Jim Hickey, a man of color, prays that "an injunction may issue restraining the Sheriff of Knox County from selling your Orator" to satisfy certain judgments. Hickey, by his next friend, Charles J. McClung, recounts that he and his wife were once the property of the late Cornelius Hickey, and, as such, the clerk and master of the chancery court "sold your Orator and his said wife at public sale for the sum of two hundred dollars" to one M. W. Williams. The petitioner asserts, however, that "this purchase was in appearance only, for by the kindness and generosity of a number of gentlemen in Knox County, your Orator had been presented with the sum of two hundred dollars, with which to purchase his freedom and that of his said wife," and he avows that said Williams "did not advance one cent out of his own means towards" the said purchase. He further alleges that Williams "always admitted that he had no right to hold your Orator and his wife as slaves, but that said purchase was made upon an express agreement to afterwards emancipate them." With Williams insolvent and no longer in the state, Hickey states that he has been levied upon for Williams's said debts. He therefore seeks a perpetual injunction restraining said executions and a decree "declaring and establishing your Orator's freedom."
Result: Partially granted.
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Repository: Tennessee State Library and Archives, Nashville, Tennessee
