To the Honorable the General Assembly of North Carolina
Mr. Speaker and Gentlemen of the House of Burgesses:
The petition of sundry of the Inhabitants of the Eastern part of Burke County Humbly Sheweth.
That your petitioners will labour under a very great disadvantage Should the Court be established at the enormous distance it is now placed from us; upwards of fifty miles from the lower part of the County, Experience having not yet tanght us, that the Court house in any County hath been placed in the frontier part of the County, Convenient to the lesser number of scattering inhabitants; and so far remote from the main body of the People joining the County from which they were but lately separated, as what it is in this County, the particular situation of which we refer to General Rutherford, who is well acquainted with this County. Had the Commissioners who were first appointed placed the Court House, we would not have had such cause of complaint, as they were appointed by different, disinterested Persons, who seemed to
have the good of the whole County in view, by appointing three in each end of the County, and one in the centre, which gave an equal chance to all parts. But one of those Commissioners refusing to do this duty, prevented the rest, until he was sent a member to your house, where (by his own confession) he (through a Commissioner) had the appointing of two other Commissioners; one in the upper part of the County and one in Rowan, a Person whose Interested connection with the appointed give us reason to think the plan was Concerted previous to the appointment, which doth appear more evident from the following considerations, viz. The appointer on his way home from the Assembly did say, that he expected in a short time there would be a new County formed out of the lower part of Burke and the upper part of Rowan; the appointed, immediately after selling the Court House, took aside two of the lower Commissioners, and recommended to them to use their utmost influence and address to obtain together with the appointer, the representation of the County at the ensuing Election, which obtained, to present a petition to your Honorable House from the lower part of Burke and the neighboring part of Rowan; praying a new County taking a part of Burke and that part of Rowan in which he lived for that purpose, and as he had done us a considerable injury, in placing the Court House so inconvenient to us in order to remedy which he would assist us in the said Scheme, Concluding by saying that if the Business was well managed it would be completed by next fall, &c.We your petitioners therefore, Sensible of your love for justice and equity, humbly pray your Honors, out of Compassion for the injured and depressed, you would make void what hath been done with respect to selling the Court House, and impower the first Commissioners to act agreeable to their first orders. Or that you appoint others in each extremity of the County for that purpose. We further pray your Honors may not appoint men living out of this County, who will not feel the inconveniency they may Cause.
N. B. All those names wrote in one hand are the names of Dutchmen who could not write their name in English, therefore at their request their names were wrote in English for your better understanding.