Christopher Clark purchased a slave named Randal for eight hundred dollars from Isaac Skillman on the recommendation that he was "a very good Country black Smith" and that he was "honest and faithful." Following the purchase, Clark hired Randal out to "Mayberry and Weaver, Iron masters." Clark later learned that the slave "commenced there a system of plundering and stealing seldom equalled and perhaps never surpassed." As punishment, Randal was "burnt in the head," but "this punishment however produced no reformation for before the wound got well he committed new felonies was again apprehended, tryed and condemned to be hanged and the Court from the badness of his character valued him at only five hundred dollars." The bond that Clark gave to purchase Randal "passed through several hands until it fell into the hands of a certain Jesse Irvine," to whom Clark paid the five hundred dollars. Irvine has now obtained a judgment for the other three hundred dollars. Clark seeks relief, remarking "that from the time he obtained the possession of the slave untill he was finally taken away from him and condemned to be executed, he never derived any benefit from him but he was a continual source of expense and trouble."
Or you may view all people.
Repository: Library of Virginia, Richmond, Virginia
