Early Governors' Papers

His Excellency Joseph M^cMinn Governor of the State of Tennessee

The undersigner your petitioners show to your Excellency that on the 27^th Inst. at the hon^l [Grant?] and for the county of Anderson held at Clinton before the hon^l Thomas Emmerson on of the Judges of law and Equity in & for the [?] aforesaid cannon to be tried a certain Jonathan Coban, who being tied by & at said Court was evicted of hte sum of murder, for which crime he was sentenced by said court to be punished with death - Your petitioners state further to your Excellency that altho said convict was found [?] of murder by a [judge?] of his country & choice that still he is as they believe a fit subject for Executive clemency - It seems from the testimony that the decesased was under an arrest by state warrant for an assault & Battery and in custody of hte [?] offence when said officer commander said Coban the convict to take charge of him until he said officer should return and then went away that while the said officer was absent the prisoner made an attempt to escape when said Coban called to him at least thru [sic] several times to halt said deceased still [unending?] his [face?] to make his escape and had advanced about thirty or forty years when said Coban (with a rifle gun