Click to enlarge:
Select an image:
Three weeks after taking office as Secretary of War under President Thomas Jefferson, Henry Dearborn approved this account presented by John H. Barney for express riding from Georgetown and George Washington’s former estate, Mount Vernon.
After George Washington’s death in December 1799, his widow and former First Lady Martha Washington continued to operate Mount Vernon with the assistance of farm manager James Anderson until her death in May 1802.
HENRY DEARBORN.
Autograph Endorsement Signed on Account of John H. Barney, March 26, 1801. 1 p., 8 x 7¾ in.
Inventory #26237
Price: $490
Complete Transcript
The United States Dr
To John H. Barny
1801
March 26th
For Sending on Express from George Town to mount vurnin for $5,00
[Endorsement by Dearborn:]
approved
Henry Dearborn
[Endorsement:]
Received George Town Aprl 20th 1801 of John Wilkins Jur Qur Master Genl by Thos Williams five dollars in full for the above acct Signed duplicate
Jno H. Barney
Historical Background
The express rider, whether Barney or more likely someone sent by him, probably carried a letter from President Thomas Jefferson to Tobias Lear, former personal secretary to President George Washington from 1786 to 1799. Lear was present at Washington’s death and oversaw the funeral arrangements. From Washington, Lear inherited a lifetime interest in Walnut Tree Farm, one of the plantations of Mount Vernon, located on the Potomac River between the Mount Vernon estate and Georgetown.
On March 26, 1794, Jefferson wrote to Lear, “I have to appoint a Consul to reside near Toussaint in St. Domingo, an office of great importance to us at present, and requiring great prudence. no salary is annexed to it: but it is understood to be in the power of the Consul, by means entirely honorable, to amass a profit in a very short time.” Jefferson asked Lear to accept the appointment but required “a very early departure,” and Jefferson would need to see Lear within two or three days before making a short trip to Monticello.[1] The urgency of Jefferson’s request may have required an express rider to deliver the letter.
On the same day, March 26, Lear responded to Jefferson, “I have been this moment honored with your favor of the present date, and feel grateful for the attention you have been so good as to pay me, by an offer of the Consulship in St. Domingo; and am highly flattered by the confidence which you repose in my prudence and discretion.—But, how ever desireable such an office may be to me, either in a pecuniary point of view; or from a wish to serve my Country, I must, at present, decline it, as the situation of my own Affairs will not permit me to leave the United States immediately....” Lear also recommended Bartholomew Dandridge for the post, as Dandridge had already been appointed consul from the southern district of Santo Domingo. Lear continued that he would be in Washington two days later and hoped to meet with the President, adding, “if it is not really necessary to make this appointment before that time, you will do me a favour by delaying it; for I confess if it should be possible for me to receive it I should most readily embrace it.”[2] Jefferson endorsed Lear’s letter as received on April 26.
On March 31, Jefferson signed a commission for Lear as consul general for the island of Santo Domingo, but it was replaced by another dated May 11, 1801. In January 1802, the Senate approved Lear’s appointment.
Henry Dearborn (1751-1829) was born in New Hampshire and studied medicine with a doctor in Portsmouth before opening his own practice in Nottingham, New Hampshire in 1772. In 1775, he fought at the Battle of Bunker Hill as a captain in the 1st New Hampshire Infantry. He was captured during the Battle of Quebec at the end of 1775 and was released on parole in May 1776 but not exchanged until March 1777. He fought at Ticonderoga and in the Saratoga campaign. He joined General George Washington’s main army at Valley Forge, Pennsylvania, as a lieutenant colonel. Dearborn joined Washington’s staff in 1781 as deputy quartermaster general and commanded the 1st New Hampshire at the Battle of Yorktown with the rank of colonel. He was discharged from the Continental Army in June 1783 and settled in Maine. He served in the U.S. House of Representatives as a Democratic-Republican from the District of Maine (then part of Massachusetts) from 1793 to 1797. In 1801, President Thomas Jefferson appointed him Dearborn as Secretary of War, a post he held until March 1809. President James Madison appointed him as collector of the port of Boston, a position Dearborn held from March 1809 to January 1812, when he became the Commanding General of the U.S. Army. After mediocre service in the War on the northern frontier with Canada, Dearborn was discharged from the army in June 1815. In 1818, Dearborn ran for Governor of Massachusetts, but his article criticizing Israel Putnam’s performance at the Battle of Bunker Hill sparked a long-lasting controversy that harmed his campaign in a largely Federalist state. The Senate rejected Madison’s nomination of Dearborn for Secretary of War, and Dearborn served as minister to Portugal from May 1822 to June 1824. He then retired to his home in Massachusetts. Dearborn married three times—to Mary Bartlett in 1771, to Dorcas Marble in 1780, and to Sarah Bowdoin, widow of James Bowdoin, in 1813.
John H. Barney (1752-1840) was a brother of Commodore Joshua Barney (1759-1818). He served as postmaster of Havre de Grace, Maryland, from 1789 to 1795, where he also operated a ferry. By 1797, he had invested in a stage line between Philadelphia and Baltimore. In 1800, he moved to Georgetown, and the firm of John H. Barney & Co. continued to operate stagecoaches on routes between Alexandria, Baltimore, Washington, and Philadelphia into the 1830s.
Tobias Lear (1762-1816) was born in New Hampshire and graduated from Harvard College in 1783. He tutored Martha Washington’s grandchildren and served as personal secretary to George Washington beginning in 1786. He remained as Washington’s personal secretary, with some interruptions, until the former president’s death in 1799. Lear started T. Lear & Company to work with Washington’s Potomac Company to promote river traffic and to speculate in land. His business was largely a failure, and he returned to Washington’s service. He married Mary Long in 1790, and they had one son before she died in the yellow fever epidemic in Philadelphia in 1793. Two years later, Lear married Frances Bassett Washington, the recent widow of the President’s nephew George Augustine Washington. She died in 1796 of tuberculosis. In 1803, he married Frances Dandridge Henley, a niece of Martha Washington. Lear served as a diplomat during the administration of Thomas Jefferson to Saint-Domingue (Haiti) (1801-1802) and to North Africa during the First Barbary War (1803-1805). He and his third wife remained in Algiers until 1812, when he fell out of favor with the Dey. He apparently committed suicide by shooting himself with a pistol.
Condition: Trimmed at bottom; expected wear; overall toning; edge darkening; chipped edges
