The story of this suit starts with a related petition filed in 1854 by the children and heirs of the late Jonathan H. Koen, who had died one year earlier in Arkansas, against Eli Tidwell, the executor of their father's will and against several slaves who had been emancipated by their father in his last will and testament. In that suit, the petitioners relate that in 1843 Jonathan H. Koen, then a resident of Louisiana and heavily in debt, was forced to sell eleven slaves to Charles Cappell. The following year Koen's son-in-law, Lorenzo Lewis, purchased the slaves and returned them to Koen as a gesture of good will and family loyalty. Koen, however, fled with the slaves to Bradley County, Arkansas, changed his name to John Kolen, and remained there until his death in 1853. In his will he emancipated some of the slaves. The 1854 petition was filed by the heirs to regain possession of his property, including the former slaves. In this 1855 petition, the petitioners, Martha Ann Ewell, Lorenzo Lewis's widow, her new husband, John Ewell, and her two minor children, Richard M. and Mary Emma Lewis, seek to add a number of slaves as defendants in their case against Eli Tidwell, Koen's executor. The new defendants include Betcy Williams and her two children, Clarissa and Hannibal; Emiline Morrow and her four children, Sally, Osburn, Rolla, and Emily; and Charles, Albert, Rasha, Mercinda, Mary Ann, Temple, and Betcy. The black defendants are, the plaintiffs assert, "slaves for life."
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Repository: Bradley County Courthouse, Warren, Arkansas
