To Thomas Jefferson from Abraham Buford, 20 March 1781
From Abraham Buford
March the 20th 1781
Sir
I am informed from good authority that Epafroditus Rudder, Cornett in Baylors Regiment of horse, did impress the stud Horse of David Deardins (of Mecklenburg County) Cal’d Romulous which was apprais’d to £750 Specie, that horse he has since swoped with Col. George Gibson for a gelden and gets Two Hogsheads of tobacco to boot.
A Buford
I am informed the within by Cornett Rudder, Frances Ruffin of Mecklenburg County and by Col. Gibson.
A Buford
RC (Vi); endorsed: “Colo. Bufords information.”
See White to TJ, Apr. 5. There was a horse named Romulus, by Mark Anthony out of Pompadour, that belonged to John Tyler in 1776, but that Romulus may not have been the one involved in this impressment; , 1st. ser., xi (1902), 93. Cornett Rudder: It does not seem likely that the name Epaphroditus Rudder could be confused with another, but the reference to his being a cornet is puzzling. There was an Epaphroditus Rudder who was second lieutenant in the 1st Virginia State regiment in 1777; first lieutenant from April 1778 to October 1779 in the same regiment; and lieutenant in the 1st Continental Dragoons, 1780 (, ii, 421, note). If this was the same Rudder referred to in the present letter, it is difficult to account for his being a cornet, except on the ground of his having been broken—a plausible assumption in view of the nature of the matter discussed in the present letter and in Davies’ reply, 21 Mch.; see also TJ to White, 24 Mch. and Greene to TJ, 30 Apr. 1781.