Description:

Slavery

Enslaved Girl Lucy Huge Archive 29pp Texas Supreme Court Case

 

When Robert O. Bean could not pay his debt, Joseph R. Arnold sued him and won. When the sheriff seized the 11 or 12 year-old enslaved girl Lucy from Bean’s home to sell at auction to pay Bean’s debt to Arnold, Bean’s brother insisted that Lucy was his property. The controversy over who owned Lucy went all the way to the Texas Supreme Court, but when that court decided in 1867 that Lucy belonged to Robert Bean, she was no longer a slave because of the end of the Civil War and the passage of the 13th Amendment.

 

[SLAVERY, TEXAS. Archive of documents relating to the case of Arnold v. Bean, 1856-1862, Smith County, Texas. 3 letters, 29 pp. total, 8" x 12.5" Manuscript has expected folds and some foxing. All text is clear, dark, and legible.

 

Excerpts:

“It is adjudged that the negro in controversy is the property of the defendant F. H. Beane and not subject to plaintffs execution.”

 

“a trial was had in a cause in which J. R Arnold was Plff and F. H. Bean was defendant, in a cause involving the trial of the right of property to a negro girl that on the 30th day of June 1860, said defendant recovered a Judgment against your petitioner, which said Judgment was for the costs of the suit, and that said negro was the property of F. H. Bean & not subject to your petitioners execution. Your petitioner shows that said Judgment is erroneous and assigns for error the following grounds. That said Judgment is contrary to the law and the facts. The court erred in rendering Judgment for Deft. The court erred in not subjecting the negro to sale to pay the plaintiffs execution for all of which said Judgment ought to be reversed and rendered for Plff.”

 

Historical Background:

 

On July 3, 1856, the Bell County District Court in Texas awarded a judgment in behalf of Joseph R. Arnold against Robert O. Bean for $322.55 and costs. By July 1859, Arnold had still not recovered the debt. On September 29, 1859, the sheriff of Smith County, Texas, seized an 11- or 12-year old enslaved girl named Lucy, valued at $800, from the possession of Robert O. Bean. That same day, Bean gave a bond that he would deliver Lucy to the sheriff to be sold to pay the judgment against him on November 1, 1859, in Tyler, the county seat of Smith County. On October 24, Bean’s brother Franklin H. Bean claimed Lucy as his property and gave a bond for twice her value.

 

At the June 1860 term of the Smith County District Court, Franklin H. Bean declared that Lucy was his property and not that of Robert O. Bean. He had left her at his brother’s house to help his sister-in-law. As Lucy was Franklin Bean’s property, she was not liable to be seized and sold for Robert Bean’s debts. Robert Bean had sold Lucy to his brother Franklin on June 9, 1856, for $550. Suspiciously, that sale was less than a month before the Bell County District Court issued a judgment against Robert Bean, and the Beans did not record the sale of Lucy until March 23, 1858. Robert Bean testified that there was another execution for more than $450 against him, and the sheriff was about to seize Lucy to pay the debt. His brother became his security for the payment, and when Robert Bean could not pay the execution, Franklin Bean paid the execution and gave his brother the balance of the purchase price for Lucy. Robert Bean asked to hire Lucy from his brother, but Franklin Bean left her without charge to care for Robert Bean’s ill wife. Judge R. A. Reeves tried the question of property, and on June 30, 1860, Reeves decided that Lucy did belong to Franklin H. Bean and ordered Arnold to pay the court costs.

 

In December 1861, Joseph Arnold filed a petition for a writ of error to the Texas Supreme Court from the judgment of Judge Reeves. The Texas Supreme Court summoned Franklin H. Bean to appear at Tyler in April 1862 to answer the charges made by Arnold. R. B. Long, the clerk of the Smith County District Court, wrote out this entire document to submit to the Texas Supreme Court for this case. This District Court Transcript consists of the following documents:

 

Index to Court Record, 1 p.

Court Record, December 22, 1859, 1 p.

Affidavit of Franklin H. Bean, October 24, 1859, 1 p.

Bond of Franklin H. Bean, October 24, 1859, 1 p.

Bond of Robert O. Bean, September 29, 1859, 3 pp.

Court Record, June 30, 1860, 3 pp.

Writ of Pluries Fieri Facias and Bill of Costs, July 20, 1859, 2 pp.

Sheriff’s Return, November 26, 1859, 3 pp.

Statement of Facts, including Bill of Sale, July 2, 1860, 7 pp.

Petition and Bond for Writ of Error, December 4, 1861, 3 pp.

Citation in Error and Sheriff’s Return, January 28, 1862, 2 pp.

Clerk’s Certification, February 5, 1862, 1 p.

Docketing, April 1862, 1 p.

 

The Texas Supreme Court that met in Tyler in April 1862 consisted of Chief Justice Royall T. Wheeler and Associate Justice James H. Bell. Associate Justice Oran M. Roberts did not attend this session.  Apparently, the Supreme Court did not decide this case until 1867. At that time, Chief Justice Asa H. Willie wrote the opinion for the court, which decided that Robert Bean’s possession of Lucy for three years made her his property and thus subject to seizure to pay his debt to Arnold. Willie wrote, “The statute of March 16, 1840, to prevent frauds and fraudulent conveyances, provides; that when any loan of goods and chattels or slaves shall be pretended to have been made to any person, with whom…possession shall have remained by the space of three years…the same shall be taken, as to the creditors and purchasers…to be fraudulent within this act…. This case presents precisely the state of facts contemplated by the statute….” (30 Texas 13). The Supreme Court reversed Judge Reeves’ decision and remanded the case to the Smith County District Court for further action. By 1867, of course, Lucy was no longer a slave, so Arnold won the legal issue but would have had to recover the debt Robert Bean owed him from some of Bean’s other property in 1867.

 

Joseph R. Arnold (1812-1881) was born in Tennessee. In 1844, he married Mary Ellen Polk. In 1860, he was a stock raiser in Hill County, Texas, where he lived with his wife and eight children. He also owned two slaves. During the 1860s, Arnold moved to Bosque County, Texas.

 

Robert O. Bean (1806-1898) was born in Tennessee, and in 1833 or 1834, he married Lovinia J. Hart (1812-1895), with whom he had at least eight children. In 1860, he was a farmer in Flora, Texas, with $3,000 in real estate, and $4,200 in personal property.

 

Franklin H. Bean (1814-1887) was born in Tennessee. In 1852, he married Elizabeth Cheatham Bundy (1825-1909), and they had at least seven children between 1853 and 1870. In 1860, he was a farmer in Flora, Texas, with $3,000 in real estate, and $3,600 in personal estate, including five slaves.

 

This item comes with a Certificate from John Reznikoff, a premier authenticator for both major 3rd party authentication services, PSA and JSA (James Spence Authentications), as well as numerous auction houses.

 

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