Catharine Hammond and Joseph Harper, her trustee and next friend, seek an accounting of and payment for the sale of two slaves. Catharine conveyed a female slave named "Nancy and her future issue to" her brother, David W. Barsh, in 1834 to be held "In trust for her sole and separate use." She also assigned David "the balance of One Thousand and five Hundred Dollars," which was "then due and owing by him on" a bond from the previous year. David settled "the principal of the said Bond ... and all the interest ... but never afterwards paid anything and neglected altogether his duty to invest" money or "to pay the money or fulfill his Trust." By 1852, the Hammonds were heavily in debt, and Catharine's remaining "negroes were seized by the Sheriff." With her husband in jail, Barsh, "acting in concert with John K. Bivin redeemed the negroes by a compromise with the execution creditor" and transferred two slaves to Georgia while selling another slave. The petitioners assert that Catharine was kept "in the dark" about their actions and that the "said J. K. Bivin never did apply the money thus received to relieve the Trust estate." Once the slaves were in Georgia, Bivin "sold and disposed of them in breach of the duty which he had undertaken" and "converted the money to his own use." They seek an account of said slaves and ask that Bivin be forced to pay them the slaves’ full value.
Result: Granted pro confesso .
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Repository: South Carolina Department of Archives and History, Columbia, South Carolina
