Duel with the Devil (37 page)

  
1
“at the bar he is more remarkable for ingenuity”
: Chernow,
Alexander Hamilton
, 193.

  
2
“He delighted in surprising his opponents”
:
Memoirs of Aaron Burr
, 2:15.

  
3
hammering nails and tongs for New Yorkers for years
:
NYWM
, 28 May 1791.

  
4
“Do you remember” … “any thing in the conduct of
Mr. Ring
”: William Coleman,
Report of the Trial of Levi Weeks
, 71. In Coleman’s transcript, Watkins says that Elma’s bed stood “within four inches of the partition”; after being corrected by James Hardie, Coleman retracted this particular phrase in his letter to the
NYAC
of 30 April 1800. Apparently it was the partition itself that was four inches thick, but as Coleman did not indicate the revised quote’s exact wording in his correction, I have left it out of the quotation.

  
5
“rustling of beds, such as might be occasioned”
: Hardie,
Impartial Account of the Trial
, 27–28.

  
6
“It continued some time”
: William Coleman,
Report of the Trial of Levi Weeks
, 72.

  
7
an affidavit from Watkins’s ailing wife
: Ibid., 74.

  
8
“I heard her say” … “the Thursday after she was missing”
: Ibid., 73.

  
9
Betsy, had heard similar sentiments
: Ibid., 76.

10
one of Levi’s own coworkers—had heard by that fourth day
: Ibid., 83.

11
“Did you ever speak of this noise”
: Ibid., 73.

12
“When did you first mention to Croucher”
: Ibid., 74.

13
Hugh McDougall, a Broadway glazier and sign painter
:
NYCA
, 27 October 1800.
Longworth’s American Almanack
for 1800 (265) also notes McDougall as running an oil and paint store at the same 92 Broadway address.

14
“I have been acquainted with this
Mr. Croucher
”: William Coleman,
Report of the Trial of Levi Weeks
, 82.

15
“I told him I thought it was
wrong
”: Ibid., 83.

16
a Greenwich Street grocery
:
Longworth’s American Almanack
(1800), 203.

17
“On Friday last, Croucher came running to the store”
: William Coleman,
Report of the Trial of Levi Weeks
, 80–81.

18
Alexander Hamilton snatched up a candle from the table
: Ibid., 82.

19
“Did you ever publish the handbills about apparitions?”
: Ibid., 93.

20
“I saw a young man, the week before the girl was missing”
: Ibid., 90.

21
she had lost her husband to yellow fever back in the outbreak of ’98
: Hardie,
Account of the Malignant Fever
, 83.

22
“On the 22nd of December” … “being my little boy’s birthday”
: William Coleman,
Report of the Trial of Levi Weeks
, 92.

23
Several others … were not witnesses of great public reputation
: Ibid., 93. Specifically, of the four other witnesses noted by name in Coleman’s transcript, three are not even listed in any edition of
Longworth’s American Almanack
. The only witness at the Ashmore party with any public profile, Jacob Hopper, does not exactly speak to the moral character of the gathering. He is listed on page 233 of the 1800 edition as a cartman, but later went on to become well-known indeed—as a swindler who absconded with substantial sums of money from Manhattan banks and merchants. He was to be captured soon afterward in Cuba.
Essex Register
(Salem, Mass.), 26 November 1807.

24
Colden had used an impressive quote … “Circumstantial evidence is all that can be expected”
: William Coleman,
Report of the Trial of Levi Weeks
, 62.

25
“Positive and direct proof of fraud is not to be expected”
: Morgan,
Essays
, 1:208.

26
the fraudulent policy on a £110 cargo of oats
: Park,
System of the Law of Marine Insurances
, 238. The Morgan quotation is itself drawn from this passage in Park.

27
testimonials by local worthies
: William Coleman,
Report of the Trial of Levi Weeks
, 90.

28
“In some cases, presumptive evidences go far”
: Ibid., 93.

29
It was now 2:30
A.M.
:
Ibid.

30
“sinking under the fatigues he had suffered”
: Longworth,
Brief Narrative of the Trial
, 13.

31
“Really” … “he had not the strength to proceed”
: William Coleman,
Report of the Trial of Levi Weeks
, 94.

32
“was obliged to at five or six in the morning to enter a reply”
: Longworth,
Brief Narrative of the Trial
, 13.

33
at least one was quietly teetering on the edge of insolvency
:
NYG
, 8 August 1801. The reference is to a notice of insolvency for juror Richard Ellis. He had also been listed as insolvent on at least one previous occasion, in
Diary; or, Loudon’s Register
(New York, N.Y.), 27 September 1797.

34
Two nights passed in this manner might make some of them sick
: Longworth,
Brief Narrative of the Trial
, 13.

35
“The examinations of the paintings must doubtless be very edifying”
: Ibid.

36
we relinquish our closing argument
: William Coleman,
Report of the Trial of Levi Weeks
, 94. In one newspaper account (
NYDA
, 3 April 1800), Hamilton is specifically noted as the counsel making this statement.

37
The question involves considerations of great moment
: Ibid., 95.

38
You must find the prisoner guilty
: Ibid., 97.

39
“beyond a
reasonable
doubt” had started to gain currency as a legal concept
: Langbein,
Origins of Adversary Criminal Trial
, 33.

40
ten minutes
:
NYMA
, 3 April 1800.

41
four
: Hardie,
Impartial Account of the Trial
, 34.

42
or five
: William Coleman,
Report of the Trial of Levi Weeks
, 98.

43
“less than two”
: Longworth,
Brief Narrative of the Trial
, 14.

44
called a final roll
: Ibid.

45
Simon Schermerhorn … foreman
: Hardie,
Impartial Account of the Trial
, 34.

46
He raised his right hand
: Longworth,
Brief Narrative of the Trial
, 14.

47
Look upon the prisoner
: Jacob and Tomlins, “Trial,”
Law-Dictionary
. This wording by the clerk is alluded to as “universally” used in courts in a discussion during, ironically enough, Aaron Burr’s trial for treason in 1807 (Robertson,
Trial of Aaron Burr for Treason
, 550).

48
“Not guilty”
: William Coleman,
Report of the Trial of Levi Weeks
, 98.

49
shouts and applause as the judge gaveled loudly for order
:
NYDA
, 3 April 1800.

  
1
“many hundreds, perhaps thousands”
:
NYMA
, 14 April 1800. Specifically, this was a letter sent to the paper by Monteath McFarlane, the printer of James Hardie’s account of the trial.

  
2
four years of hard labor for stealing a black mourning cloth
:
NYAC
, 10 April 1800.

  
3
“Although some circumstances point to him”
: Letter by Abraham Bancker, 12 January 1800, Bancker Papers.

  
4
“Mr. Burr opened the defense with perspicuity”
:
NYDA
, 3 April 1800.

  
5
Within hours of the acquittal
: William Coleman,
Report of the Trial of Levi Weeks
, ii.

  
6
David Longworth was known for publishing plays
: Remer,
Printers and Men of Capital
, 91.

  
7
sentimental prints of the late General Washington
:
NYCA
, 25 January 1800.

  
8
now this hastily assembled account
:
NYDA
, 16 April 1800. Although the pamphlet itself lists no publisher, Longworth takes credit for it in this public response to William Coleman.

  
9
set the type even as his “Gentleman” wrote it
: Longworth,
Brief Narrative of the Trial
, 16.

10
“The narrative I published was too hastily written”
:
NYDA
, 16 April 1800.

11
“The careless and inelegant style”
: Longworth,
Brief Narrative of the Trial
, 15.

12
“he had procured the clerk of the circuit court”
:
NYDA
, 5 April 1800.

13
“The miserable shift of trying to put off this catch-penny”
:
NYCA
, 4 April 1800. Though the ad is not initially identified as Coleman’s, when it ran again the following day in the
New-York Mercantile Advertiser
, it included his byline.

14
“gratify the public curiosity”
:
NYCA
, 4 April 1800.

15
“By what privilege does this man insult me”
:
NYDA
, 16 April 1800. Coleman should have known better, as New York printers could be ruthless. In just the previous few months, one printer had accused another of stealing a set of translations right off its press (
NYCA
, 14 December 1799); another claimed an imposter had strolled into its office to steal copy (
NYDA
, 18 March 1800); and still another press saw its proprietor grab up an iron rod to chase a rival out of his shop (
NYS
, 12 March 1800). The assailant, as it happens, was the radical journalist and gadfly William Cobbett; he turns up as a character in my book
The Trouble with Tom: The Strange Afterlife and Times of Thomas Paine
(New York: Bloomsbury, 2005).

16
As a brilliant young Scottish scholar, Hardie came to New York
: Ross,
Scot in America
, 285–86.

17
“Greek, Latin and English languages grammatically”
:
NYDA
, 8 May 1798.

18
running a Literary and Intelligence Office
:
NYG
, 22 July 1799.

19
“Not being acquainted with the art”
: Hardie,
Impartial Account of the Trial
, vii.

20
thirty-seven and a half cents
:
Impartial Register
(Salem, Mass.), 14 July 1800.

21
“When it was promised at an earlier day”
: William Coleman,
Report of the Trial of Levi Weeks
, i.

22
before the adversarial system … confessions and dying words on the scaffold
: Halttunen,
Murder Most Foul
, 94.

23
stenographic systems had been around for two centuries
:
Diary of Samuel Pepys
, lxxxvii. Samuel Pepys and Isaac Newton, among others, were enthusiastic early users.

24
Coleman favored—known as Byrom’s New Universal Shorthand
: Gillogly, “Breaking an Eighteenth Century Shorthand System,”
93. Specifically, this article identifies Byrom shorthand in a 1796 letter of Coleman’s.

25
developed by a brilliantly deceitful courtier
: King-Hele and Hancox, “Man of Many Mysteries,” 250.

26
Full transcripts were published of Henry Bedlow’s rape trial
:
Report of the Trial of Henry Bedlow
.

27
Pennsylvania trial of four murderous conspirators against one Francis Shitz
:
A Correct Account of the Trials of Charles M’Manus
.

28
“Let me ask”
:
NYAC
, 26 April 1800.

29
builder had quietly tried to bribe the author … Coleman rebuffed him
: Willard,
Willard’s History of Greenfield
, 163. As Coleman was a former resident of Greenfield, this account goes into substantial detail about both the man and his subsequent friendship with Ezra Weeks, particularly their patronage of the arts.

30
in a response to his critics, Coleman revealed
:
NYAC
, 30 April 1800. Coleman quickly published (
NYCA
, 29 April 1800) official filings of copyright in New York newspapers, a formality so unusual in that piratical era that most readers could have been forgiven for not even knowing what the newspaper notice meant. It was an unmistakable shot across the bow of any competitor, and a necessary one—for another printer in town, William Davis, was about to bring a
fourth
trial account to press (
NYMA
, 14 April 1800). Curiously, this newest trial manuscript vanished from the historical record, never to be heard of again. It’s unclear whether Davis was put off by the number of competitors or by Coleman’s saber rattling over copyright, or whether Ezra Weeks found Davis more open to being bribed.

31
the launch of a new frigate
:
NYAC
, 11 April 1800.

32
“Huzza for the President”
: Ibid., 10 April 1800.

33
Ground & Lofty Tumbling
: Ibid., 11 April 1800.

34
Livingston and Hamilton were on one side of an insurance suit
:
Law Practice of Alexander Hamilton
, 591.

35
Livingston and Burr
: NYSC Case 0452,
Arnold & Ramsey v. United Insurance Company
, 1800, Aaron Burr Papers, 1774–1836.

36
Burr took out another $1,500 loan
: Promissory note to William and James Constable, 29 April 1800, Aaron Burr Papers, 1774–1836.

37
“account, by the former ones”
: Charles Wilkes (Bank of New York cashier) to Alexander Hamilton, 22 April 1800,
Papers of Alexander Hamilton
, 24:420.

38
“It is universally acknowledged”
:
NYS
, 23 April 1800.

39
pen name of … John Quincy Adams
: Nagel,
John Quincy Adams
, 75.

40
caucused in the Tontine City Hotel on April 15, 1800
:
NYDA
, 17 April 1800.

41
they were weakened by the party’s
: Chernow,
Alexander Hamilton
, 607.

42
“two grocers, a ship chandler”
: Matthew Davis, quoted in Wills,
“Negro President,”
70.

43
“Now I have him all hollow”
: John Adams to James Lloyd, 17 February 1815,
Works of John Adams
, 10:125.

44
“What means these gigantic figures?”
:
NYDA
, 28 April 1800.

45
“Committees were in session day and night”
: Isenberg,
Fallen Founder
, 199.

46
Burr had virtually invented modern electioneering
: Chernow,
Alexander Hamilton
, 607.

47
“Many people wonder that the ex-Senator”
:
NYDA
, 28 April 1800.

48
“The leaders of the aristocratic faction bewailed”
:
NYAC
, 28 April 1800.