Oliver Pollock (ca. 1737–1823), merchant, financier, and planter, was born in northern Ireland and immigrated to Pennsylvania in 1760. In 1762 he went to Havana and established a business specializing in trade between Cuba and North America. Pollock moved in 1768 to New Orleans, where his friendship with the Spanish military commander exempted him from trade restrictions on non-Spanish merchants. He also speculated in West Florida land, and in 1772 he established a plantation near Baton Rouge. When the American Revolution began, Pollock embraced the patriot cause, and as the Continental Congress’s commercial agent at New Orleans he made that port an important supply depot for American troops. In 1779 he negotiated bills of exchange that George Rogers Clark drew on behalf of Virginia to assist his Illinois expedition, but Virginia’s refusal to pay these drafts undermined Pollock’s credit. He became overextended in 1781 after guaranteeing bills drawn by Congress, and the latter’s failure to pay them off effectively bankrupted him. Although he gradually regained his fortune, Pollock spent the next several decades obtaining reimbursement from Virginia and the United States (ANB description begins John A. Garraty and Mark C. Carnes, eds., American National Biography, 1999, 24 vols. description ends ; DAB description begins Allen Johnson and Dumas Malone, eds., Dictionary of American Biography, 1928–36, 20 vols. description ends ).

In public letters dated 6 Nov. 1779, TJ and the Virginia Board of Trade agreed that, at the behest of Governor Patrick Henry, Pollock had exerted himself financially to supply Clark’s Illinois campaign, and that the state should therefore take steps to reimburse him (PTJ description begins Julian P. Boyd, Charles T. Cullen, John Catanzariti, Barbara B. Oberg, and others, eds., The Papers of Thomas Jefferson, 1950– , 32 vols. description ends , 3:158–9).