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22 Fred Wilbur Powell^ A. M.

The matter was taken up for discussion in the committee of the whole house on the state of the Union on December 23,

1828. Gurley proposed an amendment to the Floyd bill, pro- viding for a grant of land forty miles square to Bradford's New Orleans con^>any. Everett, however, "stated that, in that part of the country from which he came, there was an association of three thousand individuals, respectable farmers and artizans, who stood ready to embark in this enterprise, as soon as the permission and protection of the Government should be secured to them." He therefore raised the question whether an exclusive grant of land such as was proposed would be fair to other prospective settlers as enterprising and meritorious as those of the New Orleans company.

The obnoxious provision was therefore stricken out on the following day, and the amendment was further modified "by inserting the names of Paul and J. Kelley [sic], and his asso- ciates (a similar company from Massachusetts), and Albert Town [sic] and his associates, (a company from Ohio), as entitled to the permission granted by the bill."^

Of Kelley's other activities during the years from 1824 to

1829, we know little. That he engaged in little if any remuner- ative employment is certain,^* though his engagement as a land surveyor by the Three Rivers Manufacturing c<»npany would suggest that he may have served others in like capacity. It would seem, however, that he neglected his personal affairs, and became involved in difficulties which threatened the loss of his property. These troubles he attributed to the efforts of the opponents of the settlement of Oregon.

"To accomplish their designs, and to prevent mine, and to make an end of my project, they raised an army in the city of Boston, and afterwards in '27, enlisted troops in the cities of New York and Washington, and in '29 raised a more bloody troop in the village of Three Rivers, to which place I had just moved my family. ... As early as in the year '24 . ..

20 20 cong. a sess. Register of Debates, V, 126. See also p. 146. a I Kelley, Narrative of Events and Difficulties, 7.