Vol. 10: March 1774-June 1775

[December 1774] Cash Accounts, pp. 193-95

p. 194: Dec. 20-By my Subscription to Mr Ballendines Proposals 20.0.0

[January 1775] Cash Accounts, pp. 220-21

p. 221: "By Exps. In Alexandria (8)

p. 221: Ed. Note 8: GW went up to Alexandria to a meeting of the trustees for opening the Potomac River, but "None met" (Diaries, 3:304). See Thomas Johnson to GW, 24 Jan., and note 1of that document.

24 January 1775 Thomas Johnson to GW (from Annapolis), pp. 242-43

pp. 242-43: "This Morning . . . I received your two Letters by Mr. Stewart dated the 20 Instant and this Afternoon Mr Ballendine came to see me on the Subject of them I should have needed nothing more than your Desire to have waited on the Gent. at Alexandria on Thursday if it was in my Power but I am so circumstanced that I cannot oblige you (1) . . . I had resolved . . . to send you off my Thoughts tomorrow which I do by Mr Ballendine though the Time will not allow me to reduce them to the full Draft of a Bill and desparing of ever seeing Poto. made navigable on the plan I most wished it you may depend on my best Endeavours to get a Bill passed here similar to yours (2) whether upon giving a Fee simple in fiat & invariable Tolls or having the Tolls ascertained a new from Time to Time with an Eye to a limitted profit per Cent on the Cost and Repairs of the Work or giving a Term only with a still higher profit. I may possibly be insensibly led by my own particular Interest to view the Advantages of Navigation on the River as more general and extensive than I ought but I really believe if I had not a Foot of Land above the Falls I should be as warm a Friend to the Scheme-Unless our Assembly will so far assist us as to emit a Sum of Money for Loan to the Subscribers I do assure you I do not think that those on our Side who would most willingly subscribe will be able to do any Thing alone I myself am in such a Situation that I cannot raise any Sum of Money with out selling a part of the very Estate to be benefited by the Scheme . . ."

pp. 243-44: Ed. Note 1: Neither of GW's letters has been found. After his return from England in the summer of 1774, John Ballendine organized a company of investors from Va. & Md. to further his plans for opening the upper Potomac to navigation. For his trip to England to promote his Potomac River scheme, see GW to Boucher, 5 May 1772, n. 1. For the earlier involvement of GW & Johnson see source note in Johnson to GW, 18 June 1770. On 10 Oct. 1774 GW and Johnson were among the twenty-odd men who subscribed money to support Ballendine's "plan and proposals for clearing Potowmack," which they found to be a "useful and necessary undertaking" (DLC:GW). GW, who pledged £500 to the Ballendine co., did not attend the meeting of the trustees of the company in GT, Md. on 1 Dec. 1774, but he was at the meeting in Alexandria on 19 Dec., when he joined with fellow trustees John Carlyle, John Dalton, and William Ramsay, among others, in approving the decision to hire 50 "Negro Men" to begin work under Ballendine on the Potomac in 1775 (Virginia Gazette, [Dixon and Hunter; Williamsburg] 7 Jan. 1775). The meeting to which Johnson refers here was scheduled for 26 January. GW wrote in his diary for that day: "Went up to Alexandria to an intended meeting of the Trustees for opening the Rivr. Potomack. None met" (Diaries, 3:304). The minutes of a meeting of the Md. trustees on 16 Nov. 1774, calling for the meeting on 1 Dec. in Georgetown, gave a vote of confidence to Ballendine with the recommendation that they begin clearing obstructions at Shenandoah Falls as well as at "the lower Falls" (MnHi).

P. 244: Ed. Note 2: It is not clear whether by "Yours" Johnson is referring to the bill for creating a Potomac River Company which GW shepherded through the Va. assembly in 1772 (see GW to Boucher, 5 May 1772, n. 1) or to the bill for the same purpose that George Mason drew up and sent to GW on 8 Mar. to be forwarded to Johnson. Johnson's "Thoughts" may be the undated ten-page document in Johnson's hand at MnHi in which Johnson poses questions about Potomac navigation and then answers them. This document may, however, be the "Subscription Paper" he mentions in his 18 June 1770 letter to GW. At MnHi is an undated document entitled: "Heads of an Act for Raising the sum of 50,000 for the more Effectual Carrying Mr Ballantynes plan of Extending the Navigation of Potomack River into Execution &c. &c. &c." No such act has been found in Hening, but in June 1775 the VHB passed and the council approved an act for raising a capital sum of £40,000 sterling for opening and extending navigation on the Potomac (JHB, 1772-1776, 249, 274).

17 February 1775 George Mason to GW (from Gunston-Hall), pp. 265-67

p. 265: "I return'd from Maryland but last Night . . . ."

p266-67 : "I had gone a good Way thro' the Bill for improving the Navigation of Potomack, before I went to Maryland, & am happy in finding that I had fallen into many of Mr Johnston's Sentiments, tho' I was a Stranger to them, 'til I rec'd yr Letter upon my return last Night. (4) I wish it was in my Power to spend a Day wth him on the Subject. some of his Remarks are not so intelligible to Me as they wou'd be, if I had all the Queries which He seems to answer. What He mentions of some kind of Jealosy least the Virginians shou'd have some advantage, & that there shou'd be some Equality between the Maryland & Virga Subscriptions, I can have no Idea of. What Matter is it whether the Majority of the Subscribers are Marylanders or Virginians if their property is put upon an equal Footing, & the Work is of general advantage to both Provinces? Nor can I think his notion of proportioning the Tolls to the average profits can well be reduced to practice: a sufficient Sum can't be raised by those only who are locally interested; Men who are not, will not advance their Money, upon so great a Risque but wth Views of great & increasing profit, not to depend upon future alterations: the Tolls, to be sure, must be moderate, such as the Commodities will bear, with advantage to the makers; it is probably for some Years they will yield very little Profit to the undertakers, perhaps none; they must run the Risque of this, as well as of the utter Failure of the Undertaking, & surely if they succeed they have a just Right to the increased Profits; tho' in Process of Time they may become very great: if I am not misinform'd, this is the Principle upon which every thing of this Nature has been succesfully executed in other Countrys.(5)

p. 267: Ed. Note 4: GW's letter has not been found. See Thomas Johnson to GW, 24 Jan. For Mason's Potomac River bill, see Mason to GW, 8 March.

Ed. Note 5: Thomas Johnson's "Remarks" have not been found. See Johnson to GW, 4 January.

18 February 1775 George Mason to GW (from Gunston-Hall), pp. 267-69

p. 268: "It has not been in my Power to do any thing, since I came from Maryland, towards the Potomack River Bill; but I will apply to it as soon as I can, & when finish'd forward it to You.

25 February 1775 Thomas Johnson to GW (from Annapolis), pp. 274-76

p. 274: Johnson has received GW's of the "2d Inst."(1)

pp. 275-76: "From what I hear it is designed our Assembly should sit about the last of March against that Time I should be glad to have through Mr Calverts Hands or any other convenient Conveyence Colo. Masons Estimate of his Remarks and the other papers I sent you by Mr Ballandine (4) I shall in a Day or two go to Balt. and there hope to learn exactly what Opposition is intended to our late Road Law on potowmack; from what I have yet heard I expect some narrow designing Men intend to get the people of Balt. and a part of this as well as of Frederick County to petition for a repeal of the Road Law or to have such alterations made as will render it ineffectual-I have heard too that the Representatives for this County are to be instructed by their Constituents to vote against any Improvement of potowmack but I do not believe that the people in general of this County are week enough to be led into any Resolution which could reflect so much on themselves if I am mistaken & such an Instruction should be really obtained it will greatly embarrass me I am much averse from engaging in a more active Way in politicks but if petitions or Instructions should be sollicited either against the Improvemt of any Roads or the River I must endeavour to counteract such proceedings if an Attempt should be made against either the Roads or River I wish both may be attacked at once which will explain the Motive as it truly is to shut out the Back people altogether from a Market.(5) I shall most thankfully receive Information of any further Thoughts that may have occurred to you or Colo. Mason relative to clearing poto. and the Draft of the Bill itself if Colo. Mason has made and if not I shall with pleasure do it as well as I am able--"

p. 276: Ed. Note 1: GW's letter to Johnson has not been found.

Ed. Note 4: See Johnson to GW, 24 Jan., and George Mason to GW, 17 Feb, and 8 March.

Ed. Note 5: Johnson is probably referring to the act passed in December 1773 which provided money to build a good wagon road form Fort Cumberland westward. See Johnson to GW, 21 Feb. 1774, n.2.

[8] March 1775 George Mason to GW (from Gunston-Hall), pp. 298-99

p. 298: "I have at last finished the Potomack River Bill; which I now send You, together with some very long remarks thereon, & a Letter to Mr Johnston; into which You'll be pleased to put a Wafer, when You forward the other Papers to Him. I also return the Acts of Assembly, & Mr Johnston's Notes, which You sent Me. This Affair has taken Me five times as long as I expected; and I do assure You I never ingaged in any thing which puzled me more; there were such a Number of Contingencys to provide for, & drawing up Laws a thing so much out of my way-I shall be well pleased if the pains I have bestowed upon the Subject prove of any Service to so great an Undertaking; but by what I can understand, there will be so strong an Opposition from Baltimore, & the Head of the Bay, as will go near to prevent it's passage thro' the Maryland Assembly, in any Shape it can be offered. (1)"

p. 299: Ed. Note 1: Despairing of raising enough money by private subscription alone for John Ballendine's company to proceed with the work to make the upper Potomac navigable, Thomas Johnson on Jan. 24 sent GW his "Thoughts" about a bill for public support for a Potomac River company, which GW forwarded to Mason. Johnson and Mason also had been in correspondence about such a bill, for on Feb. 25 Johnson asked GW to return to him "Colo. Masons Estimate his Remarks and the other papers [referring to Potomac navigation] I sent you. Mason began work on the bill sometime after 18 Feb., when he wrote GW that "since I came from Maryland," he had been able to do nothing "towards the Potomack River Bill." Mason's draft of a Potomac River company bill has not been found, but it may well be the bill "for raising a Capital sum of forty thousand Pounds, Sterling, by subscription, and establishing a Company for opening and extending the Navigation of the River Potowmack," which was referred to a committee of the VHB on 3 June and passed, with amendments, on 17 June (JHB, 1773-1776, 181, 191,229, 249, 274).

[Actually, the HB on June 3 ordered that Mr. Mercer and Mr. Henry Lee bring in a bill (p.181); it was presented on June 5 (p. 191), passed on June 17 and sent to the Council, which informed the HB of its approval on June 21. The session laws for June session 1775 are not included in Henings, nor are they in Jenkins Early State Records or Evans Early American Imprints].

9 March 1775 George Mason to GW (from Gunston-Hall), p. 300

p. 300: "I beg You to inform Mr Johnston that the Bill I have drawn is intended only as a Ground-Work, & that I desire every part of it may be submitted to his Correction."