who, after congratulating him upon his safe arrival and recapitulating his claims to public admiration, tendered him an invitation to a public dinner, as a token of their esteem and regard. He was touched by this most seasonable evidence of undiminished confidence, and immediately addressed them the following reply:

LETTER FROM COL. FREMONT TO THE CITIZENS OF ST. LOUIS.

"ST. LOUIS, August 30th, 1847.

"GENTLEMEN: I had the pleasure this morning to receive your letter of this date, in which, with many kind assurances of welcome and congratulations on my return, you honor with the strong expression of your approbation, my geographical labors during the recent explorations in Oregon and North California, and the military operations in which sudden emergencies involved me in California.

"I beg you to receive my earnest acknowledgments for the very favorable notice you have bestowed upon the published results of those expeditions, and I regret that events which interrupted, and more recent circumstances which abruptly terminated the last exploration, will permit me to give only a brief and imperfect account of California, and of the intervening basin, which it had been the great object of the expedition to explore and determine.

"The labor of many years in the interest of science, undertaken and sustained with only a distant hope of gaining your good opinion, has received, in the rapid progress of events, an earlier reward than I could possibly have hoped for or anticipated; but I am free to say that the highest pleasure I received from the perusal of your letter, was derived from your decided approval of my political course in North California. Circumstances there made us, in connection with the emigrants to that country, involuntary witnesses, and unwilling actors at the birth. of a great nation, but to which we now consider it our great

good fortune to have aided in securing the blessings of peace with civil and religious liberty.

"Placed in a critical and delicate position, where imminent danger urged immediate action, and where the principal difficulty lay in knowing full well what must be done; where in a struggle barely for the right to live, every effort to secure our safety involved unusual and grave responsibilities, I could only hope from your forbearance a suspension of judgment until, with full possession of facts, you would be able to determine understandingly.

"I had the gratification, on my arrival, to find that neither remoteness of situation, nor the more immediately important and interesting events at home, had diverted your attention from our conduct, but from a knowledge only of the leading occur rences in California, it had been fully justified and sustained.

"I regret that, under present circumstances, I cannot have the pleasure of meeting you at the dinner you have done me the honor to offer me, but I beg you to accept the assurances of the high and grateful sense which I entertain of your kindness and regard, and the very flattering manner in which expressed it.

you have "With sentiments of respect and consideration, I am, gentlemen, your very obedient servant,

"J. C. FREMONT."

CHAPTER X.

FREMONT ARRIVES AT WASHINGTON-DEMANDS A COURT MARTIAL ILLNESS AND DEATH OF HIS MOTHER-COURT MARTIAL ORDERED-ITS ORGANIZATION AND PROGRESS-FREMONT'S DEFENCE-VERDICT OF THE COURT-SENTENCE REMITTED BY THE PRESIDENT-RESIGNS HIS COMMISSION AND RETIRES FROM THE ARMY.

THE fame of Col. Fremont's arrest preceded him. across the Alleghanies, and some days before his arrival at Washington, had penetrated the seclusion of his widowed mother's home at Aiken, in South Carolina. Her heart had not been properly prepared for such tidings, and the pleasure which he naturally expected from rejoining his family was destined to be qualified by one of the severest trials he had yet known. He found letters at Washington informing him that his mother was dangerously ill. Without delay, he asked for leave of absence to join her, and it was granted on the following day; but before availing himself of it, he addressed the following manly letter to the adjutant general, in relation to his position in the service:

LETTER FROM COL. FREMONT TO THE ADJUTANT GENERAL. C STREET, WASHINGTON, Sept. 17th, 1847.

TO THE ADJUTANT GENERAL:

"SIR: According to the orders of Brigadier General Kearney,

person, in a state of

I have the honor to report myself to you in arrest, and to make the following requests: "1. A copy of the charges filed against me by the said general.

"2. A copy of the orders under which the said general brought back from California to the United States myself and the topographical party of which I had the command.

"3. A copy of the communications from Senator Benton, asking for my arrest and trial on the charges made in the newspaper? against me, and which application from him I adopt and make my own.

“4. That charges and specifications, in addition to those filed by General Kearney, be made out in form against me, on all the newspaper publications which have come or shall come to the office, oral or written.

"5. That I may have a trial as soon as the witnesses now in the United States can be got to Washington; for, although the testimony of the voice of California, through some of its most respectable inhabitants, is essential to me, and also that of Commodore Stockton, who has not yet arrived from that province, yet I will not wish the delay of waiting for these far distant witnesses, and will go into trial on the testimony now in the United States, part of which is in the State of Missouri, and may require thirty days to get into Washington. I therefore ask for a trial at the end of that time.

"These requests I have the honor to make, and hope they will be found to be just, and will be granted. I wish a full trial, and a speedy one. The charges against me by Brigadier General Kearney, and the subsidiary accusations made against me in newspapers, when I was not in this country, impeach me in all the departments of my conduct (military, civil, political, and moral), while in California, and, if true, would subject me to be cashiered and shot, under the rules and articles of war, and to infamy in the public opinion.

"It is my intention to meet these charges in all their extent

and for that purpose to ask a trial upon every point of allegation or insinuation against me, waiving all objections to forms and technicalities, and allowing the widest range to all possible testi

mony.

"These charges and accusations are so general and extensive as to cover the whole field of my operations in California, both civil and military, from the beginning to the end of hostilities; and as my operations, and those of which I was the subject or object, extend to almost every act and event which occurred in the country during the eventful period of those hostilities, the testimony on my trial will be the history of the conquest of California, and the exposition of the policy which has been heretofore pursued there, and the elucidation of that which should be followed hereafter. It will be the means of giving valuable information to the government, which it might not otherwise be able to obtain, and thus enlighten it, both with respect to the past and the future. Being a military subordinate, I can make no report, not even of my own operations; but my trial may become a report, and bring to the knowledge of the government what it ought to know, not only with respect to the conduct of its officers, but also in regard to the policy observed, or necessary to be observed, with regard to the three-fold population (Spanish, Americans, Anglo-Americans, and Aboriginal-Americans), which that remote province contains. Viewed under these aspects of public interests, my own personal concern in the trial-already sufficiently grave-acquires an additional and public importance; and for these high objects, as well as to vindicate my own character from accusations both capital and infamous, it is my intention to require and to promote the most searching exami nation into everything that has been done in that quarter.

The public mind has become impressed with the belief that great misconduct has prevailed in California; and, in fact, it would be something rare in the history of remote conquests and governments, where every petty commander might feel himself invested with proconsulate authority, and protected by distance from the supervision of his government, if nothing