ANENT the first use of the term " Copperhead" as an opprobrious epithet applied to Democrats during the American Civil War, the late James Ford Rhodes wrote, "I have made and had made a considerable search for the first use of the term 'Copperhead'. The earliest that I have found it employed is in the Cincinnati Commercial of October 1, 1862 " Mr. Albert Matthews in a similar investigation wrote, "the earliest known instance is from Illinois, in reference to Indiana" in the Chicago Tribune for September 24, 1862.2 Inasmuch as both of the above authors have curiously overlooked a conspicuous and widespread newspaper usage of the term some two months before the dates of their first findings, a further word upon the matter is illuminative.

The Cincinnati Gazette of July 30, 1862, notified its readers: "The Copperhead Bright Convention meets in Indianapolis today", referring to the state Democratic convention. Antagonistic to the convention was a serenade accorded General Lew Wallace, a despatch. account of which the Gazette published July 31 under the caption, "A Glorious Sequel to the Copperhead Convention". An investigation into a considerable number of newspapers has not revealed an earlier use of the abusive title. Since "Copperhead" appeared in print without quotation-marks it might seem that the application of the word was not new at that time, or type-practice in the Gazette office was that of omitting quotation-marks for even fresh adaptations. These are matters probably incapable of proof. Whatever the more immediate facts, they were inconsequential in the light of the real significance of the affair, namely, that the new brand of reproach had fallen upon a subject which attracted more than a statewide interest. On this account the new concept of " Copperhead", linked to the Indiana Democratic convention, was rapidly circulated throughout the Ohio Valley. This currency was brought about through the copy which was made of the Gazette July 31 despatch by widely separated newspapers. In Missouri, the St. Louis TriWeekly Democrat of August I copied the despatch with its "Copperhead" caption. In Illinois, the Springfield Weekly State Journal of August 6 made the same copy. In Ohio, the Wooster Republican of August 7 made the same copy and captioned it: "The Copperhead Democrats". Further citations might be made of newspapers which through the same method contributed together, within the short

1 History of the United States, IV. 224, note.

2 Publications of the Colonial Society of Massachusetts (1917), XX. 207. AM. HIST. REV., VOL. XXXII.-53.

course of one week, to widely acquaint the public mind of the Middle West with the new nickname.

Multiplied users soon diversified the application of the new term. An Indianapolis letter to the Chicago Tribune on August 3 reported grand jury proceedings against "some prominent Copperheads ". This account was printed August 5 under the caption: "Preparing to Deal with Hoosier Copperheads ". A letter to the Cincinnati Commercial on August 21 described a Democratic gathering at Lancaster, Ohio, as one where "the usual number of copperhead lies were told by orators". The letter was published under the indiscriminate caption: "Grand Copperhead Turnout in Fairfield County". These are fair examples of the rapidity with which the new term became generalized. The "Copperhead" cognomen was destined to become an important addition to Civil War nomenclature. After the apparently first appearance of the defamatory word in July, and its spread during August, a month followed during which the term seems to have dropped from the press. But the epithet had taken root in popular fancy and it began to reappear in the press during September and October. The first evidences of a scattered crop from a good seeding are the first findings of Messrs. Rhodes and Matthews, both of whom, from this point on, cite instances of the growing usage of the word. Aside from any antiquarian interest in the determination of the first use of the term

"Copperhead" there is further value in its concrete evidence of the early rise of vitriolic politics during the Civil War period.

PAUL S. SMITH.

DOCUMENTS

Despatches from the United States Consulate in New Orleans, 1801-1803, I.

A PECULIAR historical interest attaches to those American consulates established in ports which at the time were foreign but which subsequently became a part of the territory of the United States. Professor R. W. Kelsey, and before him Josiah Royce, have shown how much of interest there is in the story of the United States consulate at Monterey, California, and Dr. Kuykendall has printed interesting despatches from consular American officers at Honolulu. The history of the consulate at New Orleans in the period of the cession of Louisiana and just before, 1798-1803, is also of interest.

At the time when the first consular officers of the United States were appointed, it was the custom of European governments to admit the establishment of no consuls in their colonies.1 The new American government, however, had naturally a different conception of the relation of a colony to its European metropolis, and its citizens moreover began immediately, and especially after the opening of the great war in 1793, to have important commercial relations with colonial ports. Accordingly, among the fifty or sixty consuls or vice-consuls appointed by President Washington, we find consuls for French Hispaniola (Cap François and Aux Cayes), Martinique, and Isle of France, for Dutch Surinam, St. Eustatius, Curaçao, and Demerara, for Danish Santa Cruz, British Calcutta, and Spanish New Orleans; and to these President Adams added in his first year Swedish St. Bartholomew, Spanish Santo Domingo, and Havana.

The appointment of a consul in New Orleans was a natural result of the provisions respecting trade and deposit in the Pinckney Treaty of 1795. The status of trading foreigners before that time. is fully set forth in retrospect by the experienced Daniel Clark : 2

By the letter of the Spanish commercial laws, all trade is prohibited to her colonies, except it be carried on by natives, or naturalized residents. 1 Moore, Digest, V. 17; J. Q. Adams, Memoirs, IV. 88. D. B. Warden, On the Origin, Nature, Progress, and Influence of Consular Establishments (Paris, 1813), p. 219, prints a list of French consular establishments as they were in time of peace, i.e., before 1803; none was in any American port outside the United States. The same is true of his list of British consuls, pp. 281-282, if exception be made of the peculiar case of Brazil under John VI.

2 Proofs of the Corruption of General James Wilkinson (Philadelphia, 1809), P 84.

The extreme rigour of this rule defeated the execution, and the very existence of several of its colonies depended on its relaxation. This accordingly took place at New Orleans, particularly during the administration of the Baron de Carondelet. The first indulgence was granted, by extending the privilege to residents, altho' not naturalized. The second, by the officers of government contenting themselves with the simple declaration of any individual, commonly the consigner, that he was the owner of the vessel. This declaration was not made under oath, nor was it in most cases supported by any documents. Sometimes it was even accepted from a person who, though not actually resident, had declared his intention of making a settlement in the country, or who had obtained a license to introduce goods. It deceived nobody, but it furnished the officers of government with a very flimsy pretext for registering the vessel in their books as Spanish property, and thus preserving an apparent compliance with the law; but so little attention was paid to this formality, that the Governor and Intendant gave certificates that the vessel was American property, even while she stood on their Custom-house books as being owned by a resident.

The great increase of trade between New Orleans and the United States due to the more liberal provisions of the Treaty of San Lorenzo, the introduction of the sugar-cane into Louisiana, and the enlarged production of cotton, made it desirable to establish there a consul of the United States. On March 2, 1797, President Washington, as his last consular appointment, nominated to that office Procopio Jacinto Pollock of Pennsylvania, son of the well-known Oliver Pollock who had been so useful a financial agent of the United States in New Orleans and Havana during the Revolutionary War. This appointee however never went to New Orleans as consul, and ultimately he resigned.3

A year's interval occurred, during which the crying need for a representative of American commercial interests was informally supplied by Daniel Clark, resident merchant of Irish origin, born in Sligo in 1766. In a statement made to Congress in 1808, he says:* "I arrived from Europe, at New Orleans, in December, 1786, having been invited to the country by an uncle [Daniel Clark, sr.], of considerable wealth and influence, who had been long resident in that city. Shortly after my arrival I was employed in the office of the Secretary of the Government." On January 13, 1798, we find him writing to his friend Daniel Coxe of Philadelphia, "We are here

3 Executive Journals of the Senate, I. 228. H. E. Hayden, A Biographical Sketch of Oliver Pollock (Harrisburg, 1883), p. 20, says of the son, "About 1800 he removed to Oporto Rico [sic] and engaged in the coffee culture. He became very wealthy; but nothing more can be learned of him". May 23, 1797, he is mentioned as of Havana, and May 6, 1799, Secretary Pickering writes of him as having resigned. Historical Index to the Pickering Papers, pp. 402 and 9.

4 Proofs, p. 105*; Wilkinson, Memoirs, II., app. no. V.; Am. St. Pap., Misc., I. 704, II. 111; Annals of Congress, 10 Cong., I sess., I. 1388.

without a Consul and his presence is highly necessary to prevent and put a stop to the numerous abuses which the Spanish Governm't force the Americans to submit to ".5 In March, at the instance of Andrew Ellicott, the boundary commissioner, and Captain Isaac Guion, U. S. A., commanding at Natchez, he agreed to act, and Gayoso agreed to allow him to act, as vice-consul until a consul duly appointed by the President should arrive."

Irregular as was his position, Clark proceeded to accomplish two useful things. Under the existing regulations, American vessels could not export from New Orleans the produce of Louisiana without paying duties of twenty-one per cent., quite prohibitive, and Spanish vessels could not export American produce which came down the river and was deposited at New Orleans, without paying six per cent. on the importation in addition to the ordinary export duty of six per cent.-twelve per cent. in all. With tactful and cogent representations Clark urged the intendant Morales to give greater freedom to commerce, under the hard conditions of wartime, by permitting American vessels to export the produce of the colony with the same freedom as Spanish vessels on payment of the same duties of six per cent., and to permit Spanish or Louisiana vessels to export American upriver produce, elsewhere than to Spain, as freely as American vessels on paying the same export duties. Morales conceded both points. Secondly, the acting vice-consul sent to Secretary Pickering a valuable general memoir on the commerce of Louisiana with the Ohio country."

Meanwhile Clark was making an endeavor to be actually appointed consul. In view of the subsequent relations between the two

5 Dept. of State, Misc. Letters.

6 Ellicott and Guion to Clark, Mar. 2, 1798; Clark to Ellicott and Guion, Mar. 14, Clark to Pickering, Mar. 17, admitting that Gayoso had gone too far and that the whole proceeding was irregular. All in the State Department volume, Consular Despatches, New Orleans.

7 Clark to Morales, May 1, 1798, Archivo General de Indias, Seville, Pap. proc. de Cuba, leg. 612-2. For photographic copies of this and other documents, and for intelligent summaries and notes of many others, the editor is indebted to Miss Irene A. Wright of Seville. Clark to Pickering, Apr. 18, 1798, Consular Despatches, N. O.

8 Morales to Clark, June 13, 1798, A. G. I., ubi sup. Clark to Pickering, June 14, Consular Despatches, N. O.

9 Maj. Constant Freeman to Pickering, Savannah, June 11, 1798, enclosing the memoir, ibid. Parts of it were printed, from a copy furnished by Wilkinson, in the pamphlet A Plain Tale, supported by Authentic Documents, justifying the Character of General Wilkinson: by a Kentuckian (New York, 1807), pp. 10-14. These were reprinted in Clark's Proofs, pp. 6*—9* (see also p. 106), and somewhat fuller extracts in Wilkinson's Memoirs, II., app. no. VI., and Am. St. Pap., Misc., I. 707-709.