A Brief Sketch of the Services of John G. Watmough, During and Subsequent to the Campaign of 1814 and 1815, When an Officer in the United States Army
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Edmund Pendleton Gaines was an American soldier. He made the arrest of Aaron Burr and was a witness at the latter’s trial.
Background
Edmund Pendleton Gaines was born on March 20, 1777, in Culpeper County, Virginia.
His father, James Gaines, was a Revolutionary soldier and the nephew of Edmund Pendleton, the famous lawyer. His mother was Elizabeth Strother.
George Strother Gaines was his younger brother. At the close of the Revolution, the family moved to North Carolina and a little later went west into Sullivan County, now a part of Tennessee.
Career
At the age of eighteen, Gaines saw service as a lieutenant in a company of riflemen organized for Indian warfare, and in 1797, entered the United States Army as an ensign, being at once promoted to lieutenant.
From 1801 to 1804, he was engaged in surveying a road from Nashville to Natchez and in 1804, was made a military collector of Mobile and commandant at Fort Stoddert, becoming a captain in 1807.
He made the arrest of Aaron Burr and was a witness at the latter’s trial. With a view to resigning, he obtained a long leave and having studied law began practice in the Mississippi Territory, but the war with Great Britain brought him back into active service in 1812 with the rank of major.
He was promoted at once to lieutenant-colonel, and in 1813 to colonel. At the battle of Chrysler’s Field in 1813, his regiment covered the American retreat. He was made adjutant-general and put in command of Fort Erie, which he defended successfully against a long and heavy British attack.
For this, he was promoted to brigadier-general with a major-general’s brevet, was thanked by Congress and given a gold medal, and received votes of thanks from five states and swords from Virginia, New York, and Tennessee. He was seriously wounded and took no further part in the war.
In 1817, he was sent south as commissioner to treat with the Creek Indians, and a little later was engaged with Jackson in the campaign against them and the Seminoles. He was in the Black Hawk War in 1832, and in 1835, when the Florida war began, he commanded an expedition against the Indians and was wounded in the mouth at Onithlacoochie.
Bitter jealousy and enmity between him and Gen. Winfield Scott, which had developed long before, became open in this campaign. A court of inquiry held in 1837 to investigate their failure, while criticizing both, justified their military conduct.
In 1838, Gaines submitted to the War Department a report on the defense of the western frontier in which he advocated floating batteries for harbor defense and a network of railroads in the interior. Disgruntled because of its unfavorable reception, he elaborated his defense plan in a memorial presented to Congress in 1840.
At the outbreak of the Mexican War, being then in command of the western department, he called upon Louisiana for volunteers to send to Zachary Taylor, and although the War Department at once reprimanded him, he called on Alabama, Mississippi, and Missouri for troops a few months later.
A heated correspondence with Secretary Marcy followed, in which Gaines wrote of the official reprimands, “I carelessly submit to them, as they seem to be a source of pleasure to the War Department, and certainly inflict no injury on me”.
He was finally removed from the command of the department and ordered to Fortress Monroe for trial by court-martial.
He defended himself with much skill and with all his usual vehemence, maintaining that since Gen. Taylor, his subordinate in the department, had been given authority to call for volunteers, the authority necessarily belonged to him as well.
The court, while declaring that he had no authority to call for troops, held that his undoubted patriotism and the real necessities of the case made hint excusable, and accordingly recommended that all proceedings against him be stopped. Later, he was placed in command of the eastern department.
Full of suspicion of Gen. Scott, who barely outranked him, and of Gen. Macomb, who was promoted over them both, he was ever ready to believe himself the object of conspiracy and injustice.
Ten years later, he died of cholera at New Orleans.
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Personality
Gaines was violent in speech and in his formal defense compared Scott to Benedict Arnold.
During his long service in the army, Gaines was constantly at variance with the War Department. His official communications breathe anything but respect for authority or disposition to obedience. He was fiery, unrestrained, and often bitter.
Gen. Scott hated Gaines and during his later years made no secret of his belief that he was insane, stating it again and again in official communications.
Connections
Gaines was married three times: first, to Frances, daughter of Judge Flarry Toulmin; second, to Barbara, daughter of Senator William and Mary (Granger) Blount of Tennessee, who died in 1836; and third, in 1839, to Mrs. Myra Whitney of New York, the daughter of Daniel Clark.
After his death, his widow’s name was conspicuous in the press for many years during the process of extensive litigation over her father’s will.