1186
AMERICAN HISTORICAL ASSOCIATION.
had some difficulty in arranging matters with the Gen 1 about his com- pensation ,expenses etc. etc. which however now appears settled by n11owing him his expenses and a.bout $200 pr month for services and the stock is selling at about 100 pr ct advance It is now believed that Doctr Robertson one of our most worthy citizens will go out as agent and take with him a large connexion and many respectable friends you will find him a great acquisition to the settlement of your new Country, he possesses sterling integrity good sound sense mildness of manners and conduct and firmness suited to the undertaking and with all n good stock of practical experience in the ups and downs of li:fe--I wns a stockholder but poverty prevents my holding on to it- The old business of A. Erwin Groce & Co. and Erwin & C 0 of which you have heard so much nnd so varient from the true state of the case keeps me in poverty·and at present on the limits prescribed for un- fortunate ·debtors from which I shall be released in about twenty days as I have twice within the last 7 years given up my last knife and fork to creditors I did expect to have escaped this ordeal but so it is owing to party feelings growing partly out of my defending myself and neighbours against Gen 1 Jackson & Co. with eventual suc- cess excites feelings of hostility from that quarter and the circum- stance of Mr. Groces·lea\11ng the country with property causes some to suppose I had knowledge of it which he lmows is not the £act and the circumstances of my living on a good tract of land and having the use of 14 negroes which are mortgaged to the government for three times what they would sell for furnishes a pretext for some illclisposed persons to say that I hold property and withold it from my creditors Even your neighbour Mr. Groce who knows these facts as well as I do sometimes I am told indulges himself in saying we are all rich and owe him and refuse to settle with him etc etc In your letter you ask how this matter is above you have the answer all of which I could prove by Mr. Groce himself in a court of the United Stutes and by Record Testimony in the city of Augusta were he here-no mnn wishes Mr. Groce to pi·osper more than I do It is true he joined me in a merchantile business in which business I had been prosperous fo_r more than 20 years-Both our objects w~re to make money in which I lost upwards of $100.000 of my own capital and ]\fr. Groce near $50,000 leaving us jointly bound for large sums which both he and myself exerted ourselves to settle and at our last meeting in Augusta James Erwin Mr. Groce and myself each executed our notes to .Col. :McKinne for about ten thousand dollars which each were to pay and was to exonerate Mr. Groce from all other liabilities in Georoia and he exonerated us :from him for all claims by him on either of us. :Mr. Groce left the country without paying his note it was paid by us and I presume is the clnim about which James Erwin
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