought him evil on the ground that the man who refuses to preach Goodness must be Bad. Yet juries are often grateful to the Colonel for
not
preaching at them. Neither Burr nor Hamilton was a natural orator like Clay or Webster. They could not move multitudes; on the other hand, they were effective with juries and with their peers.

Despite their rivalry, Burr and Hamilton sometimes worked together. On one case, the vain and edgy Hamilton insisted that Burr precede him and give the first argument. Without protest, Burr took the inferior position. Then, blandly, he used all the arguments that he knew Hamilton was going to make. Hamilton was furious—and uncharacteristically short and to the point when it came time for him to speak.

These are the facts for those years and Mr. Davis simply puts them all down, pasting an occasional platitude over the Colonel’s wax-like effigy. I have just sent him back the manuscript with a grateful letter. Now I must begin the real work: finding out what is true, if possible, or if not true useful to my purpose.

One important detail from the Davis manuscript. He reproduces a letter Colonel Burr wrote from the Columbia county estate of the Van Ness family. The text of the letter (to a Colonel Claypoole) is of no particular interest. But the date and the place are vital.

The Van Ness house in which Burr was staying is only a few miles from Kinderhook where Martin Van Buren was born December 5, 1782.

The date of the letter is March 11, 1782. (Yes, I have ticked off the months on my fingers.)

Burr’s last line is cryptic. “I disport myself as best I can in this wooded valley, and you know what I mean by that.”

LEGGETT TOLD ME THE LATEST Van Buren story. One senator bet another senator that he could get Van Buren to commit himself publicly on a public issue. “Matt,” said the senator, “there’s been some talk that the sun rises in the east. What do you think?”

“I have heard the same rumour, Senator, but since I never get up until after dawn, I have no useful opinion in the matter.”

COLONEL BURR and I watched with child-like pleasure the demolition of a whole block of houses on Broadway just across from the Park Theatre. We were not alone. What looked to be half the town had turned out to watch as a huge iron ball attached to a crane smashed in the wall of the first house. Mr. Astor intends to build on the site a hotel that will eclipse the City Hotel. No doubt he will succeed. He always does.

“Splendid!” The Colonel clapped his hands as the narrow Dutch building buckled in upon itself with a hollow cascading sound. But then as a thick cloud of gray dust slowly began to rise, the audience fled.

The Colonel and I crossed to the City Hall Park. Although we had an appointment at the Register’s Office, the Colonel was in no mood for work. Instead we sat on a bench beside a purple lilac hedge.

Burr breathed contentedly; looked about the well-kept park. “This used to be called the Fields.” He pointed to a high place on a line with the City Hall. “And over there were the gallows. But not just an ordinary commonplace gallows. Oh, no! New Yorkers have always liked their pleasures exotic. So our gallows was designed to resemble a Chinese pagoda. Very pretty it was, too. And what a lot of poor wretches they used to hang there. In the first year of the federal government, when New York was the capital, there were five hangings in a single afternoon, one right after the other. The town was thrilled. President Washington was no doubt impressed.”

“Were there as many murderers then as now?”

“Murderers? Hardly! We hanged only burglars in those days. Murder was practically unknown.”

“There is so much I’d like to know about that time.”

“Yes, I know you would.” With a stick, Burr drew suns and stars in the dust at his feet. Emblems of his Mexican empire?

“I’ve read some of Mr. Davis’s book.”

“Don’t tell me.”

“I won’t.”

“Must I do it myself?”

“I see no choice.”

The Colonel gave a soft moan. “You know, Charlie, I made a great error—that is, of the
many
great errors I have made in my life, the worst was supposing that one could not be hurt by a lie. As a result, I never corrected a slander. I simply assumed that since there were so many honourable men in the world who knew my character, matters would be set straight in time. Well, I was wrong. Friends drop away, die. While the slanders never cease, never!” Burr spoke with a stoic wonder. No bitterness that I could detect.

“When my daughter was alive, I was intent upon clearing my name for her, for my grandson. Then ...” He removed his hat, as if at grave-side—no,
water
-side. “... for a good many years I have been perfectly indifferent. But now your interest ...” He looked at me (he must know!) and smiled. “Well, I do enjoy teaching though I would prefer a subject other than my career, despite its cautionary aspects. Very well. We shall talk and you may write down, if it amuses you, what I say in your short hand, which is so much more dextrous than my long.”

Thus it was agreed.

I have now begun to drive the Colonel a bit hard but there is not much time to assemble all the details. Leggett wants the Van Buren connection made explicit, with as much documentation as possible for an anonymous pamphlet. Later, under my own name, I will write the whole life, anticipating Mr. Davis. A prospect that excites me though Leggett is full of foreboding. “You will be favourable to Burr, and so must fail because the American reader cannot bear a surprise. He
knows
that this is the greatest country on earth, Washington the greatest man that ever lived, Burr the wickedest, and evidence to the contrary is not admissible. That means no inconvenient facts, no new information. If you really want the reader’s attention, you must flatter him. Make his prejudices your own. Tell him things he already knows. He will love your soundness.”

“Then explain your success at the
Evening Post
.
Every day you attack your advertisers’ prejudices ...”

“And every day we lose another advertiser because of what Bryant calls my fierceness. I am also in constant danger of a knife in the ribs. Be warned by my ‘success.’ ” I shall be.

IT TOOK THE COLONEL and me several days to learn how to work together. He is not used to dictation; he also refuses to rely on memory. “After all, I am a lawyer. Therefore I need evidence—books, letters, newspapers: things I can refute!”

Our first attempts were simply fragments. The Colonel could not connect episodes. He tended to wander from the point. But now (the middle of May) we are working well and what began as a series of random anecdotes is becoming such a full narrative that as we sweep down the years I am at last able to detect, here and there, a glimpse of my quarry, and I am certain now that once I have thoroughly mapped the jungle it ought not to be too difficult to find whatever beast I want, no matter how hidden the lair!

THE COLONEL is unusually nervous today. “I feel like an actor who does not know his lines.” He has been sitting with a packet of letters and some old newspaper cuttings on the table in front of him. Also, an open much-marked copy of
The Life of Alexander Hamilton
,
recently published by Hamilton’s son, John.

“For once, Charlie, I wish that I had sired a proper son. There is a good deal to be said for filial piety, no matter how infelicitous. Naturally, I assume that any son of mine would write better than this boy who sounds like a combination of his father at his most windy, and his grandfather Schuyler at his most confused. Well, I shall be my own son—with your help.”

The Colonel puts his feet up on the grate; shuts his eyes as if he expects some inner curtain to rise upon past spectacles. “You asked me about Hamilton.” I had asked him about Van Buren. “Let me recall a scene or two for you.” He closes his throat. “It is November ...”

The eyes open for a moment and he glances at a newspaper cutting. “November 25, 1783. I have just come to New York City from Albany, with my wife and daughter. The American states have made peace with England. The British are about to depart. General Washington is to make his triumphant entry into the city.”

I record now the Colonel’s recollections—not as he dictated them to me but as they currently exist after a number of revisions in his own hand.

AT ABOUT NOON, I arrived with my wife Theodosia at Cape’s Tavern in the Broad Way. The streets were filled with veterans, many drunk, all happy. New York City was a small place in those days but the people, despite a certain Dutchness, were as lively then as now.

The assembly-room of the tavern was crowded with former officers wearing cockades of black and white, as well as sprigs of laurel to attest to our gallantry and patriotism. I knew most of the officers, though not their wives. I particularly recall General McDougall; between the stammer and the Scots burr he was quite incoherent with joy.

Theodosia hung back, intimidated by so many strangers. But then Elizabeth Hamilton took her firmly by the hand, in that effective Schuyler way, and presented her to various ladies. Elizabeth was uncommonly handsome as a girl, if too square-jawed. I have been told that Hamilton used to discuss his infidelities with her. If he did, they must have had a good deal to talk about.

My old friend Troup greeted me; he was now a lawyer like me (after two weeks in the city I had more business than I could handle).

“A great day!” we both agreed and of course it was, despite the fact that the war had been over for some time. Today’s ceremony was a tribute to the dilatoriness of Sir Guy Carleton, the British commander in New York. He kept finding excuses not to go home: the weather was bad, the ships in disrepair, His Excellency indisposed. But now it was finally ended.

As we waited in the tavern, Sir Guy’s troops were slowly embarking from the Battery. At last General Washington could make his “triumphal” entry into the city that he had lost to the British seven years earlier and never, by arms, regained.

Hamilton hurried into the long room, cheeks bright with excitement. He greeted Troup and me warmly. Though rival lawyers, each intent on being first in the town, we were all of us friends that day.

What a vivid, bright, pretty little man Hamilton was! And oh, what a gift he had for making a
moral
point while destroying the reputation of an adversary. The malice in him was as spontaneous as the brilliance. “
He’s
in Chatham Street, at the Tea Water Pump!” We knew who
he
was. “Governor Clinton will escort
him
here.”

We congratulated one another on our good luck in so soon having the glorious Washington amongst us. But human pageantry is peculiarly vulnerable to the ridiculous. The only time I saw the Emperor Napoleon he was proceeding up the marble stairs of a Paris theatre, moving with all that sombre elegance he had learned from the actor Talma. But then, at the very top of the stairs, as all of us bowed reverently, he shrilly broke wind.

Today’s comedy had been prepared by two British soldiers who had slyly greased the flag pole on the Battery. When our flag and its attendant tried to mount the pole, flag and attendant dropped in a heap to the ground, deeply mortifying General Washington.

Colonel (now Brevet-General) Malcolm joined us. Like so many senior officers who have not seen combat, this good man wanted to discuss the war. But the young men—and Hamilton, Troup and I thought we had invented youth—spoke only of the present and the future.