Robert King Carter's Correspondence and Diary

   A Collection Transcribed
        and Digitized
   by Edmund Berkeley, Jr.


List of Letters | About This Collection

Electronic Text Center , University of Virginia Library


Summary



Letter from Robert Carter to William Dawkins, June 19, 1723

     Robert Carter writes to London merchant William Dawkins, June 19, 1723, advising him of several bills of exchange drawn on the account of the estate of Nathaniel Burwell by Mann Page and himself. He reports a shipment of 19 hogsheads of the estate's tobacco on board Adam Graves' ship, the Bailey as well as a shipment of 20 hogsheads of his own tobacco on the Bailey sent as a favor to help Graves fill his ship. He concludes with a snipe at Dawkins' complaints about the quality of his tobacco.



Letter from Robert Carter to William Dawkins, June 19, 1723


-1 -

Wmsburgh. [James City County, Virginia]

June. 19th. 1723

Wm. Dawkins

     My last advised you Colonel Page & myself had
drawn upon you for £70 to John Sutton to be paid on account of that
Estate we have since drawn on you upon the Same account for £50 to
John Lewis Esquire for £6 to John Holloway for £5 to John Clayton
which we desire you to pay also there is Nineteen hogsheads of Tobo
of that Estates on board of Adam Graves the baily committed to
your care Colonel Page has sent the bill of lading

     I have drawn upon you for £3:10 shillings upon my own
account payable to the aforesaid Clayton

     herein I send you a bill of lading for 20 hogsheads of
my own Tobo on board the baily which I shipped in Service to your
concern when Adam [Graves] was out of all hopes of getting his load
it is all stemmed & Straight laid made at some of my best
plantations & managed with nicest care & yet perhaps you are
got into such a road of complaining you will Exercise your
bileing still in giveing it a mean Character I am leaving
this place in a few days shall say no more at Present



Per the Baily

NOTES



Source copy consulted: Robert Carter letter book, 1723 June 16-1724 April 23, Robert Carter Papers, (acc. no. 3807), Albert H. Small Special Collections Library, University of Virginia.

Robert Carter writes from Williamsburg, the colonial capital of Virginia, where he has been attending a meeting of the Assembly. The county and colony have been added for clarity.


[1] Carter refers to the estate of his deceased so-in-law, Nathaniel Burwell (d. 1721).


[2] John Lewis (1669-1725) of "Warner Hall," Gloucester County, had been a member of the Council since 1704. ( Louis B. Wright and Marion Tinling, William Byrd of Virginia: The London Diary 1717-1721 and Other Writings. [New York: Oxford University Pres, 1958]. p. 458 )


[3] Adam Graves, was a son of Captain Thomas Graves, long a captain of vessels trading to Virginia, and a special friend of Robert Carter's. Adam Graves commanded the Bailey in 1725-1727, a ship that belonged to London merchant William Dawkins. ( Survey Report 6800, and Adm. 68/194-196 found in the microfilms of the Virginia Colonial Records Project, Albert H. Small Special Collections Library, University of Virginia )



This text revised August 6, 2009.