Sold for taxes, redux.

by Lisa Y. Henderson

No. 471. An Act for the relief of John Montgomery and William A. Lewis, of Forsyth County; Nancy Going, Adaline Page, Thursday, Isabella, De la Fayette, and Elmira, free persons of color, of the County of Columbia, and for other purposes therein specified.

WHEREAS, Bryant Oxendine, a free person of color, was taken up for failing to comply with the Registration Laws of this State, in the year 1850, and was found guilty and fined by the Inferior Court of Forsyth County one hundred dollars, and being unable to pay the fine was hired out, under the Laws of this State, for a term of eighteen months, for the price of one hundred dollars, to John Montgomery, on the 5th day of December, 1850, and the said John Montgomery gave his note due eighteen months after date, to the Justices of the Inferior Court of Forsyth County, for the sum of one hundred dollars, with William A. Lewis as security for the same. And,

WHEREAS, The said Bryant Oxendine ran away on the 28th day of August, 1851, and therefore failed to perform the service for the time for which he was hired.

…

SECTION I. Be it therefore enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the State of Georgia in the General Assembly met, and it is hereby enacted by the authority of the same, That the said John Montgomery and WIlliam A. Lewis be relieved, discharged and acquitted from the payment of so much of the said note, in proportion, as the service aforesaid was not performed, to wit: the sum of fifty-five dollars.

…

Acts of the General Assembly of Georgia, 1853-4 (1854).