Primarily official legal forms, most of the documents in the collection hold little in the way of narrative about the suits cited, and were most likely kept for the value of their signatures. The Arbitration Records are forms that record the names of the plaintiffs, defendants, and arbitrators, location of the arbitration (often a tavern), and the settlement, but generally not a précis of the case. The Insolvency Petitions record the petitioner (and sometimes his occupation), a schedule of his property, his creditors and debt owed, and a statement of the means by which he became insolvent; most of the forms were printed and sold by Thomas S. Manning. The Miscellaneous Records are mostly simple docket transcripts for capias (arrest warrant) cases or certifications of appeals filed in the Court of Common Pleas, and contain little content about the parties involved or their suits. There are just a few folders with more extensive testimonial evidence, including one involving the officers of the Brotherly Union Society of the County of Philadelphia, a mutual aid organization that was formed in 1823 by group of free black men. Many of the folders hold printed forms titled bear the signature of Philadelphia alderman John Binns., John A. McAllister was an antiquarian collector living in Philadelphia.
Creator
McAllister, John A. (John Allister), 1822-1896, collector
According to the caption, the lithograph shows the manner in which subjects were brought to court in the country governed by the Demboa. (Today, Demboa is part of the state of Borno in northeast Nigeria.) The man being led to court wears a forked branch around his neck. The forked end is secured by a rod; the bailiff holds the other end. (The branch is like those commonly used in the African slave-trade, and frequently featured in depictions thereof.) Additionally, the man's hands are held together by a frame-like, rectangular, wooden (?) restraint. While he wears only a plain white loin-cloth, the bailiff is clothed in colorful, patterned fabrics., Plate 13 in Jean-Baptiste Douville's Voyage au Congo et dans l'intérieur de l'Afrique equinoxiale: fait dans les années 1828, 1829 et 1830 (A Paris: Chez Jules Renouard, libraire, rue de Tournon, n. 6; Imprimé chez Paul Renouard, rue Garencière, n. 5, 1832)., Caption underneath the image reads: "Maniere de citer un sujet à comparaître devant le souverain, dans le pays gouvernés par les Demboa.", Fels Afro-Americana Image Project, Africa: Images, Maps, and Geography.
Creator
Daussi, lithographer
Date
1832
Location
Library Company of Philadelphia | Books & Other Texts | Rare *U Afri Douv 10079.O plate 13, https://digital.librarycompany.org/islandora/object/Islandora%3A2898
An allegorical figure representing Justice hovers over the figure of Britannia, who is seated on a throne with a slave kneeling and praying at her feet. Although the slave wears shackles around his wrists and ankles, it is unclear whether his chains have been broken or remain intact. Behind him, a mother and child gesture toward Britannia. Ostensible subject of the engraving is Britain's renounciation of slavery. It accompanies the following lines in Montgomery's poem: "Britannia, -- she who scathed the crest of Spain, / And won the trident sceptre of the main, / When to the raging wind, and ravening tide, / She gave the huge Armada's scatter'd pride, / Smit by the thunder-wielding hand that hurl'd / Her vengeance round the wave-encircled world; / -- She shared the gain, the glory, and the guilt, / By her were Slavery's island-altar's built, / And fed with human victims; -- till the cries / Of blood, demanding vengeance from the skies, / Pierced her proud heart, too long in vain assail'd; / But justice in one glorious hour prevail'd : / Straight from her limbs the tyrant's garb she tore, / Spotted with pestilence,and thick with gore; / O'er her own head with noble fury broke / The grinding fetters, and the galling yoke, / Then plunged them in th' abysses of the sea, / And cried to weeping Africa -- 'Be free!' (p. 19-20), Plate in James Montgomery's Abolition of the Slave Trade: A Poem, in Four Parts (London: Printed by T. Bensley, for R. Bower, the proprietor, 1814), p. 18., Fels Afro-Americana Image Project, Anti-Slavery Imagery.
Creator
Worthington, William Henry, ca. 1795-ca. 1839, engraver
Date
Dec. 1, 1809
Location
Library Company of Philadelphia | Books & Other Texts | Rare *Am 1814 Mon 13197.Q p 18, https://digital.librarycompany.org/islandora/object/Islandora%3A2720
A man smokes and sits with his leg on a table. A wine glass and a tankard are on the table. "Three-balls" is slang for a pawnbroker., Text: Go on, go on, with your sporting and spending, / You'll last as long as your uncle is lending; / Two chances to one, like his three-ball sign, / Your end will be at the end of a line., Provenance: McAllister, John A. (John Allister), 1822-1896, collector.
