Russellville, Ky May 1^st 1861.
To His Excellency
Hon. Beriah Magoffin
Governer of Kentucky:
Dear Sir:

Sometime in August 1858, John M^cClean, a citizen of the County of Logan became involved in a personal encounter with another citizen of Said County, named John Borran in which said M^cClean inflicted several wounds on the person of Said Borran, with a common pocket Knife. At the ensuing term of the Logan Circuit Court thereafter an indictment was returned against said M^cClean for stabbing with intent to Kill. The Cause was continued by the Commonwealth until the January term 1861 of the Logan Equity and Criminal Court, when by Consent of Court and Commonwealths Attorney, a trial was waived and the defendant confessed judgment & an assault and battery and his fine was assessed at fifty dollars —

The facts in the case, it is exceedingly doubtful if a trial had been regulary gone through with, would not even have warranted a conviction of an assault and battery. The testimony I know was conflicting as to who struck first, but M^cClean is an exceedingly poor man, and under advice of his counsel, to save the expense of a trial in the way of attorney fees &c, consented to a judgment assessing a fine against him for fifty dollars as before stated. A capias has issued against him on said judgment. He is an exceedingly poor man with a wife nearly blind and a large family of helpless children. He is a painter by trade and owing to the great financial and political troubles, he is not able to obtain work enough to support comfortably his helpless family. Had times had remained difficult he would honestly have paid the fine, but he now finds it next to an impossibility to do so. Though

[...] he humbly beseeches your Excellency to interfere and release him from his liability by reason of such fine. If payment is exacted imprisonment will be almost necessarily the consequences & his family be deprived of the aid & sustenance they now receive from the little work he is unable to obtain & now do. He is a man advanced in years, nearly sixty-years of age, of good family and an interposition on the part of your excellency would meet with the approbation of the citizens of the Community in which he resides.

Yours Very respectfully
A G. Rhea

Logan Eq. Ct

Remitted
B. M

Iss^dMay 3. 61

Jno. M^cClean