To George Washington from Thomas Jefferson, 15 May 1791
From Thomas Jefferson
Philadelphia May 15. 1791.
Sir
We are still without any occurrence foreign or domestic worth mentioning to you. it is somtime since any news has been recieved from Europe of the political kind, and I have been longer than common without any letters from mister Short.1
Colo. Hamilton has taken a trip to Bethlehem.2 I think to avail myself also of the present interval of quiet to get rid of a headach which is very troublesome, by giving more exercise to the body & less to the mind. I shall set out tomorrow for New York, where mister Madison is waiting for me, to go up the North river, & return down Connecticut river and through Long-island. my progress up the North river will be limited by the time I allot for my whole journey, which is a month. so that I shall turn about whenever that renders it necessary.3 I leave orders, in case a letter should come from you covering the commission for Colo. Eveleigh’s successor, that it should be opened, the great seal put to it, and then given out. my countersign may be added on my return. I presume I shall be back here about the time of your arrival at Mount-Vernon, where you will recieve this letter.4 the death of Judge Hopkinson has made a vacancy for you to fill. should I pick up any thing in my journey, I will write it to you from time to time. I have the honor to be with sincere respect & attachment, Sir, your most obedient and most humble servt
Th: Jefferson
ALS, DNA: RG 59, Miscellaneous Letters; ALS (letterpress copy), DLC: Thomas Jefferson Papers; LB, DLC:GW.
1. For William Short’s dispatches, which Jefferson received on 23 April 1791, see Short to Jefferson, 7, 18, 22 Feb. 1791, 19:257–59, 289–90, 323–25, 361–63.
2. Alexander Hamilton left Philadelphia with his wife sometime after 9 May and apparently lodged alone at the Sun Inn in Bethlehem, Pa., before returning to Philadelphia by 24 May (“Excerpts from the Waste Books of the Sun Inn,” 39:473; Hamilton to Short, 24 May 1791, 8:356–57).
3. The joint tour of Jefferson and James Madison to New York and New England in May and June 1791 was seen by contemporary supporters of Hamilton and many historians since primarily as a political expedition. Both Jefferson and Madison, however, were also interested in exploring the natural history of the region, and Jefferson the enlightened agriculturalist also hoped to study the depredations of the Hessian fly, the larvae of which had been destroying mid-Atlantic wheat crops since at least the late 1770s. He also took the opportunity provided by the trip to obtain information about maple sugar production and acquire saplings to transplant at Monticello (see Jefferson to GW, 1 May 1791, n.4).
4. Jefferson addressed the letter to Mount Vernon. GW arrived home on 12 June, and Jefferson returned to the capital on 19 June.