Taunton March 21st. 1763 Mrs. Eldridge,

I expected to have seen you at December or March Court, to put an end to our dispute about the Land, but I suppose the bad weather hindred you & as a neighbour of yrs. told me you wanted to know what the Cost was I take the first opportunity to inform you the whole cost amounts to £47.5.2 as taxed by the Court upon the paying of which I will give you a Deed of all the Land & I should be glad if the affair might be settled at June Court. Yr. hble. Servt.

R. T. PAINE

LbC ; addressed: "To Mrs Deliverance Eldridge at Dartmouth."

1.

Thomas Paine received a judgment against Elnathan Eldredge, Jan. 30, 1740, for £273.17.9 plus costs. In Eldredge on July 27, 1741, deeded to Thomas all his "Housing lands & meadow lying247& being in Dartmouth." One piece of these lands containing eight acres was sold in 1751 by the widow Deliverance Eldredge, as administratrix to her husband's estate, under the assumption that it still remained part of the estate. When RTP was collecting his father's debts, he noted in his diary for June 2, 1758: "Saw the Widow Eldridge, and settled my Business abt. the Land."

Before the Superior Court in Bristol Co., Oct. 1759, RTP et al. were granted the recovery of 8 acres of land in Dartmouth sold by Deliverance, as administratrix of her husband's estate, to Jonathan Kenny in 1751 (writ of summons, 19 Aug 1762).

Phila. March 21st. 1763 Respected Friend Robert Treat Paine,

I1 Recd. thine of the 2d. Current2 And in Answer Just Say, J. Wormley, Went to the Wt. Indies Years ago from Whence he is not Return'd, nor have I Reason to think he Ever will, tho' his Wife & Child (a Daughter) is supported by her friends here. And as he was Married by a fictious Name here, and the Clergyman Dead that marrd. him the 2 Witnesses Absent, & wither Dead or Living Cant Say, as one is a Seafaring Man, the other is a Woman Gone with an Officer, that there's no Proof But a Record in the Deceas'd Clergymans Book, and as it is in fictious Names It would be Verry Difficult now to Prove the Marriage. And Suppose you Could, What will she gett by Suing a Beggar, for when he Went away he absconded for Debt. I have heard nothing of his Death. I Heartily Simpathize wth. Each of these Dristess'd Ladies, Ruind per a Bad Man. I am Oblig'd for thy Kind Congratulation on my Very Happy Change of Life & wish thee as much Happiness when thou Embarques in a Like State. Please to Lett me know If I am Safe in Lend'g Nathl. White of Taunton about £240 or £50 this Money he is safe Arrived att No. Carolina. I gott his Intrest Insur'd from Hence, there, & from thence to N. York or Phila. Jno. Hoops Mother & Sisters are Well, my Regards to all My friends abt. Taunton, Leonards, Fales, Cobbs, & all the Rest. Thine,

RICH. SMITH

P.S. When thou Writes to me If thou Incloses it to Jno. G. Wanton of Rhod Island. Often Opportunitys from thence per Water.

RC ; addressed: "To Henry Laughton3 Mercht. In Boston for Robert Treat Paine Per Post"; endorsed.

1.

Richard Smith, a Philadelphia Quaker merchant, who had business connections with the Otis family of Barnstable, Mass. (Otis Papers, MHS).

248 2.

Not located.

3.

Henry Laughton (d. 1784), an importer of English goods in Boston, was a loyalist during the Revolution (Jones, Loyalists of Massachusetts, p. 188).