Dudley Woodbridge, who was his partner, said of Harman Blennerhassett that he had every sort of sense except common sense. That is the simplest explanation why this Irish gentleman found himself in the summer of 1807 in the State Penitentiary in Richmond, facing a charge of treason against the United States.

Harman Blennerhassett was born quite by chance, in Hampshire, England, while his parents were there on a visit from Ireland. He was the youngest son of a family described as distinguished. As a boy he attended the famous Westminster School in London and from there went on to Trinity College, Dublin, where he was graduated with honors. He chose law as his profession and at the age of 25 years was admitted to the bar. Through the death of his elder brother he unexpectedly succeeded to the family estates, which were considerable.

Harman’s sister Katherine married Captain Robert Agnew, Lieutenant-Governor of the Isle of Man. They had a daughter Margaret who, on reaching her teens, was sent to school in England. While Harman was on a visit to the Agnews he was entrusted with the pleasant mission of crossing to the mainland to bring his niece home. Harman at this time was 31 years old and Margaret 18. In the course of the trip he became completely infatuated with her and proposed marriage. No doubt dazzled by this man of the world thirteen years her senior, Margaret accepted him. When the newly married uncle and niece arrived on the Isle of Man and Harman introduced Margaret to her parents as his wife the Agnews were furious. In their anger and humiliation they disinherited Margaret and repudiated Harman. In fact the Agnews and their friends made the situation so unpleasant that the Blennerhassetts concluded their only recourse was to leave home and seek asylum in the United States.

Blennerhassett sold his estates, which brought him $100,000, a tidy sum in those days, and he and Margaret sailed for New York where they arrived in 1796. As though this were not enough to rid them of the curse that had descended on their romantic adventure, they did not linger long in the East but set out to look for a permanent home on the frontier.

Reaching Pittsburgh in the fall of the year, they bought a keelboat and dropped down the Ohio River. The valley of the Ohio was then a wilderness save for a few small settlements at favorable spots along the stream. One of these was Marietta where the Blennerhassetts found a society of refined and cultivated people who received them cordially. There they remained throughout the winter while they reconnoitered the neighborhood for a suitable site for an estate.

At last they found what pleased them on an island in the river two miles below the present Parkersburg, West Virginia, at the mouth of the Little Kanawha. This island they purchased. It consisted of 170 acres, which lay in Wood County, Virginia, a significant circumstance in the light of later developments. There the Blennerhassetts spent $30,000 erecting a spacious two-story dwelling with wings and numerous appurtenances. In keeping with the custom of the time, they also purchased slaves to serve the household and work the land.

In this American wilderness they brought into being an establishment such as might have been found in England or on the continent of Europe. The spacious mansion was painted white and the fields surrounding it were neatly inclosed in white post fences. Attached to the house was a formal garden with shrubbery and hedges in the English style and espaliers of peach, apricot, quince, and pear. With stables, barns, overseers’ houses, and quarters for the slaves the settlement made an impressive sight indeed.

No less impressive was the interior of the mansion which was richly furnished from top to bottom. Costly paintings adorned the walls and handsome imported rugs covered the floors.

Margaret Blennerhassett was above average height, well proportioned and graceful. Her eyes were blue and her hair dark brown and, in keeping with the prevailing mode, she wore it in a turban. In England she had enjoyed the benefits of the best education that was to be had by a young woman. She spoke French and Italian fluently and was well versed in Shakespeare’s plays, which she liked to recite. She herself wrote poetry. In spite of these intellectual qualities she delighted also in the rugged out-of-doors life the island afforded. She rode horseback and not infrequently took long walks on the mainland of from ten to twenty miles in a day. Withal she was a good housekeeper and kept an excellent table.

Nature had been less kind to Harman. He was a spare man, standing six feet tall, and his distinguishing feature was a long nose. He was so near-sighted that he was helpless without his eyeglasses, and it was jocularly reported that on the rare occasions when he went hunting he had to take his wife and a servant along to aim the gun! Unlike his wife he was not partial to outdoor exercise, preferring to spend his time with books and engaging in scientific experiments. He was interested in chemistry, electricity, and astronomy. In fact he came to know too much about electricity and its dangerous properties. A thunderstorm so played on his nerves that he had to close the doors and windows and get into bed. In addition to his scholarly talents Blennerhassett was an accomplished musician, playing both the violin and the ’cello.

The Blennerhassetts had two sons whom they named Dominic and Harman. What with their children, their servants, their livestock, their well-appointed house and grounds, and their deep affection for each other they seemed at last, after a somewhat inauspicious start, to have achieved domestic bliss. But, under the surface disturbing forces were at work. After eight long years, life on the island was growing monotonous and the proprietor and his family restless. Even more disturbing, the plantation failed to clear expenses and Blennerhassett saw his fortune gradually wasting away.

Such was the situation when Aaron Burr, on his first trip to the West in 1805, passed down the Ohio River from Pittsburgh in his houseboat. He mentioned in one of his letters to Theodosia at this time that whenever he came upon a likely looking house along the river he would dispatch a note to the owner stating that Mr. Burr, the former Vice-President of the United States, was in the neighborhood and would like to call. He boasted that not once was such a request refused. Naturally Blennerhassett Island did not escape his keen eye and he was duly impressed with its magnificence. He sent his customary note and his request to call was readily granted.

The master was away but the Colonel was cordially received by Mrs. Blennerhassett. It must have been a surprise to Burr to discover in this remote frontier a woman of Margaret Blennerhassett’s breeding and cultivation, which were of a quality little inferior even to Theodosia’s. And surely so polished a man as Burr, and one so capable of making himself fascinating to women, must have been a welcome sight to Margaret who seldom had an opportunity to entertain such congenial company. Burr probably did not discern the financial problem that hung over the Blennerhassetts. On the contrary, the elaborate appurtenances of the estate may readily have misled him into estimating their fortune at a figure much greater than it was in fact. At any rate, his attitude toward the Blennerhassetts indicated that he considered their acquaintance well worth pursuing.

Burr must at some time on this first trip to the West also have encountered Harman, for a correspondence sprang up between them in the course of which Burr suggested several plans by which Blennerhassett might improve his fortune, and the latter asked Burr’s opinion as to the advisability of his moving to Louisiana. The Colonel was not above using flattery to ingratiate himself with the Irishman. “Your talents and acquirements,” he wrote, “seem to have destined you for something more than vegetable life, and since the first hour of our acquaintance I have considered your seclusion as a fraud on society.” How Blennerhassett’s ears must have burned on reading that high praise from a man of the Colonel’s standing in the great world.

During the last days of August in the following year Colonel Burr landed once more on Blennerhassett Island. This time he was accompanied by a Col. Julien de Pestre, a French ÉmigrÉ who had served both in the French and English armies. De Pestre now held the imposing office of Burr’s chief-of-staff. In attendance also was one Charles Willie, a young German acting in the capacity of Burr’s secretary. The fourth member of the party was Dudley Woodbridge, Blennerhassett’s partner, whom they had picked up at Marietta.

The party was most kindly welcomed by Blennerhassett and spent the night in his house. Next day the Colonel returned to Marietta where he contracted with Woodbridge for 100 barrels of pork. He also ordered from a local boatyard on the Muskingum River fifteen barges of impressive dimensions. They were to be from forty to fifty feet long and have a ten-foot beam. One of them was to be specially equipped for the Blennerhassett family. The whole flotilla, when completed, was estimated to be adequate for the transportation of 500 men and their necessary equipment and provisions. These matters attended to, Burr continued down the river to Cincinnati.

What Burr discussed with Blennerhassett on the night he spent on the island was not recorded, but a hint is found in four articles which were published a few days later in the Ohio Gazette. Bearing the signature “Querist” they were the work of Harman Blennerhassett. In them he set forth arguments as to why it would be to the advantage of the western states to separate from the Union. He dwelt upon the fact that the money now paid to the Federal Government in taxes, and from which the westerners derived little return, could serve a better purpose if kept in the West and used for local improvements. In one of the papers Querist was careful to remark: “But I wish it understood that I have no intention of recommending either the mode or the time in which it should be effected.” In other words, the articles were no more than a means of sounding out the western inhabitants to see what their reaction to the suggestion would be. Not too many years before secession had been openly discussed in the West and it had attracted a number of prominent citizens. But now both Kentucky and Tennessee were glorying in their newly acquired statehood, the transfer of New Orleans to the United States had removed that barrier to commerce, and other grievances of the frontier people had been corrected. In consequence, the desire to separate from the Union had greatly diminished if it had not entirely disappeared. So much for what Blennerhassett wrote. If the later testimony of witnesses is to be believed, he also engaged in some indiscreet talking, as did Burr in Cincinnati.

From Cincinnati Burr proceeded on horseback to Nashville, Tennessee, stopping at Lexington, Kentucky, on the way. At Nashville he met Andrew Jackson, and it was on this visit he engaged with Jackson and John Coffee for the building of five more boats and the assembling of supplies.

Meanwhile Theodosia and her son arrived on Blennerhassett Island, and here, in October, they were joined by Joseph Alston. It was not long before Margaret Blennerhassett developed an admiration for Theodosia that bordered on idolatry. It could hardly have been otherwise. Imagine the many interests these two exceptionally well-educated women found they had in common. It must have been distressing to both of them when the visit came to an end. The Alstons said goodby to Margaret and, accompanied by Harman, set out to join Colonel Burr in Lexington, Kentucky.

The building of the boats and the collecting of supplies soon was known to all the community and lent force to the rumors of a conspiracy. John Graham, Secretary of the Orleans Territory, had now been assigned by President Jefferson to pick up Burr’s trail and to report back on his findings. He reached Marietta on his quest in the middle of November. There he met Blennerhassett who by now had returned home from Kentucky. As previously mentioned, Blennerhassett, supposing Graham to be one of Burr’s adherents, talked to him freely. He confided to him that he thought the West would profit by getting out of the Union. He said Burr was of the same opinion but added that the reaction to the articles by Querist indicated that the public was not yet ripe for the move.

In the Pittsburgh area Burr’s lieutenant, Comfort Tyler, was assembling supplies and enlisting recruits. Reports were gaining currency that as many as a thousand young men had responded favorably to the appeal for volunteers. But when the time came for departure the party consisted of not more than thirty men distributed among four boats. The immediate objective of Tyler’s contingent was Blennerhassett Island. There the flotilla arrived on December 7.

While Graham was in Marietta he learned that a committee of citizens, stirred by the President’s proclamation, had been organized in Wood County, Virginia, opposite the island, to oppose any illegal scheme that might be in the making. On November 21 Graham met with this group at the courthouse near Parkersburg, and Col. Hugh Phelps, commander of the Wood County militia, told him he had been urged by Blennerhassett to join the expedition. According to Phelps, Blennerhassett assured him that General Andrew Jackson had promised 1,000 men, that 800 were expected to join the expedition from Kentucky, and from 200 to 300 from Pittsburgh. Alexander Henderson, another Wood County man who was at the meeting, said he was not free to give details, but advised that the United States send a strong military force to New Orleans at once.

It was then that Graham set out in haste to catch Governor Edwin Tiffin of Ohio, who was at Chillicothe, and lay what evidence he had before him. With equal dispatch the Governor sent a message to the Ohio Legislature stating that Blennerhassett had approached two gentlemen of great respectability and invited them to join in an expedition planned by Burr to seize New Orleans by force, take possession of $2,000,000 known to be in the bank there, and also the military stores and two brass cannon belonging to the French.

A new government, the message continued, then would be set up under the protection of a foreign power. This done, overtures would be made to the western states to sever their connection with the Union and attach themselves to the new government in New Orleans. The Governor added that he had been informed that a force of 1,500 men had been recruited in Ohio. His recommendation to the Legislature was that it issue authority for the seizure of the boats that were building on the Muskingum and the provisions collected at Marietta, and for the arrest of any of Burr’s agents discovered within the jurisdiction of the Ohio authorities or attempting to pass down the Ohio River.

So it was that a bill containing these authorizations was prepared and hastily passed by the Legislature, and Judge Return Jonathan Meigs and Major General Buell were sent to Marietta with a small body of Ohio militia to carry out the order. Mrs. Blennerhassett, who was on the island, learned of the rising tide of public indignation and dispatched Peter Taylor, her gardener, to Kentucky to find Blennerhassett and Burr and to warn Burr not to return.

On hearing that the Ohio militia under Judge Meigs and General Buell were on the way to the boat yard, Dudley Woodbridge set off for the island to give the alarm. On the way he ran into Blennerhassett, Comfort Tyler, and some of the young men who were going after the boats. But they were too late. The boats had been seized by Meigs and Buell and with them 200 barrels of provisions.

Following this loss, and alarmed by the threatening attitude of the Wood County militia, Blennerhassett and Tyler concluded that the expedition would be jeopardized by remaining longer on the island. They decided, therefore, to slip away during the night on Tyler’s four boats, leaving Mrs. Blennerhassett and the two boys on the island with instructions to follow later when arrangements could be made. The weather was enough to take the heart out of the conspirators. It had snowed during the day; then the snow was followed by rain and the ground near the river bank was a sea of mud. Regardless of the need for secrecy, a fire was lighted where the members of the expedition might find a little warmth and perhaps a chance to get partially dry. Throughout these trying preliminaries Margaret Blennerhassett exhibited surprising energy in helping with preparations for the departure.

It was 1 A.M. on the morning of December 10 when the four boats put off from the island and began their long journey downstream. The conspirators numbered about thirty in all. It was a sorry war they were waging against the United States, if war it could be called. Their departure was made none too soon. A few hours later Colonel Phelps arrived at the head of the Wood County militia. These patriots, finding their quarry gone, made free with Blennerhassett’s wine, got drunk, insulted Mrs. Blennerhassett, and vented their wrath against the owner of the house by smashing windows, breaking up pictures and furniture, and committing other disgraceful acts of vandalism.

The Ohio authorities set a guard on the river at Cincinnati to halt any expedition as it came down, but the little flotilla passed during the night and was not detected. Six days after leaving the island it arrived at Jeffersonville, Indiana, opposite Louisville. There it found and joined forces with Davis Floyd, another Burr lieutenant, and his detachment of two boats.

Meanwhile Burr had appeared before the two grand juries in Kentucky and had been discharged by both of them without being indicted. He had faced up to Andrew Jackson’s suspicions and convinced that gentleman of his innocence of any wrongdoing against the United States. In the boats built for him by Jackson and John Coffee he set out from Nashville down the Cumberland River to rendezvous with his forces on the Ohio. Burr had sent word to Blennerhassett by Jackson’s nephew that he would join him at the mouth of the Cumberland on December 28. He actually arrived one day ahead—the historic meeting took place on December 27. The flotilla had now grown to ten boats and a company of not more than 100 men.

The rank and file were in need of inspiration by this time and it seemed appropriate for the leader to say a few words to them. So they were marshaled on Cumberland Island for that purpose. But if they expected to get any information from their leader they were disappointed. With his customary air of mystery Burr merely announced that he could not at that time tell them what their destination would be, and that he must wait for a more appropriate occasion.

From there the flotilla continued on its journey down the Ohio River. At Fort Massac, the army post above the confluence of the Ohio and the Mississippi where Burr and Wilkinson had conferred in the summer of 1805, Burr presented himself to the commander, Captain Daniel Bissell, who greeted him warmly and extended to him all the courtesies of the post. The party had completed its visit and departed when a messenger arrived posthaste from General Jackson warning Bissell of the nature of the expedition and urging him to halt it. Bissell, having seen the force with his own eyes, sent the messenger back to Jackson with the report that there was nothing to fear from it. From then on Jackson was more than ever convinced that the furore raised by the Administration over the conspiracy was purely political and had no basis in fact.

On January 10 the flotilla reached Bayou Pierre, some thirty miles north of Natchez, in Mississippi Territory. There Burr landed and went to pay a call on a friend, Judge Bruin, who lived nearby. And there, in a newspaper handed him by the Judge, he saw his letter of July 29 to Wilkinson and knew for the first time that he had been deserted and betrayed by the General. At Judge Bruin’s, too, he learned of the President’s proclamation and that his arrest had been ordered by the acting governor of the territory, Cowles Meade.

According to their later testimony some members of the party proposed resistance to any force that might come to arrest them. But by this time Colonel Burr perceived that matters had gone far enough. It no doubt occurred to him also that resistance to the civil authorities would be most incriminating. Since he was going to base his defense on innocence of any wrongdoing he must act in accordance with that assumption.

Therefore, as any innocent man would have done on learning that charges had been preferred against him and that he was, so to speak, a fugitive from justice, Burr hastened to vindicate himself by seeking out Acting Governor Meade and surrendering at discretion. He was taken to the village of Washington, then the capital of Mississippi Territory, where a grand jury was summoned and the territory’s attorney general, one Poindexter, tried to get out an indictment against him. Again, as in Kentucky, the Colonel’s bravado stood him in good stead. The grand jury not only refused to indict him but took the territorial officials to task for having arrested Burr and his men without cause.

But the Colonel knew that the respite was only temporary, since the Federal authorities were hot on his trail. So, on February 1, after assuring his followers that he would rejoin them shortly, he assumed a disguise and fled.

Once more Blennerhassett, Tyler, Floyd, and the rank and file of the now pathetic little band, were arrested and placed under guard. But they were treated with humanity and permitted occasionally to walk about with no restraint more binding than their own honor. As soon as the excitement died down they were set free.

After her distressing experience on the island Margaret Blennerhassett, accompanied by the boys, took refuge in Natchez, Mississippi. There she was joined by her husband. Curious to know the condition of his property Harman set out in June to visit it. He had reached Lexington, Kentucky, when on the 25th the news of the proceedings in Richmond caught up with him and he was arrested. He at once called in Henry Clay to defend him but, in spite of that able counsel, the court refused to grant a release.

On July 14. Blennerhassett wrote to his wife that a messenger, after making a rapid journey from Richmond, had brought him intelligence of his indictment with Colonel Burr on the charges of treason and misdemeanor. “I have no idea of attempting an escape,” he assured her. “I feel conscious of all want of law or evidence to convict me.”

At this point his letter was interrupted by the arrival of a Mr. David Mead who had come to arrest him on the part of the United States. “He is an amiable, kind young man, with whom I shall set out in a few days for Richmond.”

Four days later, from jail, Blennerhassett wrote again asking Mrs. Blennerhassett to look for the copy of the first letter he had written to Burr which he thought he might need for his defense. He also asked her for any letters she could find from Burr to her. Nor was his present predicament to interfere with his artistic pursuits if he could help it. He directed Margaret to forward also “the morocco case, containing my music and the two sheets of manuscript I lent Mrs. Wallace, with my spectacles.”

At last Blennerhassett’s slow mind was beginning to perceive the manner in which he had been exploited by Colonel Burr. To his wife he confided: “I am extremely sorry to find the injury to private individuals of this country in consequence of a baseless authority for Burr’s financial operations here last autumn far exceeding my greatest suspicions. If it be shown that he had not funds and friends pledged to him to warrant his drafts, his conduct would appear nefarious enough to displace all the friendships he ever formed.”

Burr was aware of the danger to himself that lay in the possible defection of Blennerhassett. As early as May 21 he had written him from Richmond: “I have barely time ... to assure you and Mrs. Blennerhassett of my devoted attachment and regard, and to express my sympathy for all the vexations you have encountered.” From then on he was to exert every effort to keep his alleged co-conspirator in line.

Under the gracious chaperonage of young Mr. David Mead, Blennerhassett made the journey from Lexington to Richmond, where they arrived on August 3. Mead took his prisoner to the Washington Tavern, to the west of the Capitol Square, and there they had an excellent dinner. This over, another deputy marshal appeared to present Blennerhassett with a warrant for high treason. He had a carriage waiting outside and in this Blennerhassett was conveyed to the penitentiary where he was assigned the sumptuous apartments lately vacated by Colonel Burr. Here he was to remain throughout the course of Burr’s treason trial. And here he was to find ample time to set down an account of the proceedings. He too was to enjoy the same gracious treatment by the best people of Richmond that had been accorded Colonel Burr.