Legal document of indenture for William H. Harrison Travis

Source catalog description

This description refers to material held by Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture. Visual details below describe the original material.

A legal indenture document for William H. Harrison Travis, handwritten in brown ink on blue paper, and dated January 26, 1852. The document states that Thomas N. Shelton, identified as an “overseer of the poor of the county of Patrick,” does “place and bind William H. Harrison Travis, a coloured infant under the age of Twenty One Years, being ten years old on the 29th October 1851, to be apprenticed or bound to the said James Joyce” until Travis turns 21-years-old. The signatures of Shelton and Joyce appear in the bottom right of the document. The back of the document reads [ T. N. Shelton, overseer. / to/ Jas. Joyce [hand drawn line] Orphan Indentures / Wm. H. Harrison Travis / Filed June 10th 1852].

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