THE JOURNAL OF THE MASONIC SOCIETY
the name of Johns. It was discussed in lodges at Batavia, Le Roy and Rochester. Johns suggested that Morgan should be separated from Miller and placed on a farm in Canada West. For this purpose he was taken to Niagara and placed in the magazine of the Fort until arrangements for settling him in Canada were completed, but the Canadian Masons disappointed them. After several meetings of the lodge in Canada, opposite Fort Niagara, a refusal to have anything to do with Morgan left his “kidnappers” greatly perplexed. Opportunely a Royal Arch chapter was installed at Lewiston. The occasion brought a large number of enthusiastic Masons together. “After labor,” in Masonic language, they “retired to refreshment.” Under the exhilaration of champagne and other viands the Chaplain (the Rev. F. H. Cummings, of Rochester) was called on for a toast. He responded with peculiar emphasis and in the language of their ritual: “The enemies of our order may they find a grave six feet deep, six feet long, and six feet due east and west.” Immediately after that toast, which was received with great enthusiasm, Col. William King, an officer in our war of 1812, and then a Member of Assembly from Niagara county, called Whitney of Rochester, Howard of Buffalo, Chubbuck of Lewiston, and Garside of Canada, out of the room and into a carriage furnished by Major Barton. They were driven to Fort Niagara, repaired to the magazine and informed Morgan that the arrangements for sending him to Canada were completed and that his family would
assisting with Morgan’s murder. Whitney’s account of things is told in chapter seven of William Morgan and is claimed to be information Whitney gave to Morris in 1859.7 The Morris / Whitney story tells us that it was John Whitney and Nicholas Chesebro who engineered Morgan’s deportation to Canada, assisted by a handful of other dedicated members of the Masonic fraternity, viz. Col. William King, Burrage Smith, Loton Lawson and Sheriff Eli Bruce,8 the entire plan organized with the full understanding, acceptance and financial support of Governor De Witt Clinton.9 Morris claimed that John Whitney told him he went to visit Clinton at Albany in August of 1826, returning to Rochester with a detailed plan and a signed letter from the Governor making it clear that “no steps must be taken that would conflict with a citizen’s duty to the law.”10 Clinton’s plan, according to the Morris / Whitney story was to attempt to buy Morgan’s manuscript and get him to agree to a deportation to some foreign country where he might be separated from his publishing partner David Miller.11 The governor also assured Whitney of $1,000 if required, and the assurance that those involved would be sustained by Masonic authorities within New York State, so long as things were kept legal.12 Whitney allegedly went to Batavia on September 5, 1826, where he offered Morgan $50 cash and the payment of his debts if he would destroy his exposé and leave the country.13 With Morgan’s willingness to leave taken care of, Whitney then went to Canandaigua the next day to involve Nicholas Chesebro
“With no conviction in the murder of William Morgan, all we are left with today is a 183-year-old cold case.” soon follow him. Morgan received the information cheerfully and walked with supposed friends to the boat, which was rowed to the mouth of the river, where a rope was wound around his body, to each end of which a sinker was attached. Morgan was then thrown overboard. He grasped the gunwale of the boat convulsively. Garside, in forcing Morgan to relinquish his hold was severely bitten. 5 Weed’s version of Whitney’s story was pretty strong evidence against the Masonic fraternity at a time when Freemasonry was once again feeling the pressure of anti-Masonic inquiry. The letter, which was published by the National Christian Association in pamphlet form in 1882 also found its way into many New York newspapers including the December 7, 1882 edition of The Malone Palladium, which ran the letter below the headline, The Death of Morgan: Thurlow Weed’s Dying Revelation.6 It is doubtless that few readers, particularly those predisposed to a mistrust of Freemasonry, gave any critical thought to Weed’s claims, accepting the account as a true and accurate depiction of what really happened. But the same could be said of the Freemasons who accepted, without question, another version of the Whitney confession: the one offered by the Masonic author Rob Morris. In 1883, the year after the raising of Morgan’s monument in the Batavia cemetery, Morris, a well-known and well-loved Masonic poet and author, wrote a book called William Morgan or Political Anti-Masonry, its Rise, Growth and Decadence. The book presented the argument that Morgan was not abducted and murdered by Freemasons, but deported to Canada at his own request. Morris’ account of the series of events from Morgan’s arrest in Batavia on September 11, 1826 until his disappearance at Fort Niagara is largely based on the alleged oral testimony of John Whitney—the same man Thurlow Weed claimed confessed to
in the plan, both men being known to each other through their membership in the Knights Templar at Rochester.14 The two men agreed that the easiest way to get Morgan quietly out of Batavia was to have him arrested,15 an innkeeper named Ebenezer Kingsley being persuaded to press charges against Morgan for the shirt and cravat Morgan had borrowed from him the previous May, but had yet to return. Morgan’s journey from the jail at Canandaigua to Fort Niagara is covered by Morris in the course of a few pages that make a hero of Whitney for staying with Morgan the whole journey as they changed horses and carriages, all donated by Masons willing to help separate
William Morgan: This posthumous illustration of William Morgan was drawn by Noel Holmes under the direction of G. Vorpe, one of the editors of the Cleveland Plain Dealer, who commissioned him to do the piece based on a legal description of Morgan. The image was used as the frontispiece of Thomas Knight’s 1932 book, The Strange Disappearance of William Morgan. Knight titled the image, “William Morgan, the traitor.” Of all the Morgan portraits, Holmes’ may be the closest to an honest depiction of what the man may have looked like in life. SUMMER 2009 • 13
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