Enslaved People Named: None
On March ?17?, 1863, in Bryan County, Miss Eliza C. Clay appeared before a justice of the Bryan County Inferior Court to request exemption from military conscription for her plantation overseer, George B. Cooper. She stated that she, Miss Anne Clay, Miss Em??? J. Clay, Robert H. Clay and Thomas C. Clay all owned a Bryan County plantation on which there were 130 or 140 “negro slaves.” She claimed that there was no white male adult on the plantation capable of managing it except the overseer George B. Cooper, who had been employed prior to April 16, 1862. She said they had made a diligent search and could not find anyone else to do it who was not subject to conscription. Her nephew, Thomas C. Clay, was absent serving in the C.S.A.; Robert H. Clay was a minor under conscription age and not able to take charge of the plantation. The plantation had been settled about 30-40 years earlier, and the “said negro slaves have not been placed on said farm from any other farm or plantation.” Eliza said she was speaking as the representative for herself and as the executrix of the estate of Thomas S. Clay.
L.S. Quarterman and R.M. Demere also appeared before Justice John P. Maxwell to swear that they were well acquainted with Eliza C. Clay, her sister-in-law and nieces and nephew and knew them to be “persons of undoubted veracity.” They supported her statement.
Recorded in Bryan County Superior Court on November 12, 1863.
Bryan County, Georgia, Deeds & Mortgages, v. H-J 1853-1874, Book I (1860-1869), page 147-8; digitized microfilm accessed through catalog, FamilySearch.org (https://www.familysearch.org/ark:/61903/3:1:3Q9M-CSLZ-1972-8 : 8 May 2025), image 392-3 of 715; microfilm #008188937, citing original records of Bryan County Superior Court.