104 HEPBURN'S CASE.—3 BLAND.

perty of theirs having been actually confiscated and taken into the
public treasury.

It appears from the various documents and vouchers produced
by the petitioner himself, that the Mollisons were English mer-
chants resident in London, engaged very extensively in trade to
this country; that they had, in Maryland, a store at Georgetown,
another at Bladensburg, a third at Pamunky, in Charles County, a
fourth at Pig Point, and a fifth at Huntingtown, in Calvert County;
that they received from various persons in Maryland large consign-
ments of tobacco; and amongst others, that this debt now claimed
originated in that way: that their trade was continued to about the
year 1775; that they had debts due to them, from debtors dispersed
over the whole of the then settled portion of the Western Shore of
Maryland, to the amount of about £17.000 sterling; about £1,5,000
of which is represented to have been due from persons who were
solvent at or alter the peace: ami that Samuel C. Hepburn. the
executor of the late creditor, at the time, and for many years after,
resided in Prince George's County, about mid-way between those
* several stores; and, as it would seem, in the midst of the
124 Maryland debtors of the Mollisons.

But it has been urged, that this creditor Samuel C. Hepburn had .
no knowledge of the fact, that any portion of the property of the
Mollisons had been confiscated and taken into the treasury. The
records of the treasury must certainly shew what has been at any
time past, received into it from every source as well as from the
ordinary one of taxation: they arc public and open to the inspec-
tion and use of every one at all interested in any fund, that may
have been carried into it. And it is a well known historical fact,
that the system of the Revolutionary confiscation laws, from the
time of the passage of the first of them, and for many years alter,
agitated, interested and engaged the attention of the people of
Maryland more intensely than any other set of laws, that ever
were passed by their representatives. With regard to the Molli-sons in particular it appears, in addition to what has been already
stated, that a large amount of their property, which had been con-
fiscated, was publicly advertised for sale, and sold at auction on
the 20th of of October, 1783, and the proceeds paid into the trea-
sury; out of which one of their creditors, it appears, was ordered
by the Legislature to be satisfied, on the ground of its being then,
1805, shewn, that there were at that time no debts due to them.
Resol. 1805, No. 20.

From all these circumstances, it is but fair to presume, and I
cannot withhold my belief of the fact, that Samuel C. Hepburn
did know, or might, by any reasonable degree of diligence have
informed himself, of an amount of those debts of the Mollisons
abundantly sufficient to satisfy his claim. But apart from those
funds; and if he actually did not know of any of them, and after