Thomas Lehre and Jacob Martin, trustees for Ann and Mary Lehre, accuse Ann of defrauding her infant daughter, Mary, of her rightful estate. Ann Lehre, the widow and executrix of Dr. William Lehre, assented to the sale of forty slaves and nine tracts of land in the estate without obtaining permission from the petitioners. Her marriage contract with Lehre, much like the marriage contract with her first husband, Samuel Miller, protected the property Ann inherited from her father, Alexander Findley. Miller died in 1795 and Ann, still a minor, married Dr. Lehre in the same year. Before Lehre died in 1799, the couple modified the trust estate in the marriage contract to make provisions for Mary. In 1801, the petitioners notified Ann that her father's estate was being sued for an unpaid debt. The said Thomas advised Ann to sell some of her "least valuable" slaves to discharge the debt, but Ann ignored her trustee, allowing the suit to continue and culminate in a decree to sell a substantial portion of the estate. Ann then had an agent go to the sale and repurchase the land and slaves for her at a reduced price. The petitioners applied to Ann "in a friendly manner" to restore her daughter's property, but she refuses. They ask the court to intervene on Mary's behalf.
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Repository: South Carolina Department of Archives and History, Columbia, South Carolina
