Edmund Randolph to Virginia Delegates, 30 June 1788
Edmund Randolph to Virginia Delegates
Richmond June 30. 1788.
Gentlemen
I do myself the honor of inclosing for your consideration intelligence just received from Colo. Joseph Martin, formerly our Indian agent.1 I have the honor gentlemen to be with great respect Yr. mo. ob. serv.
Edm. Randolph
RC and enclosure (PCC); FC (Vi). FC in a clerk’s hand. RC docketed by a clerk.
1. Martin had been discontinued as Virginia’s Indian agent after Congress appointed a superintendent of Indian affairs for the Southern Department, but he continued to send unofficial reports to Randolph ( , IX, 336 and n. 1; , IV, 395–96 and passim). On 20 June 1788 Congress appointed him agent of the Cherokee nation ( , XXXIV, 247). The enclosed papers were copies of Martin’s 11 June 1788 letter to Randolph and its enclosures, which contained an account of an unprovoked attack by white marauders on a Cherokee town near Chota ( , IV, 452–55). In response to frequent violations of the Treaty of Hopewell by the inhabitants of Franklin, Congress on 1 Sept, 1788 issued a proclamation declaring its firm determination to enforce that treaty. JM was a member of the committee that drafted the proclamation ( , XXXIV, 304 n. 1, 310, 342–44, 368–71, 476–79).