Peter Morris v. George Miller. Affidavits of J. Wiley & George Speake
District of Columbia
Washington County sct
On this 17th day of May A.D. 1816 before the subscriber pers an United States Justice of the Peace in & for Washington County aforesaid personally appeared J. Wiley & made oath on the Holy Evangels of Almighty God that on the 15th May Inst. he saw Morris Peer, a Negro boy apparently of the age of about 22 years in a room in George Miller's house in Washington where he was confined: that said Morris was claimed as a slave by one Jonathan Davis & James Kincaid then being at Millers house; that the said Davis & Kincaid stated to this Deponent that they had a short time before George Miller a few days before had purchased said Morris as a slave from the E. Hale (at Queen's Tavern in Washington) who had this spring brought the boy with him from New Jersey; that the said David shewed to this Deponent a bill of sale seale signed & sealed by E. Hale dated within two weeks as well as this deponent remembers by which it appeared that E. Hale sold said Morris as a slave for life to George
Miller. & on the back of the said Bill of sale was an assignment[?] of the same & of the negro to the said Davis or to Davis & Kincaid. And the said Davis hath since informed their Deponent that said Hale shewed to him a Bill of sale for the said Morris as a slave for life from one Glasse of New Ark New Jersey or New York at one or other of which places the Bill of sale was dated and that Miller purchased the said Morris as the agent of said Davis or of Davis & Kincaid.
At the same time also appeared before me George Speake aged upwards of fifteen years who being duly sworn as aforesaid said that he hath been living with Mr. Nicholas L. Queen at his tavern in Washington for some time that on Saturday last a person calling himself Hale came to the house of Mr. Queen with his family in a stage, that the said Hale stated that he came directly from New York, he brought with him a black boy whose name this Deponent does not remember. That on Monday last the said Hale left the tavern, stating before he went that he was going to New York.
Sworn before
Danl Rapine
