The end of James and Robert Donald & Co

Have been tying up loose ends for my talk on Wednesday - did a practice run of the slides yesterday in the room the talk is in and they looked great, so if all else fails, I can just show some pretty pictures - well, pictures of Donalds past. Also did a dry run to the stink bugs at home - they made their feelings quite clear, but what do they know? Slightly worryingly I have stopped my war against them and now we tolerate each other fairly happily. I draw the line at them being on the bed or on the portrait of Thomas Jefferson which stares down at me. Show a bit of respect.

Down in UVA library again this morning - I can get from my desk at Kenwood to putting a microfilm on the machine in less than 20 minutes, which is good going. Today I wanted to try and clear up the James and Robert Donald Loyalist claims once and for all just in case I am asked a question tomorrow.

In 1809 - and I admit that all the partners were dead - the commission to look into the debts says that all seems to be in order "they adjudge the claim to be good" - they had paid out some money in 1806 and they were happy to pay another £10,000 - they had £600,000 in total to give out from 1802 onwards. Says at the end:

"Reserving what remains of the case for further investigation"


Fair enough. And next to them Colin Dunlop and sons gets some money too.

Then it all goes horribly wrong. And it was all thanks to Robert Donald - not Provost Robert Donald, but his brother in law, and first cousin for that matter, Robert Donald Jnr of Petersburgh (about 30 minutes south of Richmond) - son of Robert Donald Snr of Greenock. The chap who I thought had gone over to the other side. Now rather wish he had.

Breaking news in the commission:
There was another claim going on in the case of Robert Main and Robert looks like Burns, surviving partners of John Hyndman and Co - and they had made a big claim against - you guessed it, Robert Donad, Jnr. So the commission starts to sniff around:

Ordered that the fact lately discovered by the Board and which happens never to have been stated on the part of the claimants be recorded as material in this case on the subject of the large debt of Robert Donald, Virg. that he is the same Robert Donald who was a residing partner in the house in Virginia of James and Robert Donald and Co of Glasgow, who are claimants to a very large amount before the board...


Ah, but your honour - he was only a small partner - with only 3 shares out of the 48. Same as our Alexander. Surely we can just let this one slip? Apparently not. The board have smelt blood and are starting to dig around. You would have thought with all these Robert Donalds, he might have got away with it. Their agent spills the beans - this Robert Donald acted as a factor or collector for James and Robert Donald "before and during the war and after the peace."

He is stated in their books as a defaulter or debtors for his collections to the amount of upwards of £7,000 - that he was also indebted to the house of Gibson Donaldson and Hamilton to a large amount upwards of £1,500 ... his debts to Archibald and John Hamilton and Robert Gray and Co of Norfolk have been already alluded to - that he was engaged in various speculations and concerns in trade, under the firm of Donald and Hunter as well as Donald Fraser & Co and McAlister & Co for whose debts as his own the bonds claimed on in this case were given - 


And that besides those large debts it appears from the extract produced of Mr Wickham's letter of the 2 June 1807 that he was indebted (probably to a considerable amount) to Fraser & Co of London and from other claims before the board that he owed small debts such as sufficiently indicated his real situation in short that he left off in debt to every partnership or house he dealt with - 

The commission then seem to get very shirty that nobody had quite stressed these minor facts as being of any significance when the Donalds were submitting their claim for past debts. They think otherwise and suggest quite a few other people knew all this but didn't tell them. They then get silly about the fact that they had paid out money and the fact he misled them about the land he owned - all minor details that would take two minutes to clear up I am sure.

Surely they must have had better things to do - like go and catch real criminals - but no, they go on for page after page. Thomas Mann Randolph is then dragged down to this silly level - he was married to Jefferson's daughter Martha, and I think was Jefferson's cousin, so really no need to be involving him. Martha is the one who ended up living at Tufton.

Goes on for pages and pages and quite hard to read, so need to go through later but have to get home now for a book launch - but then the prosecution - or persecution if you ask me - then produce a letter from Robert Donald dated 28 April 1783 - totally inadmissible if you ask me - about how he was buying up land with any money that came in.

From the above it would appear not only that the said Robert Donald as a collecting partner felt no interest in endeavouring to avoid payments of the company debts in paper money ...

They then bang on about his speculations - and have a slightly harsh conclusion - which obviously ends all claims the Donalds had upon the commission:

That if on winding up the affairs of the partnership of James and Robert Donald and Co a balance had been acknowledged and made out as a distinct debt against him, little if anything could ever have been recovered. 

Thanks Cousin Robert!