Page:Oregon Historical Quarterly volume 23.djvu/159

 April

1852. Returnable before the Dist. Court of Polk County at the next term.

0. C. PRATT, 2. Jud Dist. 0. Territory

HABEAS CORPUS The Territory of Oregon ) District Court of the Unit on the Relation of ) ed States of America for

Robin Holmes ) the Territory of Oregon

vs. ) within and for the County

Nathaniel Ford ) of Polk.

Polk County P.

Nathaniel Ford the respondent in said writ makes the following return thereto, to-wit, That he has the bodies of the said individuals described in said writ in his care and prosession [sic] and under his control, towit Jenny or Mary Jane Holmes, Roxanna Holmes and James Holmes.

That the father and mother of the said Jenny, Roxanna and James, are of the negro race and were the slaves of and owned by this Respondent for many years in the State of Missouri, That the said Jenny, who is now about twelve years of age was born in said State of Missouri, and states the said father and mother were the property of this Respondent, and house, that the said Jenny was the property of this Respondent. That in the year 1844 this Respondent brought the said slaves, father, mother and child, to this territory as his servants and slaves.

That the said James was born in this territory in February 1845, and the said Roxanna somewhere about February 1847 and the parents of the said children were till after the birth of the last child in the possession of this Respondent, as his servants and slaves, and so continued till in or about the year 1849. That about the spring of 1849 the said Robin Holmes the father of said children left this Territory and went to California, and the mother of said children remained at the residence of this Respondent, till the spring of 1850, but not controlled as a slave.

That about the first of March 1850 the said Robin having returned from California, and his said wife having given birth to another child, an agreement was en