Heading: (Latin America)
Author: Crawford, William H., Secretary of the Treasury
Title: Letter ordering U.S. Customs officials to prevent a private warship from sailing with soldiers and armaments
Place Published: Treasury Department, Washington, D.C.
Publisher:
Date Published: 1821
Description: Autograph Letter Signed +postscript signed with initials. 2 pp. To James H. McCulloch, Collector of Customs, Baltimore, with his docketing note on verso of last page. November 6, 1821.Crawford, in this letter, directed the Customs Collector at Baltimore to sail by Revenue Cutter, "with all practicable dispatch" for Norfolk, to "thoroughly examine" the San Jose's cargo for armaments, preventing the ship from sailing until it was secretly boarded by U.S. Marines who would sail the vessel into Chesapeake Bay and seize any ship found waiting for the San Jose with "arms or munitions of war". The Cutter would then "keep company" with the San Jose for two days, "vigilantly examining" for armaments all ships it encountered and finally allowing her to sail on while the Marines returned to the Coast.Secretary of the Treasury Crawford received intelligence from the Navy Department that a private warship, the San Jose, was about to sail from Norfolk, and, once at sea, would take on board 200 soldiers and munitions of war probably destined for Latin America and the ongoing wars against Spanish colonial rule. Using his authority over Treasury port officials and Revenue Cutters, armed vessels of Customs enforcement. This may have seemed an unusual meddling in diplomatic affairs for a Treasury Secretary - but not for Georgia politician Crawford, who had already been Secretary of War and ambassador to Napoleon's France and fancied himself a future presidential contender - as he proved to be three years later, when he joined John Quincy Adams and Andrew Jackson in the contentious 1824 election contest that was ultimately decided in Adams' favor by the House of Representatives.

Heavy staining, with no loss of text; few small marginal tears and chips; fair to good.