O Say Can You See

In open Court on this seventeenth day of December, in the year of our Lord 1841 personally appears William Crowner the above named petitioner, and makes oath on the Holy Evangely of Almighty God, that Mrs       Evans, a material proper and complete witness In this Petitioner in the above entitled controversy and residing in the County is an extremely aged and infirm person, and has been bed-ridden for a number of years, and cannot attend as a witness & be examined in the trial, by reason of her age, sickness and infirmity, and is not likely even to be in such [illegible] or to enable her to attend. That her testimony is of great importance to this Petitioner, as he expects [illegible] by her that the mother and maternal grand mother of this petitioner were free white women of European race. That the trial of the said Petitioner is fixed for this day week Wednesday 22 next. That the above named defendant lives in this County, and within a convenient distance of the residence of the said Mrs Evans and was in Court here this morning Wednesday 15th inst and was personally witnessed by the counsel of this petitioner of this an application [illegible] about to be made that day for an order of the Court to take her [illegible] to be used on the trial of the said petitioner: That

Test
Wm Brent Clk

In this cause the Petitioner, by his Counsel F.S. Key & Carlisle, moves the court upon the within affidavit, to order the deposition of Mrs Evans, the witness therein named, to be taken upon such reasonable notice as to the Court shall seem fit, to be used on the trial, according to the Act of Assembly of Maryland, of 1779, in such case made and provided, and in force in this county.

FS Key & Carlisle for the Petr

Upon the aforegoing motion and the within affidavit, the same being considered by the Court, it is on this Seventeenth day of december A.D. 1841 by the court ordered that upon two days notice prior to Tuesday next the 22d inst, to be given to the defendant George Scott, the deposition of the said Mrs Evans be taken before David A. Hall Esqre a Justice of the Peace in and for this County of Washington, on Tuesday the twenty-second day of December instant at twelve o'clock M. at the residence of the said Mrs Evans the witness; to be read upon the trial of the above entitled petition for Freedom, if the said Witness cannot be had to attend the same & of which satisfactory proof shall be made.

By order of the Court.
Wm Brent Clk