James Bowie, free man of color

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INVENTORY OF THE ESTATE OF JAMES BOWIE, FREE MAN OF COLOR - 1832

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Note: This document has significant bleed-through damage and some parts are illegible as a result:

 

 

 


State of Louisiana }
Parish of Catahoula}	
Be it known to all whom it may concern know you that I Samuel Lightner 
Judge of the Parish of Catahoula aforesaid Did on this twelfth day of October 
in the year of our Lord one thousand Eight hundred and thirty two repair to 
the late Plantation of James Bowie deceased a Free man of Colour when and 
where I took an Inventory of said deceased to be appraised the property of the 
said deceased as follows              

640 Acres of Land in the Bushley five hundred dollars	     500.00
50 ditto ditto of the A[illegible] Tract fifty dollars        50.00
One Negro Man named Charlie   six hundred dollars	         600.00
One Negro Man named Thomas  six hundred dollars		      	 600.00
One Negro Woman named Salina four hundred fifty dolls	     450.00
350 head of Cattle fourteen hundred dollars		        	1400.00
150 ditto Hogs three hundred dollars			             300.00
13 ditto Horses four hundred & fifty five dollars	         455.00
One Note  [illegible] for Sixty dollars with		          60.00
ten per cent Interest there abouts after date
One ditto ditto for Seven dollars twenty five cents	      	   7.25
One note or [illegible] in the Hands of Robert Fristo and
Isaac Bowden payable to B. King for Seventy Eight
dollars fifty six and one fourth			   			      78.56 1/4

One note on James Doss for seven dollars		      	       7.00

One Improvement for water rights fifty dollars		     	  50.00

							                       __________________
 
						        	                        4557.81 1/4

 

Using calculations provided by the Inflation Calculation website, the estate of James Bowie, free man of color would translate into a little over $1,000,000 (1 million dollars) in buying power today.

 

When he died sometime before the date of this document (October 12, 1832), James Bowie, free man of color left a wife and seven young children. He was probably in his mid to late thirties at the time of his death. The cause of his death may never be known. There were periodic cholera epidemics, dysentery outbreaks and many other diseases that are all but unknown in the today's United States but greatly contributed to the short life spans in the early years of the 19th century.

 

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