For more than a year subsequently to the date of this letter, General Gaines made the Exiles a subject of frequent communication to the War Department. In this official correspondence, he at all times spoke of them as "runaways," "outlaws," "pirates," "murderers," etc.; but in no instance did he charge them with any act hostile to the United States, or to any other people or government. Of these communications the Exiles were ignorant. They continued in peaceful retirement, cultivating the earth, and gaining a support for themselves and families. In the autumn of 1815, they gathered their crops, provided for the support of the aged and infirm, as well as for their children. They carefully nursed the sick; they buried their dead; they lived in peace, and enjoyed the fruits of their labor. The following spring and summer found them in this enviable condition. [Sidenote: 1816.] While the Exiles living on the Appalachicola were thus pursuing the even tenor of their ways, plans were ripening among the slaveholders and military officers of our army for their destruction. A correspondence was opened by the Secretary of War with General Jackson, who commanded the Southwestern Military District of the United States, holding his head-quarters at Nashville, Tennessee. Various letters and communications passed between those officers in regard to this "Negro Fort," as they called it. Power is never more dangerous than when wielded by military men. They usually feel ambitious to display their own prowess, and that of the troops under their command; and no person can read the communications of General Gaines, in regard to the Exiles who had gathered in and around this fort, without feeling conscious that he greatly desired to give to the people of the United States an example of the science and power by which they could destroy human life.[26] At length, on the sixteenth of May, General Jackson wrote General Gaines, saying, "I have little doubt of the fact, that this fort has been established by some villains for the purpose of rapine and plunder, and that it ought to be blown up, regardless of the ground on which it stands; and if your mind shall have formed the same conclusion, destroy it and return the _stolen negroes_ and property to their rightful owners."[27]