The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, Volume 45, July 1941 - April, 1942 Page: 291

Letters and Documents

proper direction, that is in the interest of the United States."28
This policy Sibley apparently supported from 1812 to 1813 in
his relations with Jos6 Bernardo Gutierrez, the Mexican revo-
lutionist, Lieutenant William Augustus Magee, formerly of the
United States Army, and William Shaler, Special Agent of the
United States. In his official correspondence to the Secretary
of War, he assiduously recounted the robust preparations in
Natchitoches for the Gutierrez-Magee expedition, destined for
Texas and Mexico to aid in their liberation from Spain. He
revealed the machinations of French agents on the Louisiana-
Texas frontier, attempting to give French direction to the revo-
lution in Texas and Mexico. After the entrance of the Gutierrez-
Magee expedition into Texas, he narrated every event of the
revolution in Texas from 1812 to 1813, and may be considered
as one of the chief chroniclers of this episode."
Another of Sibley's many activities, it may be concluded, was
that of furnishing information for editorials concerning events
in Texas and Mexico, which were published in the newspapers
of Natchez, Baltimore, Philadelphia, and Washington, D. C.30
In 1814 he wrote of the "unlawful enterprises" of the filibus-
terers, General Jos6 Alvaredo Toledo and Dr. John Hamilton
Robinson.
On January 25, 1815, Sibley was removed as Indian agent;
he declares that he was not notified of his removal as Indian
agent until the arrival at Natchitoches of his successor, Thomas
Gale. This fact grieved him; to assuage his injured feelings,
he wrote the War Department3' requesting an explanation of
his removal. None was furnished.
Sibley, entrenched at Natchitoches, continued his activities
in the political life of Louisiana. He served as captain of militia,
28W. C. C. Claiborne, Official Letter Books, V, 176; VI, 37-38.
29For an account of these activities see Julia Kathryn Garrett, Green
Flag Over Texas, 83-233.
30A conclusion drawn by the writer; the accounts of the revolution in
Mexico and Texas published in The Aurora, Philadelphia, the Federal
Gazette and Baltimore Daily Advertiser, the National Intelligencer, Wash-
ington, D. C., Niles' Register, and The Weekly Register, Baltimore, from
the year 1811 through 1813, contain many of the exact phrases that Sibley
used in his reports to the Secretary of War. Sibley either sent information
directly, or it was copied in Washington from his reports to the War
Department.
31Sibley to Secretary of War, September 8, 1815, MS., O. R. W. D.

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