In St. Louis, postmaster and land speculator Rufus Easton writes to President Thomas Jefferson declaring triumph over James Wilkinson and seeking to color any report from Meriwether Lewis and William Clark concerning Antoine Soulard’s Archive of Surveys.
Miniature of Rufus Easton
Missouri Historical Society, mohistory.org/collections/item/1950-010-0001.
Easton Triumphs
St. Louis Novr. 29th 1806.
Sir
The confidence and respect heretofore received from you has induced me to write you-‘-The embarrass’d situation into which the load of General Wilkinsons persecutions had placed me, hitherto has prevented my addressing you. I have triumphed over Wilkinson and surmounted (tho’ with the loss of office) these persecutions.
. . . . .
It is fortunate for me however that the Books & Records of Soulard have been personally inspected by Captains Lewis & Clark, who will be the faithful messengers of their state & condition, and that they contain innumerable alterations & forgeries!—added to this the principal deputy surveyor (than whom a more honest Man liveth not) has reported them officially as “evidence only of fraud and deceit,” so that instead of the “falshood of my report” the truth of it will be established, to the exclusion of the Interest made in favor of the “amiable and chaste Soulard.”
. . . . .
Accept my Salutations & Respect,
R: Easton[1]Clarence E. Carter, The Territorial Papers of the United States (Washington, DC: United States Government Printing Office, 1949), 14:44–46, digitized by Google books.
In St. Louis, Rufus Easton was a lawyer, postmaster, and sometimes land speculator. In 1806, he became entangled in the controversies surrounding Spanish Land grants. So much so that in June 1806, he stormed into a Land Commissioners meeting and beat attorney James Donaldson with a cane. The Spanish Land grants were still a problem in the later gubernatorial administrations of Lewis (Upper Louisiana Governor 1806–1809) and Clark (Missouri Territorial Governor 1813–1820).[2]For more see Steven E. Weible, It was not Quick and it was not Simple: The Saga of Private Land Claims in Missouri, missourisurveyor.org/images/1185/document/itwasnotquick-ed1_671.pdf, accessed 16 … Continue reading
Notes
| ↑1 | Clarence E. Carter, The Territorial Papers of the United States (Washington, DC: United States Government Printing Office, 1949), 14:44–46, digitized by Google books. |
|---|---|
| ↑2 | For more see Steven E. Weible, It was not Quick and it was not Simple: The Saga of Private Land Claims in Missouri, missourisurveyor.org/images/1185/document/itwasnotquick-ed1_671.pdf, accessed 16 Dec 2025. |
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- The Lewis and Clark Expedition: Day by Day by Gary E. Moulton (University of Nebraska Press, 2018). The story in prose, 14 May 1804–23 September 1806.
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