Part 12

Hon. JOHN FORSYTH,

Secretary of State of the United States.

SIR: I would respectfully solicit copies of all documents and papers in the Department of State of the United States in relation to the subject of the northeastern boundary, with the exception of such as were furnished this department by the General Government in the year 1827. It is understood that copies have been furnished relative to this subject down to the respective statements submitted by the two Governments to the King of the Netherlands, but the arguments we have not been furnished with.

I am, very respectfully, your obedient servant,

ROBERT P. DUNLAP.

STATE OF MAINE, EXECUTIVE DEPARTMENT,

July 3, 1837.

Hon. JOHN FORSYTE,

Secretary of State of United States.

SIR: I have had the honor to receive yours of the 26th of June last, in which, by direction of the President, you indicate that the circumstances detailed in Mr. Greely's letter relative to his arrest and imprisonment are not of themselves without further explanation sufficient to justify the interference of the Government of the United States. This information is received with some surprise and much regret--surprise because I had understood Mr. Greely's communication to show that while employed within the limits of this State and under its authority on a business intrusted to him by the laws of the State he was, without being charged or suspected of any other offense, seized and transported to a foreign jail; regret inasmuch as the feelings of the people of this State have been strongly excited by this outrage upon the honor and sovereignty of Maine, and each additional day's confinement which that unoffending citizen endures is adding to the indignation of our citizens. I therefore hasten to lay before you a summary of the transactions connected with this subject as they are gathered from Mr. Greely's communications to this department. The facts are to be considered the less indisputable because they are in the main confirmed by the statements contained in the letter of the lieutenant-governor of the Province of New Brunswick, by whose order the imprisonment was made, and a copy of which I recently had the honor of transmitting to the President.

On the 8th day of March last the legislature of this State passed an act relative to the surplus revenue, a copy of which is inclosed, to the eleventh, twelfth, and thirteenth sections of which I beg leave to refer your attention. An additional act was passed on the 29th day of March last, a copy of which I also inclose. By this last-named act it became the duty of the county commissioners of Penobscot County to cause an enumeration to be taken of the inhabitants of said county residing north of the surveyed and located townships. The tract thus defined comprised the town of Madawaska, which was incorporated by this State on the 15th of March, 1831. Pursuant to that requirement, the county commissioners of said county appointed Ebenezer S. Greely to perform that service, and, being duly commissioned, he forthwith proceeded to the place designated and entered upon the required operations. Being thus employed, he was on the 29th day of May last arrested by the authorities of the Province of New Brunswick and conveyed to Woodstock, in the county of Carleton, in said Province, but the sheriff of the county refused to commit him to jail, and he was accordingly discharged. He immediately returned to the Madawaska settlements to enter again upon the duty intrusted to him. On the 6th day of June last he was arrested a second time by the same authorities and committed to the jail at Frederickton. It is for this act of obedience to the laws of his government that Mr. Greely now lies incarcerated in a public jail in the Province of New Brunswick. Is not redress urgently called for? Must not this unoffending citizen be immediately released?

Permit me, sir, to add my confident belief that the President on this presentation of the facts relative to this outrage upon the national as well as the State rights will not fail to demand the immediate release of Ebenezer S. Greely and to interpose suitable claims of indemnity for the wrongs so wantonly enforced upon him.

I am, very respectfully, your obedient servant,

ROBERT P. DUNLAP.

DEPARTMENT OF STATE,

Washington, July 14, 1837.

Hon. ROBERT P. DUNLAP,

Governor of the State of Maine.

SIR: Your letter of the 3d instant has been received. The surprise you express that the information contained in the letter of Mr. Greely which accompanied your former communication was not considered sufficient to enable the President to make a formal application to the British Government for his release has probably arisen from your not having adverted particularly to the defects of his statement. It was not expressly mentioned for what offense the arrest was made nor where it took place--upon the territory in dispute between the United States and Great Britain or beyond it. The character of the charge and the place at which the offense was committed might have been inferred from what was stated, but you must perceive the impropriety of a formal complaint from one government to another founded upon inference when the means of ascertaining and presenting the facts distinctly were within the power of the party complaining; but although this Department felt itself constrained by these considerations to delay a formal application to the British Government for the release of Mr. Greely, it lost no time, as has been already stated, in procuring the interference to that end of the British minister near this Government; and I have now the satisfaction to inform you that I have learnt from him that he has opened a correspondence with the lieutenant-governor of New Brunswick, which it is expected will lead to the release of Greely from confinement without waiting for the decision of His Britannic Majesty's Government on the whole question.

The information communicated to the Department since the receipt of your letter of the 3d instant is sufficiently explicit, and a note founded upon it has been, by direction of the President, addressed to Mr. Stevenson, instructing him to demand the immediate liberation of Mr. Greely and indemnity for his imprisonment.

I have the honor to be, sir, your obedient servant,

JOHN FORSYTH.

P.S.--The papers asked for in your letter of the 27th ultimo will be sent to you.

DEPARTMENT OF STATE,

Washington, July 19, 1837.

Hon. ROBERT P. DUNLAP,

Governor of Maine.

SIR: In compliance with the request contained in your letter of the 27th ultimo, I have the honor to transmit to you a printed volume containing a statement on the part of the United States of the case referred, in pursuance of the convention of the 29th September, 1827, between the said States and Great Britain to the King of the Netherlands for his decision thereon, and to refer you for such other papers and documents in relation to the northeastern boundary as have not been specially furnished by this Department to the executive of Maine to the following numbers in the volumes of documents of the Senate and House of Representatives distributed under a resolution of Congress, and which have been from time to time transmitted to the several State governments, including that of Maine: