In 1853 or 1854, Henry Goodrich and Robert Bean, operating as merchants under the name of Goodrich & Bean, sold a slave woman and her child worth $700 to $800. The slaves belonged, in part, to the petitioner, Mary Ann Burroughs, and her now deceased sister, Rebecca Burroughs. The petitioner was due one-seventh of the selling price, but never received it. A year later, the petitioner's brother, W. T. Burroughs, bought a boat for the sum of $500, using money loaned him by the petitioner. Goodrich & Bean, agents for the sale, coerced the petitioner into executing a mortgage to secure full payment. The firm eventually took possession of the boat and sold it. Burroughs claims that Goodrich & Bean, knowing she is illiterate, deceived her into mortgaging a male slave by telling her she was signing a document concerning the boat. They then took possession of her slave and "lodged him in Jail." She petitions the court to invalidate the mortgage. In his answer, Henry Goodrich charges Burroughs with concealing the slave in question by keeping him "dressed in women's clothes" and pretending that he was dead.
Result: Agreed.
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Repository: Maryland State Archives, Annapolis, Maryland
