[1846 Letter from New Orleans by Asheville, North Carolina Merchant James Washington Patton discussing Family Financial Affairs and a Federal Lawsuit]

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James W. Patton (1803–1861), writes from New Orleans, Louisiana to his sister in Clarkesville, Georgia. He discusses family estate and financial matters. These involve “the estate of our dear Dec’d Brother,” and an “agent at Mobile.” Also discussed is Patton’s brother-in-law, Virginia-born physician Dr. George D. Phillips. Patton had advised Phillips about the purchase of a tract of land, a debt for which was now “in suit in the Federal Court of this City.”

Other family members mentioned include a brother, Thomas Patton (c1809–?), Andrew Patton, and various members of the Erwin/Irwin family. James Patton describes his brother as “evidently not in his rational mind” and reports on his erratic behavior:

He came from Mobile with Dr. Phillips & seemed to be shady, & if he was going to conduct himself so, asked that he would go with us home. The 2nd day after Dr. Phillips left he began to indulge in drinking, & the first thing I learned of him, he had taken passage, on a Ship for Havanna, in company with an acquaintance he made here, hiring a white Servant sending Abram his black man [slave] to Nashville to take his horses & buggy home.

James W. Patton was the son of Irish immigrant James Patton (1756–1845) and Hannah Reynolds Patton (c.1775–1827) of Wilkes County, North Carolina. Patton Sr. later settled the family in Buncombe County where he helped establish the town of Asheville and where his son became a prominent merchant. Patton Avenue is named after the son who also inherited the Eagle Hotel, one of the first hotels in Asheville, [etc.]¹

Price: $100.00