MADISON, James (1761-1836). Letter signed ("James Madison") as Secretary of State to Spanish Minister to the United States Carlos Martínez de Yrujo, Department of State [Washington], 19 January 1804.

One page, 255 x 205mm, bifolium (expected creases and folds, one negligible inkstain at left edge). Quarter blue morocco folder with engraving.

Madison requests aid on behalf of an imprisoned American merchant, held captive after his ship was seized and his crew imprisoned as suspected contraband smugglers. In this letter, the secretary references the great injuries suffered by a Mr. William Cooke by "unjust and rigorous proceedings of Mr Niguri, late Intendent at Havana" and states that Cooke "has just informed me... that a tribunal is at length organized by His Catholic Majesty with powers competent to review the decision he complains of and from whose reversal of it he hopes for justice." Thus, since "his sufferings have been as unmerited as they were severe", Madison takes the liberty of "asking for your interposition in whatever manner you may judge proper, in aid of his instances before that tribunal".

In a sworn affidavit from months earlier, Cooke, a South Carolina merchant on a route to New Orleans, stated that he sailed from Charleston in the ship Betsy with his pregnant wife and children. This vessel was later taken into Nassau by a privateer, so Cooke purchased the ship Rainbow to continue his voyage to New Orleans, yet this vessel was then forced to land in Havana in distress on 18 August. According to Cooke, the discharged master of the Rainbow, Solomon Geer, swore before the intendant at Havana, Don Luis de Viguri, that Cooke was an Englishman attempting to smuggle contraband into New Orleans; Cooke and his crew were thus jailed four days later, and three seamen would subsequently die. This affidavit was enclosed to Madison on 27 November, with a letter from Cooke, stating that Cooke is being detained under $50,000 bail, "notwithstanding they have every dollar of my property". Cooke states his intention to carry the case to a higher tribunal in Madrid, not expecting justice though to show the injustice shown to him and his crew in Havana (“William Cooke to James Madison, 27 November 1801 (Abstract),” Founders Online, National Archives, https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Madison/02-02-02-0408. [Original source: The Papers of James Madison, Secretary of State Series, vol. 2, 1 August 1801 – 28 February 1802, ed. Mary A. Hackett, J. C. A. Stagg, Jeanne Kerr Cross, and Susan Holbrook Perdue. Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 1993, p. 277.])

Madison then addressed this letter to the U.S. Minister to Spain, and interestingly sent a nearly identical (though notably more polite) letter of the same date to the Governor of Cuba, the Marqués de Someruelos, stating instead that he is "satisfied of the benefit to be derived in his [Cook's] pursuit of justice from your favorable interposition and countenance, I take the liberty of asking them in his behalf as far as may comport with the attributes of your official station: and I avail myself of this opportunity of tendering to your Excellency assurances of the distinguished consideration with which I have the honor to be your Excellencys most Ob Sert."

The troubles related to this case seemed to plague Cooke long after the close of this letter. Over ten months later on 20 November 1804, Cook again writes to Madison, informing him that all documents of this case were being translated in New York and requesting his permission to deposit that translation with the State Department "...as a Document importantly usefull to the Government to shew them from Authentick Sources the unheard of practices, used in some of the Spanish Tribunals against the people of this Country and to be enabled to Prove to the Spanish Government from these Authentic proofs that such practices do exist in their Tribunals..." Finally, Cooke writes to Madison nearly five years later on 24 March 1809, just twenty days after the latter's inauguration as President, sending his elation at Madison's election and thanking him for the friendship shown "under the great pressure of misfortune that Compelled me to solicit it...I have not, and perhaps never may obtain any redress, still the kind interest you were pleased to take in my misfortunes has fixed in my Heart a gratitude that will induce me to pray for every thing that can give you Honor, distinction, and happiness in this life."