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To Col. Samuel Thomas, Assistant Commissioner of the Freedmen's Bureau in the State of Mississippi.
The petition of Samuel Marley
Your petitioner respectfully states he is a Citizen of the State of Mississippi, residing in Warren County, and is over Seventy years of age. He never took any part in the War, as his advanced age would very clearly indicate, nor was either of his sons ever in the army.

Your petitioner owns a portion of lot no. 194 in Square N.29 in Vicksburg fronting on the East side of Washington Street, twenty four feet and six inches beginning 49 feet and 2 inches South of Grove Street, as will be seen by a note from Hon. L.S. Houghton late Probate Judge of said County and custodian of the records thereof to C.T.A. Montross Asst. Spcl. Agt. of the Treasury Department filed herewith as part hereof. Your petitioner further states that at the time of the surrender of Vicksburg, said lot was vacant and wholly unimproved- He resides in the Country about twenty miles from town- and has the lot as an investment of money - not intruding or expecting to ever actually occupy it. After the surrender of Vicksburg your petitioner is informed and believes his said lot was taken as abandoned property - tho it was in fact no more abandoned there than it already had been - and some one has leased it as he [[?]] from the agent of the Treasury Department and erected a cheap wooden house upon it - and is now occupying it as shoe makers' shops.
Your petitioner has taken the amnesty oath [[presented?]] in the proclamation of President Johnson of the 29th of May 1865 - which he is advised and believes entitles him to a restoration of all of his property, except [[along?]] , and of course to the possession of said lot, whether it could rightfully be regarded as abandoned property or not - And he therefore respectfully prays that it may be [[?]] up to him
Samuel Marley by
J.A. Marshalls Atty.