The enclosed note dated Richmond, 1 Oct. 1822, constituted TJ’s “promise to pay to Bernard Peyton or order, without offset, negotiable and payable at the Farmers Bank of Virginia, one thousand Dollars” (MS in MHi; printed text [rendered above in italics], with blanks filled in partially in TJ’s hand and one word [“Farmers”] in an unidentified hand; TJ’s signature to the note and Peyton’s name on verso deleted to cancel it). In his financial records for 27 Sept. 1822, TJ deleted “Having given a note to Bernard Peyton for 1000.D. to be discounted I drew on him this day in favr. Wolfe & Raphael for 300.D. and gave E. Bacon an order on them for that sum,” and substituted, in parentheses, “The note was not discountd” (MB description begins James A. Bear Jr. and Lucia C. Stanton, eds., Jefferson’s Memorandum Books: Accounts, with Legal Records and Miscellany, 1767–1826, 1997, The Papers of Thomas Jefferson, Second Series description ends , 2:1389).

The Richmond Enquirer of 4 Oct. 1822 reprinted and responded to the recent demand in the Federal Republican and Baltimore Telegraph that the press copy (see TJ to Ritchie & Gooch, 10 June 1822, and note) be produced to exonerate TJ of the charge by “A Native of Virginia” that he had accepted a fraudulent double payment. The Enquirer asserted that the copy in question was seen “yesterday”; that it was “in the hands of a gentleman in this city”; that it “bears the marks of age—is most clearly a press copy from the faintness and running of the letters—and is precisely a verbatim and punctuatim fac simile to the official copy which was filed in the treasury office of the U.S. in 1792”; that “The much disputed item is stated, as Mr. Jefferson describes it”; and that “Not a word is said of cash being obtained for it—the forgery of the Native of Virginia to the contrary notwithstanding. We pledge all our credit for the truth of our statement.”