Duplin County, NC - Court Records File contributed for use in USGenWeb Archives by Grace Williamson Turner Transcribed and posted by Sloan Mason PETITIONS CONCERNING DOCTOR HANSON F. MURPHY-1849 Duplin Co., N.C. Duplin, 10th May 1849 Gov. MANLY Dear Sir, I take the liberty to address your excellency in reference to a matter that may come under your consideration, some two years since I was attacked by a disguised mob composed of some 15 or 20 persons nearly every one connected to it --- of its lawless band; either by consanguinity or affinity under entirely false allegations. The fact is this, said Captain of the mob, whose name is Hanson MURPHY had injured me privately previously to the attack made upon me under the cover of ----, the injury done me was larcenous or malicious mischief in its character, in its eye of the law-and then, it is my opinion and its opinion of many others its of - is naturally a very zealous minded fellow, all did to this infernal -----------, he MURPHY married a wife whose Mother and two or three of her sisters had children previous to getting married This fellow MURPHEY was tried and convicted at the last term of the Superior court for Duplin, and was sentenced to three months imprisonment with the paying of cost of the indictment, from which deception he was permitted to take an appeal to the Supreme court. I think this step can avail him nothing. MURPHY does not hope (I understand) that the Judgment below will be reversed, but intends petitioning your Excellency to grant him a reprieve. I trust in Heaven that you will not do that ------, however numerous his signers may be notwithstanding, he has a large connection and many concerned with him in this mob scrape, there is scarcely none of them your political friends. 1st-I stated I am your political friend. 2-Mrs. Henry HAYWOOD of Raleigh your Lady's Mother and my Mother are sister's children; my grand Mother being a RUFFIN 3rd-It would be doing me great injustice to grant the fellow his petition, it would in my opinion be countenancing and encouraging mob law in this land. 4th-There has been 4 cases of mobbing, persons in Duplin county within the last 2 or 3 years, and 2 of the persons mobbed were defenseless females, one of them being mobbed of all the money she had in her house, they were both as respectable Ladies as any in Duplin County in all the cases of attack as you and I know its villains composing the mobs were smutted as black as Negroes and 5th-Permit me to refer your excellency to the pamphlet enclosed. Your humble & obedient servant Jesse? Pridgen JORDAN His Excellency Charles? MANLY P.S. If the appeal comes before the Supreme Court, I hope you will be so kind as to speak a word to the Attorney General on the Subject and thereby oblige your injured constituent. J. P. J. I neglected to state to your Excellency that I have a wife and four children, having married into one of the best families in the lower part of the State. This circumstance also, I hope your excellency will take into consideration while as I remarked in the letter this envious malicious and jealous fellow my arch enemy married into a very base family & so far as concerning there previous to their married state. J. P. JORDAN Gov. C. MANLY Raleigh, N.C. To His Excellency Charles MANLY, Governor of the State of North Carolina The undersigned citizens of the County of Duplin respectfully represent to Your Excellency that at the Spring Term 1849 of the Superior Court of Law for the County of Duplin. Doctor Hanson F. MURPHY was charged with having committed an assault and Battery upon Jesse P. JORDAN of said County and being convicted thereof it was adjudged by the Court that he should be imprisoned for three calendar months. We approaching Your Excellency to ask for the exercise of Your Execution clemency; Your Petitioners have no Complaints to better acquaint the verdict of the Jury or the judgment of the Court. The demands of the law have better heard and ----- pro---- responded to be the Officers of the laws. Their appeal to you in for judgment in ----- that mercy which it is your prerogative above to dispute and they trustfully rely upon the circumstances of the case for ---- to them their prayer for pardon from the disclosures made at the time of the trial and from statements then unheard because ---the strict rules of law in ------- but which reading the case of Doctor MURPHY were so reliable as to influence his action it appears that during his absence from home his house was visited at night by the Prosecutor JORDAN who was aware of his absence and with whom through his neighborhood no social intercourse had existed for some months prior thereto scarcely had he entered it where he commenced a series of indignities a lot of expressions and action toward Mrs. MURPHY the wife of the Doctor who was there without any protection and then whose a more exemplary reputable and virtuous lady does not live. A------ and increased at his conduct she repelled and rebutted him in the best way she could, but he persisted in his outrages until a late hour of the night there leaving a wife from without which caused him to fear the approach of her husband he ------ ------ and returned to his own house. Upon this arrival of the Doctor the foregoing circumstances were communicated to him and he ------- with resentment at his violation of the Sanctity of his house sought the counsel of a few friends and soon after inflicted upon the Prosecutor which was discerned proper punishment for this improper dishonor which had been ---- alike to himself and wife. Your Petitioners will not deny that he was wrong in their activity for the law allows no ------ to be his own anger-though they cannot but think that his conduct ----- of so much publication as to make ---- a ------- violation when his victim was to much of a transgressor against all the protractions and -------- of life. They would also represent to Your Excellency that that the prosecution of this case has been attended with very great expense to the Doctor against whom a Civil Suit is also proceeding for the alleged attack upon the prosecutor and they believe that his sufferings this few have been such an act only greatly to punish him for the deed which has been done but also to exercise a corrective influence over him for the residue of his life. They have known him for years and they but express the universal testament of all who know him when they say that he has ever been ---- one of the most peaceful reputable and altogether worthy men in the whole ---- of their ----- acquaintance. Individually of the highest respectability he has a family relatives and friends who would ---- feel it as a personal calamity if the sever mandate of the law should be executed toward him. They therefore earnestly entreat Your Excellency to rescue him from the shame and ignorance? Which now overhangs him for which the law has been vindicated by his convictions. They feel approved? That Society can suffer no detriment from Your Executors actions in favor of this their petitions. Ja. W. BLOUNT R. BIRD D. G. MONSEY Thomas WRIGHT C.O. HURST Elis J. FAISON Wentworth W. PIERCE A. P. HIGHTOWER H. SWINSON C. D. HILL R. - HUNTER A. R. HICKS Charles WINDERS W. W. FAISON Jno. C.? WINDERS R. K. WILLIAMS George MORISY T. R. FAISON R.B. MORISEY Isaac D. WRIGHT Jacob BRILL Eli W. HINES Everett G. BORDEN James R. HINES Jno. B. SOUTHERLAND D. H.? RAMSEY? Thomas MORISEY D. H.? KORNEGAY Robert BEST Jas. F. SHIN A. MONTGOMERY E. BLOOMINGDALE Winton BOYETTE G. - -NELAND? Geo. W. ASKINS Wm. H. TOLAR Hinton E. CARR Readon L. COBB Henry BEST Jos. T. RHODES Thos. R. HICKS? Enoch J. HINES Wm. H. MORISY John W. NANCE Daniel BOWDEN Jonathan P. CHREE? D. B. BENTON J. R. LOFTIN Henry BOWDEN Joel LOFTIN M. F. BOWDEN? Boudin SOUTHERLAND Chas. BRADLEY Willie WILLIAMSON H. B. HINES Isham R. FAISON B. C. BOWDEN Jas T. OLIVER? S. R. BOWDEN John B. LANE David WRIGHT W. F.? KORNEGAY A. W.? HURST Henry W. FAISON C. P.? OATES Edwd. HINES D. HARPER B. W. WILLIAMS John F. MEEKS? Jas. A. SHINE John C. BUKLEY Wm. CARAWAY? H. BOWDEN Buckner BOURDEN Jese J. BAKER? W. F.? POLLOCK Jas. B. CARR James WINDERS William WILLIAMS Jos. R. HATCH W. GREGORY O. C. MORISEY Wm. HOLLOWELL Jese C. PRIDGEN David JONES Lewis C. OATES John D. THOMSON William H. THOMSON Samuel LOFTIN John E. BECTON Oates T.? LEWIS Allmand A. McKOY John McGILL __________________________________________________________________________ USGENWEB NOTICE: In keeping with our policy of providing free information on the Internet, data may be used by non-commercial entities, as long as this message remains on all copied material. The electronic pages may NOT be reproduced in any format for profit or for presentation by other persons or organizations. 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