The Admirable Trumpeter: A Biography of General James Wilkinson

x, 383 pp. Silten jacket art. "A bombastic and enigmatic figure, Wilkinson filled American history from the Revolutionary War to the War of 1812 with excitement, comedy and color. ...He fought for American independence and rose to the rank of general in his early twenties; succeeded in opening the Mississippi to Yankee commerce while at the same time carrying on treasonable correspondence with the Spanish government at New Orleans; fought with credit in the Indian wars under Mad Anthony Wayne; became commander-in-chief of the American Army; was one of the commissioners at the cession of Louisiana to the United States; was chiefly responsible for dragging the Aaron Burr conspiracy into the open and appeared as the most important witness against Burr in that most memorable of trials. He commanded an army in one of the most disastrous campaigns of the War of 1812, and died while plotting schemes for personal and national aggrandizement in Mexico."