Part 25

The governor of Maine to the President of the United States.

STATE OF MAINE, EXECUTIVE DEPARTMENT,

September 18, 1837.

His Excellency MARTIN VAN BUREN,

President of the United States.

SIR: I lose no time in advising Your Excellency that Ebenezer S. Greely, esq., a citizen of this State, while employed within its limits and under its authority in taking an enumeration of the inhabitants of the county of Penobscot residing north of the surveyed and located townships, has been arrested a second time by the provincial authorities of New Brunswick, and is now in confinement in the jail of Frederickton.

It becomes my duty to request that prompt measures be adopted by the Government of the United States to effect the release of Mr. Greely.

I have the honor to be, etc.,

ROBERT P. DUNLAP.

Mr. Forsyth to Mr. Dunlap.

DEPARTMENT OF STATE,

Washington, September 26, 1837.

His Excellency ROBERT P. DUNLAP,

Governor of Maine.

SIR: I have the honor, by direction of the President, to acknowledge the receipt of the letter addressed to him by your excellency on the 18th instant, advising him that Ebenezer S. Greely, esq., a citizen of Maine, while employed within its limits and under its authority in taking an enumeration of the inhabitants of the county of Penobscot, has been arrested a second time by the provincial authorities of New Brunswick, and is now in confinement in the jail at Frederickton; and requesting that prompt measures be adopted by the Government of the United States to effect the release of Mr. Greely.

I hasten to assure you in reply that Mr. Stevenson, the minister of the United States at London, will be immediately instructed to renew his application to the British Government for the release of Mr. Greely, and that the result, when obtained and communicated to this Department, will be made known to your excellency without unnecessary delay.

Information was given at an early day to the executive of Maine of the informal arrangement between the United States and Great Britain in regard to the exercise of jurisdiction within the disputed territory, and the President's desire was then expressed that the government and people of that State would cooperate with the Federal Government in carrying it into effect. In the letter addressed to your excellency from this Department on the 17th ultimo you were informed of the continuance of that arrangement and of the reasons for it. I am now instructed by the President (who indulges the confident expectation that the executive of Maine will still see in the gravity of the interests involved a sufficient motive for his cordial concurrence in an arrangement which offers the best prospect of an amicable and satisfactory adjustment of the general question of boundary) to request your excellency's cooperation in the conciliatory course adopted by the two Governments, an adherence to which seems the more important at this time from the consideration that an answer to the President's last proposition is daily looked for, and to renew to you the assurance that no efforts shall be spared on his part to bring the negotiation to a speedy conclusion.

I have the honor to be, etc.,

JOHN FORSYTH.

Mr. Forsyth to Mr. Stevenson.

DEPARTMENT OF STATE,

Washington, July 12, 1837.

ANDREW STEVENSON, Esq., etc.

SIR: I inclose an extract of a letter received at this Department from the governor of Maine, by which you will perceive that a citizen of that State, named Ebenezer S. Greely, while employed, in virtue of an appointment under one of its laws, in making an enumeration of the inhabitants upon a part of the territory claimed as being within the limits of the State, was seized by order of the authorities of the Province of New Brunswick on the 6th of June last and imprisoned in the public jail of Frederickton, where he still remains. I also transmit a copy of sundry documents relating to his arrest and detention. This outrage upon the personal liberty of one of its citizens has actually caused great excitement in Maine, and has produced an urgent appeal to the General Government for its intervention in procuring redress for what is considered an unprovoked and unjustifiable aggression. This arrest was made on a part of the territory in dispute between the United States and Great Britain, and could only have been justified in the existing state of that controversy by some plain infringement of the understanding which exists between the parties, that until the settlement of the question of right there shall be no extension of jurisdiction on either side within the disputed limits. It is not perceived how the simple enumeration of the inhabitants, about which Mr. Greely was employed, could be construed as a breach of that understanding, and it is expected that the Government of Great Britain will promptly mark its disapproval of this act of violence committed by the provincial authorities, so inconsistent with those amicable feelings under which the negotiation respecting the controverted boundary has been hitherto conducted, and so essential to bring it to a happy termination. You are directed immediately upon the receipt of this dispatch to bring the subject to the notice of His Majesty's Government, and to demand as a matter of justice and right the prompt release of Mr. Greely and a suitable indemnity for his imprisonment.

Mr. Stevenson to Mr. Forsyth.

LEGATION OF THE UNITED STATES,

London, August 21, 1837.

SIR: I received by the last packet to Liverpool your dispatch of the 12th of July (No. 21), transmitting copies of the documents and correspondence in relation to the arrest and imprisonment of Mr. Greely, a citizen of Maine, by the authorities of New Brunswick.