2006-06
This lot is closed for bidding. Bidding ended on 5/31/2006
An extremely unusual A.L.S. 1p. 4to., Annapolis, Maryland, April 21, 1787, in which Slave-owner M.L. Stowe writes to "Colonel Lyles of Alexandria, Virginia, in part:"…Some doubts are entertained respecting the Virg'a Law relating to slaves, and it is thought unsafe to permit negroes the property of inhabitants of Maryland to remain in your state. I am therefore induced to request that you will relinquish Bill and send him to Maryland on the receipt of this. If the relinquishment puts you to any inconvenience, if you cannot be as well supplied, I suppose we may not expect anything for the time he has served…the relinquishment must be upon such terms as you think just and right. To your judgment upon the subject I shall acquiesce…M.L.Stowe, April 21, 1787…" Since Both Virginia and Maryland were clearly slave states in 1787, the only possible reason we can see for this letter would be from misunderstandings arising from debate at the ANNAPOLIS CONFERENCE OF FEBRUARY 21, 1787, which served as a predecessor to the Constitutional Convention set to begin several weeks later on May 14, of 1787. It was known at this time that Virginia was leading a coalition of a number of the larger states concerning a National plan of government, and the distrust expressed by this Marylander towards a fellow slave-owner in Virginia, who at the time was the largest of the slaveholding states, shows the extent of the general mistrust and paranoia that existed between the various states and the gaps between their perceived interests prior to the obviously much needed Constitutional Convention in May. A tear from where the wax seal tore at the corner of the letter when opened effects several words of the text but not to the extent that they cannot be understood and a chip of paper missing from the left margin that effects nothing, otherwise very good
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