Thomas Jefferson to Patrick Gibson, 10 April 1818
To Patrick Gibson
Monticello Apr. 10. 18.
Dear Sir
I must ask the favor of you to send my acct for Jan. Feb. Mar. with as little delay as convenient, this being the season of the year at which most of my engagements fall due. this renders it necessary for me to ask further that if any flour remains on hand, the quantity may be stated, as a full view of my funds is necessary to govern my draughts. my crop of wheat in Bedford, which from 400. bushels sown ought to have given me 400. Barrels of flour for mark[e]t, gave only 30. Barrels, so total was the destruction by the fly. but for this I should have been able, without any aid, to have paid the 2d instalment of the Dutch debt which came upon me the last year. but this extraordinary loss has obliged me to ask a further discount, and I have preferred the bank of the US. because it would be satisfied with a country endorser: for I could not think of further burthening the use of your name. I have therefore inclosed a note for 3000.D. to Colo Nicholas, because he can satisfy the Directors as to the country endorser, and I now inclose you an order to recieve the proceeds of the note, if discounted, as Colo Nicholas assures me it will be. in the same event I will pray you to remit 1000.D. immediately to John Vaughan of Philadelphia with the inclosed letter. but were the discount to fail which however I suppose cannot be, then I would wish the return of the letter. the payment to Messrs Leroy & Bayard is to be made in May, and may therefore be the subject of a future letter. there are still 55. barrels of flour ready to go from this place. I note on the back hereof the draughts I have made on you since your acct rendered to Dec. 31. and of others which I must make tomorrow. it is so interesting to me to recieve speedily the state of my account for Jan. Feb. March, that if it is not too much trouble I will request the favor of you to send it by duplicates, the one to this place, the other to Popla[r] Forest for which pla[ce] I set out the day after tomorrow to return about the 1st [of] May. accept th[e] [assurance?] [o]f my friendship & respect.
Th: Jefferson1
PoC (MHi); on reused address cover of Archibald Thweatt to TJ, 17 Feb. 1818; mutilated at seal, with missing text rewritten by TJ; some words faint; at foot of recto: “Mr Gibson”; endorsed by TJ. Enclosure: TJ to John Vaughan, 8 Apr. 1818, and enclosures. Other enclosure not found.
TJ’s country endorser was Thomas Jefferson Randolph.
the draughts: Johnson was being repaid for “boatage”; Higginbotham for a cash advance; Leitch for loans of $60 and $274, plus a payment of $164 he had made on TJ’s behalf to William Hogg for cattle; and Alexander for “the portions of Hendersons’ land which I purchased of him.” The drafts of 11 Apr. were to go to Garrett for “my 1st. instalmt. to the College & 50.D. Joel Yancey’s do”; Southall for a cash advance; Leitch for two loans totaling $70.17, payments he had made for TJ to William Gamble, Ira Garrett (for Mary Lewis), William Johnson, John Pollock, Charles Vest, and William Watson, and the cost of three barrels of clover seed; and Bramham & Jones in order to settle TJ’s account with Jeremiah A. Goodman (, 2:1340–3).
A missing letter from Bramham & Jones to TJ of 8 Apr. 1818 is recorded in SJL as received from Charlottesville the day it was written.
1. Remainder on verso.
Index Entries
- Alexander, Eli; and Henderson lands search
- Alexander, Eli; TJ pays search
- Bank of the United States, Second; TJ’s loan from search
- Bramham & Jones (Charlottesville firm); debt assigned to search
- Bramham & Jones (Charlottesville firm); letter from accounted for search
- cattle; purchased by TJ search
- Central College; subscription for search
- clover; seed search
- flour; from Poplar Forest search
- Gamble (Gambell), William; payments to search
- Garrett, Alexander; and Central College subscription search
- Garrett, Ira; payments to search
- Gibson, Patrick; account with TJ search
- Gibson, Patrick; and payments made for TJ search
- Gibson, Patrick; and TJ’s flour search
- Gibson, Patrick; and TJ’s loan from Second Bank of the United States search
- Gibson, Patrick; letters to search
- Goodman, Jeremiah Augustus; TJ pays search
- Henderson, Bennett; lands of search
- Hessian fly search
- Higginbotham, David; TJ pays search
- Higginbotham, David; TJ’s debt to search
- Hogg, William; paid for cattle search
- Jefferson, Thomas; Business & Financial Affairs; debt to D. Higginbotham search
- Jefferson, Thomas; Business & Financial Affairs; debt to J. A. Goodman search
- Jefferson, Thomas; Business & Financial Affairs; debt to N. & J. & R. van Staphorst search
- Jefferson, Thomas; Business & Financial Affairs; debt to V. W. Southall search
- Jefferson, Thomas; Business & Financial Affairs; exchanges land with E. Alexander search
- Jefferson, Thomas; Business & Financial Affairs; loan from Second Bank of the United States search
- Jefferson, Thomas; Public Service; and Central College subscription search
- Johnson, William (boatman); TJ pays search
- Leitch, James; makes payments for TJ search
- Leitch, James; TJ pays search
- LeRoy, Bayard & Company (New York firm); and TJ’s debt to N. & J. & R. van Staphorst search
- Lewis, Mary Walker (Nicholas Lewis’s wife); TJ makes payment for search
- Monticello (TJ’s Albemarle Co. estate); cattle at search
- Monticello (TJ’s Albemarle Co. estate); flour from search
- N. & J. & R. van Staphorst; TJ’s debt to search
- Nicholas, Wilson Cary (1761–1820); and Second Bank of the United States search
- Pollock, John; payments to search
- Poplar Forest (TJ’s Bedford Co. estate); flour from search
- Poplar Forest (TJ’s Bedford Co. estate); TJ plans visits to search
- Poplar Forest (TJ’s Bedford Co. estate); wheat grown at search
- Randolph, Thomas Jefferson (TJ’s grandson; Jane Hollins Nicholas Randolph’s husband); endorses bank notes search
- seeds; clover search
- Southall, Valentine Wood; TJ’s debt to search
- subscriptions, non-publication; for Central College/ University of Virginia search
- Vaughan, John; makes payments for TJ search
- Vest, Charles; payments to search
- Watson, William; payments to search
- wheat; at Poplar Forest search
- Yancey, Joel (d.1833); and Central College/ University of Virginia subscription search