Seventy-three-year-old Rebecca Turner asks the court to order her son, Matthias, to deliver up her five slaves, whom he holds under a fraudulent bill of sale. In 1817 a "very infirm" Rebecca agreed to allow Matthias to manage her slaves in the cultivation of land on her plantation. Matthias promised in exchange to "maintain support and clothe" her in the last years of her life. To formalize the agreement, Matthias drew up a document, and the petitioner, who could neither read nor write, made her mark. The document, to Rebecca's great dismay, was actually an "absolute" bill of sale vesting title to the slaves in Matthias. Rebecca informs the court that at her death she intended that the slaves be divided among Matthias and her ten other children, who were "equally near and dear to her." She asks the court to nullify the bill of sale and to restore the slaves to her possession.
Or you may view all people.
Repository: South Carolina Department of Archives and History, Columbia, South Carolina
