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Whitman anything about their plans, for the President refused to give the Senate that information in December, 1842,[1] and it was only with the greatest difficulty that John Quincy Adams wormed it out of Webster on March 25, in the course of a three-hour interview.[2] Equally fictitious is the story of Sir George Simpson's presence in Washington to negotiate or to influence negotiations in regard to Oregon and the fisheries.[3] How Mr. Spalding came to fabricate these particular features of his account of Whitman in Washington and how they came to be accepted, destitute as they are of any foundation in fact, naturally piques one's curiosity, and the following explanation is offered not merely
- ↑ See Pres. Tyler's special message, Dec. 23, in reply to the Senate Resolution of Dec. 22, 1842. Statesman's Year Book, II, 1315, or Niles's Register, LXIII, 286.
- ↑ Adams's Diary, XI, 344-347. The real Oregon policy of the administration was something very different from Spalding's invention. It was to yield to England the territory north of the Columbia, excepting perhaps an approach to Puget Sound, if England would acquiesce in or promote our acquisition of California from San Francisco harbor northward and the annexation of Texas to the United States. English influence was strong in Mexico and it was believed that if England urged these concessions on Mexico she would grant them for a reasonable consideration. See Adams's Diary, XI, 340, 347, 351, and 355; Tyler's Tyler, II, 692 and 698. Webster's Private Corres., II, 154. That Webster revealed this project to Adams March 25 and about the same time or even later approached General Almonte, the Mexican minister, on the subject shows that Whitman's interviews, if he had them, had not had the slightest effect. See Adams's Diary, XI, 347 and 355, entries of March 25 and April 7. The legendary date of Whitman's arrival in Washington was March 2 or 3. He arrived later than that, but probably not so late as the 25th.
- ↑ No evidence of Sir George Simpson's presence in Washington in 1843 outside of the Spalding narrative and its derivatives has ever been found. That the Oregon question had not been under discussion between England and the United States in the winter of 1843 is clear from Webster's letter to Minister Everett, March 20, 1843, in which he says: "I have recommended to the President already to propose to the British government to open a negotiation here upon the Oregon subject." Private Corres., II, 171. Webster resigned May 8th and the attorney-general Legare took charge of the department ad interim. May 16, 1843, President Tyler wrote him: "We should also lose no time in opening a negotiation relative [to] the Oregon," Letters and Times of the Tylers, III, 111, In the legend, however, Tyler promises Whitman in March to stay all proceedings until he heard from Whitman's emigration. See Spalding's narrative, above, p. 14; Gray, Oregon, 316; C. Eells, above, p. 24; Perrin B. Whitman, in C. H. Famam's Descendants of John Whitman, 240.
