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Subject Area: Political Theory
Topic: The American Revolution and Constitution

to oliver wolcott - Alexander Hamilton, The Works of Alexander Hamilton, (Federal Edition), vol. 10 [1774]

Edition used:

The Works of Alexander Hamilton, ed. Henry Cabot Lodge (Federal Edition) (New York: G.P. Putnam’s Sons, 1904). In 12 vols. Vol. 10.

Part of: The Works of Alexander Hamilton, (Federal Edition), 12 vols.

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to oliver wolcott

  • New York,

June 9, 1796.

Dear Sir:

I called at your house the morning of my departure, but you were not then up. While I was in the city, we had a little conversation concerning an affair of an arrangement with Swan1 for effecting a remittance to Holland. I intended to resume it for two reasons: one, because it has been represented to the disadvantage of the conduct of the Treasury; another because Swan, who lodged at the same house with me, begged me to converse with you on the subject, and give my opinion both to you and him of what I thought of the matter. The latter I should of course have managed with due regard to all prudential considerations.

But I wished chiefly to apprise you that it is industriously circulated that Monroe and Skipwith, as agents for the Treasury, received Swan’s money at Paris to remit to Holland, that they mismanaged the fund, produced, besides, delay and loss, and that the Treasury now endeavors to turn the loss on Swan. If you have not been apprised of this, it is requisite you should be.1

[1]Colonel James Swan, of Boston. He had a most romantic and adventurous life, beginning as one of the Boston Tea-Party, and a soldier of the Revolution. In 1787, he went to Paris a bankrupt, where he speculated successfully, and whence he returned with a fortune in 1795. He went back to Europe in 1798, engaged in still larger enterprises, and failed. At the suit of a creditor he was thrown into Ste. Pelagie in 1815, and remained there fifteen years, litigating constantly in French courts. He died in 1831.

[1]Now first printed from the Wolcott papers in the possession of the Connecticut Historical Society.