Duel with the Devil (33 page)

  
1
HORRID MURDER
!:
Independent Gazetteer
(Worcester, Mass.), 26 January 1800.

  
2
“She was that evening to be privately married”
:
Claypoole’s American Daily Advertiser
(Philadelphia), 8 January 1800.

  
3
“The city” … “is much agitated
”: Abraham Bancker to Abraham B. Bancker, 12 January 1800.

  
4
“Could beauty, virtue, innocence, and love”
: Freneau, “The Reward of Innocence” in
Collection of Poems, on American Affairs, and a Variety of Other Subjects
, 1:113.

  
5
gazed at the cold and ashen features
: Hardie,
Impartial Account of the Trial
, 19.

  
6
offices at 47 Wall Street
:
Longworth’s American Almanack
(1800), 191.

  
7
building had served as a coffee merchant
:
NYDA
, 9 May 1796.

  
8
a shop selling hogsheads of rum and porter
:
NYG
, 26 November 1799.

  
9
Bleecker … opening a stockbroker office
:
NYDA
, 10 February 1800.

10
local Tammany Society … “Is there implanted in the human breast”
: “Records of Tammany Go to Public Library,”
New York Times
, 25 September 1927.

11
set up a few years earlier
:
Diary; or, Loudon’s Register
(New York, N.Y.), 3 March 1797.

12
young Cadwallader got the nod
:
Albany Gazette
, 19 January 1798.

13
counterfeit ten-dollar notes
:
NYMA
, 12 July 1799.

14
five-dollar bills altered to look like twenties
:
NYCA
, 25 November 1799.

15
shoplifting duo had been hitting fabric merchants
: Ibid., 2 November 1799.

16
incorrigible pair known as Rap and Baker
:
NYG
, 14 November 1799.

17
Jacob Weiser … “a monster in human form”
:
NYDA
, 20 September 1799.

18
“the damn’d villain guilty of the theft”
:
NYCA
, 1 November 1799.

19
advertise a reward for over $1,200 worth of stock certificates
:
NYG
, 1 November 1799.

20
immense crowd that filled the court and the street
: Ibid., 25 November 1799. The
Gazette
had by far the most extensive account of John Pastano’s crime and trial to run in any newspaper of the time. The rest of this passage on Pastano is drawn from that article, except where otherwise noted.

21
considered a great patriot
: Simonhoff,
Jewish Notables in America
, 53.

22
The jury deliberated for just minutes
:
NYMA
, 20 November 1799.

23
that coming Tuesday, in fact—sentenced … to hanging and dissection
: Ibid., 2 December 1799.

24
conflagration that Greenwich Street narrowly avoided
:
NYCA
, 6 January 1800.

25
breasts … showed dark bruises
:
Claypoole’s American Daily Advertiser
(Philadelphia), 8 January 1800.

26
“Her fingers appear to have been scratched”
: William Coleman,
Report of the Trial of Levi Weeks
, 59.

27
an equally enraged Richard Croucher
: Ibid., 82.

28
If I should meet Levi Weeks in the dark
: Ibid.

29
pistols had replaced rapiers
: Sabine,
Notes on Duels and Duelling
, 30.

30
The very first duel in America
: Ibid., 164.

31
journalists, politicians, and military officers
: The entries in Sabine’s compendium of known duels are especially rich in these professions.

32
newspaper letter that year proposing a “dueling club”
:
NYDA
, 6 June 1800.

33
“two French nobles could not agree”
: Sabine,
Notes on Duels and Duelling
, 35.

34
an army colonel and a navy captain dueled
: Ibid., 247.

35
“seconds”—to
also
take offense
: Ibid., 34.

36
a pair of French immigrants … met in the storied dueling ground
:
NYMA
, 17 August 1799.

37
dueled with pistols not once but twice in a single week
:
NYCA
, 9 and 13 September 1799. This particularly argumentative fellow was William Chambers, who is listed on page 160 of the 1800
Longworth’s American Almanack
as being a ship chandler.

38
Aaron Burr himself had dueled with John Barker Church
:
Political Correspondence and Public Papers of Aaron Burr
, 1:410.

39
bullets in both legs during a duel in Paulus Hook
:
NYCA
, 13 November 1799.

40
Any Quaker coffin was a plain one
: Clarkson,
Portraiture of Quakerism
, 25. The other details regarding Quaker funerals are also largely drawn from Clarkson’s account.

41
show off silver coins as buttons
: Watson,
Historic Tales of Olden Time
, 151.

42
sooner walk into street posts than wear spectacles
: Ibid., 154.

43
“Mr. Weeks will no doubt speedily meet the reward of his demerits”
:
Independent Gazetteer
(Worcester, Mass.), 26 January 1800.

44
James Snedeker was a surgeon and physician
:
Longworth’s American Almanack
(1800), 334. The few modern accounts of the Levi Weeks case spell his name as “Snedecher,” presumably because this was the spelling used in Coleman’s trial transcript. However, both the Hardie transcript and the 1800
Longworth’s American Almanack
render it as “Snedeker”; moreover, while I find no examples from that time of the name Snedecher in local newspapers, there are occurrences of “Snedeker.”

45
practice still newly established in town
: Snedeker, while listed in the 1800
Longworth’s American Almanack
, does not appear in earlier editions. In his trial testimony (William Coleman,
Report of the Trial of Levi Weeks
, 59) he notes that he is just twenty-eight years old.

46
carefully turned her head and examined her neck and chest
: William Coleman,
Report of the Trial of Levi Weeks
, 59–60.

47
“blows on her brow, chin, and breast”
:
Claypoole’s American Daily Advertiser
(Philadelphia), 8 January 1800.

48
“a sudden extinction of life”
: William Coleman,
Report of the Trial of Levi Weeks
, 60–61.

49
The Friends Burial Ground
: This location and the afternoon of burial are noted in
NYWM
, 11 January 1800.

50
To see a funeral
: Clarkson,
Portraiture of Quakerism
, 25.

51
unmarked with any headstone
: Ibid., 28–29.

52
“being moved … and seduced by the instigation of the Devil”
: William Coleman,
Report of the Trial of Levi Weeks
, 10.

  
1
“The public are desired to suspend their opinion”
:
NYDA
, 9 January 1800.

  
2
pamphlets were even circulating accounts of ghosts
: Hardie,
Impartial Account of the Trial
, v.

  
3
“Handbills were generally distributed throughout the city”
: Ibid.

  
4
a New Jersey coroner’s claim
:
NYWM
, 11 January 1800.

  
5
a live “Beautiful African
LION
”:
NYDA
, 29 January 1800.

  
6
THE NEWTONION SYSTEM OF ASTRONOMY REFUTED
:
NYCA
, 15 January 1800.

  
7
gentlemen had built a perpetual motion engine
:
NYMA
, 6 February 1800.

  
8
spot the masterful hand of Aaron Burr
: Isenberg,
Fallen Founder
, 192–93. While the editorial is not specifically identifiable as Burr’s handiwork, a number of writers and biographers (including Isenberg) have noted Burr as a likely source for this newspaper notice.

  
9
plumbing for the Manhattan Well
: Kleiger,
Trial of Levi Weeks
, 17.

10
longtime slaves Harry and Peggy
:
Memoirs of Aaron Burr
, 403–4.

11
at ease with classical languages
: Pidgin,
Theodosia
, 188.

12
ponder composing a book
: Ibid., 222.

13
Washington Irving was nurturing some affection
: Ibid., 223.

14
“convince the world what neither sex appear”
: Isenberg,
Fallen Founder
, 81.

15
she had charmed a Mohawk chief
: Pidgin,
Theodosia
, 219.

16
welcomed into the great reception hall
: Stone,
History of New York City
, 217. Stone quotes at length from Gulian Verplanck’s “Reminiscences of New York,”
Casket
, December 1829, 561–63. This unsigned and rather poignant account is of a visit to the old home by Verplanck; by the time he visited it in the 1820s, it had been converted into a rowdy entertainment hall.

17
ranks of ancient oaks and basswood
: Stone,
History of New York City
, 216.

18
a fine flower garden enclosed by hedges
: Pidgin,
Theodosia
, 212.

19
an ancient boundary line … Bestaver’s Killetje
: Ibid., 210.

20
seized in 1776 as Washington’s headquarters
: Isenberg,
Fallen Founder
, 32.

21
doomed Battle of Quebec
: Ibid., 19.

22
winter at Valley Forge with Washington, and … the Battle of Monmouth
: Isenberg,
Fallen Founder
, 85.

23
“Pipes for the conveyance of Water”
: Aaron Burr to Robert Livingston, 20 September 1799, in
Political Correspondence and Public Papers of Aaron Burr
, 1:406.

24
“one of those Grecian temples”
: Janvier,
In Old New York
, 204.

25
“RICHMOND HILL.
TO BE LET
”:
GNDA
, 8 July 1799.

26
to retrieve the ink bottles … and to lock up his papers
: Peggy Gartin to Aaron Burr, 3 December 1800,
Memoirs of Aaron Burr
, 1:403.

27
“The extreme wrong I have suffer’d”
: Henry Drinker to Aaron Burr, 15 January 1799,
Political Correspondence and Public Papers of Aaron Burr
, 1:379.

28
“I do not as yet perceive any resource”
: Aaron Burr to Pierpont Edwards, 14 December 1798,
Political Correspondence and Public Papers of Aaron Burr
, 1:359.

29
promissory note for $1,500
: Promissory note to James and William Constable, 21 November 1799, Aaron Burr Papers, 1774–1836.

30
The statesman was waiting outside
:
Extracts from the Journal of Elizabeth Drinker
, 356.

31
Philadelphia entailed taking a ferry past
: Monaghan and Lowenthal,
This Was New York
, 1.

32
three-story mansion on a double lot
: Ritter,
Philadelphia and Her Merchants
, 120.

33
at the back of a chocolatier’s shop … a cabinet workshop
: Ibid., 121.

34
“Drinker’s Big House”
:
Extracts from the Journal of Elizabeth Drinker
, 27.

35
walked in gingerly on his corns
: Maxey, “Union Farm,” 611.

36
the double chin of a successful Quaker merchant
: Ibid., 607.

37
brought his young Theodosia for a visit once
:
Extracts from the Journal of Elizabeth Drinker
, 248.

38
to purchase some eighty thousand acres
: Guide to the Pierpont Edwards Papers.

39
“The Purchase if made will be with a View”
: Aaron Burr to W. H. Drinker, 23 November 1795. This letter is not among the Henry Drinker Papers (1747–1867) at the Historical Society of Pennsylvania; it is owned by a private collector. The quote is drawn from a sales catalog transcription by the Gallery of History in Las Vegas,
http://​www.​history​for​sale.​com/​html/​prodetails.​asp?​documentid=​278468
.

40
property taxes had been accumulating
: Henry Drinker to Aaron Burr, 19 December 1799,
Political Correspondence and Public Papers of Aaron Burr
, 1:413.

41
underwrote cargo ships from Britain and ran a busy iron mill
: Maxey, “Union Farm,” 609.

42
support the Revolutionary patriots … sell British tea
: Doerflinger,
Vigorous Spirit of Enterprise
, 167.

43
holding the bag for immense debts
: Isenberg,
Fallen Founder
, 155.

44
he was on the hook for at least $80,000
: Fleming,
Duel
, 98.

45
“I am not aware of any cause of litigation”
: Henry Drinker to Aaron Burr, 15 January 1799,
Political Correspondence and Public Papers of Aaron Burr
, 1:378.

46
reputation for harrying foes with blizzards of appeals
:
Memoirs of Aaron Burr
, 2:14.

47
“is whatever is boldly asserted and plausibly maintained”
: Ibid.

48
Burr pressed the merchant relentlessly
:
Political Correspondence and Public Papers of Aaron Burr
, 1:415f.

49
missed his Sunday meeting at the Friends meetinghouse
:
Extracts from the Journal of Elizabeth Drinker
, 356.

50
“I have had to pay a large demand”
: Henry Drinker to Robert Bowne, 14 January 1800,
Political Correspondence and Public Papers of Aaron Burr
, 1:415ff.

51
yet another $1,500 out of his local merchants
: Promissory note to James and William Constable, 23 January 1800, Aaron Burr Papers, 1774–1836.

52
counterattack in the
New-York Mercantile Advertiser
:
NYMA
, 13 January 1800.

53
much of the state’s legal talent was disbarred for Loyalism
: Isenberg,
Fallen Founder
, 88.

54
Their clientele tended to follow their political inclinations
: Ibid., 89.

55
he accepted the job of New York’s state attorney general
: Ibid., 104.

56
a slave named Pompey for robbery
: Indictment,
People [AB] v. Pompey and Tom
, 4 October 1791, NYSC Case 0397, Reel 16, Aaron Burr Papers, 1774–1836.

57
a rape suspect
: Affidavit,
People [AB] v. Titus, Robert and Neilson, David
, 16 October 1791, NYSC Case 0395, Reel 16, Aaron Burr Papers, 1774–1836.

58
the hot-tempered proprietor of a glassworks
: Indictment and Deposition,
People [AB] v. Moulter, Philip and Stalsenbergh, John
, 4 October 1791, NYSC Case 0396, Reel 16, Aaron Burr Papers, 1774–1836. There are few other records of these cases, but Philip Moulter’s role as a glassworks owner in the town of Watervliet, New York, can be gleaned from a page 2 advertisement in the
Albany Gazette
of 13 October 1791. Placed immediately after his murder indictment, it seeks someone to run the glassworks for a while, as he understandably found himself “unable to carry on that important manufactory, which he views to be so very necessary in this new and flourishing country.” 88 brother-in-law and an uncle both sat on the bench:
Memoirs of Aaron Burr
, 2:13.

59
a fine example of lawyer humor
:
NYWM
, 2 November 1799.

60
he promptly and enthusiastically billed them
: Rogow,
Fatal Friendship
, 99. To be fair, as Rogow points out, this reputation at least partly rests on the Le Guen settlement, and “by today’s standards, [Burr’s fees] were not excessive.”

61
billed his client twice as much as had fellow counsel Alexander Hamilton
: Ibid.