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[[preprinted]]
State of North Carolina,
Executive Department,
Raleigh,[[/preprinted]] October 21st,[[preprinted]] 1865. [[/preprinted]]

Col. E. Whittlesy

Colonel.

A paper has been laid before the Governor, showing that a colored boy Wiley Tanner,a free boy before the war, born free, had been released by your order from his obligations to I Inscase under an Indenture from Granville County Court. The Governor instructs me to say that he has never understood your Bureau to have or to claim, control of colored people born free, and that he thinks you have no more power to rescind the Indentures of Colored persons born free bound before the war than you have to release a white bound boy from his Indentures.

Therefore the Governor requests that you reconsider this matter and give it due thought before you proceed further.

I am very respectfully
Your Obdt Servt
Jos. L. Cannon
[[underlined]]Aid de Camp[[/underlined]]