Thomas Jefferson to Samuel Mifflin, 9 November 1805
To Samuel Mifflin
Washington Nov. 9. 05
Sir
I have just recieved from Messrs. Gibson & Jefferson of Richmond your account for sheet iron furnished in August amounting to 104.27 D they inform me the iron has been lying some time with them, waiting the means of conveyance. this is the first information I have recieved of the execution of my order, which I mention as an apology for your not having sooner heard from me. it should have been paid for at any time within 30. days after notice, and the remittance shall be made you within that period from this time. I shall have occasion in the spring for 100. sheets more 16. I. wide and 11. f. 6. I. long, which I mention now because I have understood it requires choice pieces to make such, and time therefore to have them selected. I will pray you to have attention to this so as to be able to send on the supply in March after the opening of the Delaware. Accept my friendly salutations
Th: Jefferson
PoC (MHi); at foot of text: “Mr. Samuel Mifflin”; endorsed by TJ.
Samuel Mifflin (1776-1829) was born Samuel Mifflin Francis but dropped his paternal surname to secure an inheritance. He became a prominent merchant in Philadelphia and in partnership with Benjamin Henry Latrobe took over management of the rolling mill established at the city’s waterworks. In later years, he was president of the Union Canal Company and a board member of the Schuylkill Navigation Company, both enterprises linked by the goal of extending navigation between Philadelphia and the Susquehanna River (Philadelphia National Gazette and Literary Register, 19 Mch. 1829; W. A. Newman Dorland, “The Second Troop Philadelphia City Cavalry,” , 54 [1930], 73, 80; Edward J. Gibbons and Edward S. Gibbons, “The Building of the Schuylkill Navigation System, 1815-1828,” Pennsylvania History, 57 [1990], 17, 26, 31; , 1:323n).