Erith, James Thomas

His Excellency General, The Right Honorable Lord
Charles Somerset, Governor of the Cape of Good Hope, &c &c &c
May it please your Excellency,
The Memorial of James Thomas Erith humbly
Sheweth,
That notwithstanding Your Excellency was pleased
on the fourth of October to reply to His Memorial of the 30th of
August, and therein stated that Your Excellency had sent up
to the Judicial Commissariat (Mr Hayward) for His report
thereon, But not receiving any further Information,
has obliged Memorialist to again trouble Your Excellency
on the subject. As the delay of a final answer to the Contents
of that Memorial continues to add to the sufferings of Him self and
Family, and He is therefore Induced from urgent motives to
again take the liberty of reminding your Excellency that two more Posts
has now elapsed
Had the present distressed Circumstances of Memorialist
Family originated in His own Misconduct, or by the Hand of
Providence, He would have felt the remorse consequently
attending the former or have bowed with Submission to the
latter. But when Oppression has been the Precursor
of all His misfortunes, and that by the very Authorities
who ought to have protected Him _ He cannot help remarking
to Your Excellency, that the feelings with which He now looks
round on His Family are most Acute. (particularly at
the present moment) when He is obliged to appeal to a Private
Fund for their Daily Sustenance, and altho at the Seat of Government
(if it had not been for that Fund) the consequences must
have been serious, and while the Colonial Government at the same

same Moment are so considerably in Arrears with
Memorialist, both as it respects Money and Cattle.
Memorialist therefore cannot forbear
Submission to Your Excellency, cannot forbear
remarking on the Injustice and Severity with which
He has been treated (particularly after His Honor
the Chief Justice had granted Memorialist pemission
to bring His case into Publick Court) But His
Majestys Fiscal declining to commence proceedings
against those Authorities (whence all the treatment
He complained of originated) By charging Your
Excellency with deciding thereon previous to it
being brought their As also His declining to Administer
an Oath to an Affidavit which Memorialist
wished to take _ On the Subject of MrRivers
Inhumanity _
Memorilist therefore entreats Your
Excellency will be pleased to order Him immediatly
to receive a compensation for His Cattle, in such a way
as Your Excellency may deem most equitable, as
also the Diagram of His Land and the Items
from the Commissariat _
and Memorialist
will ever Pray
Jame Thomas Erith
No 39 Long Street
October 27th 1824
Cape Town