Washington, a forty-three-year-old free man of color, represents that "some eight or nine years ago ... Doctor [James] Powell sold him to a certain Thomas Higginbotham ... whom he faithfully served as a slave until some time in the month of February 1835," when said Higginbotham "departed this left testate." He further states that, in his will, "the said Thomas Higginbotham ... kindly and humanely made provision for the emancipation of all the slaves which he might own at the date of his death." Washington recounts that he intended to leave Virginia but, as a "pennyless colored man," he could not post the security bond he believed the free states imposed upon free people of color desiring to enter said states. Noting that he has a wife and eight children, the petitioner “begs to be permitted to remain where he can be with his beloved wife and children -- she it is believed will bear no more children, and he at an age that promises not many more years."
Result: Reasonable.
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Repository: Library of Virginia, Richmond, Virginia
