Mar.6, 1837, Acts 61st G.A., 2nd sitting, p.337-338.
WHEREAS Severn Martin, a coloured man, of the township of Mansfield, in the county of Burlington, was formerly claimed by William Christian, of Northampton county, in the state of Virginia, as his slave Sam, and that the said William Christian, by his attorney in fact, Michael Donahower, of the county of Philadelphia, on the eighteenth day of August, eighteen hundred and thirty-six, manumitted the said slave--AND WHEREAS the said Severn Martin purchased from Israel Biddle and Sarah his wife, by deed duly executed, bearing date the twenty-sixth day of March, eighteen hundred and thirty-five, and in said deed, by mistake of the scrivener, he is called Seborn Martin, and recorded in book O 3 of deeds, page 76, &c., in the clerk's office in the county of Burlington, at Mount Holly, a certain lot of land in the said township of Mansfield, on which he has built a comfortable dwellinghouse, where he now resides--AND WHEREAS the said Severn Martin having by petition prayed that the said conveyance may be confirmed, and that he may be declared by law entitled to all the rights and privileges of a free coloured man of this state, and it being reasonable that the prayer of the said petition should be granted--Therefore,
Sec. 1. BE IT ENACTED by the Council and General Assembly of this state, and it is hereby enacted by the authority of the same, That the deed of conveyance from Israel Biddle amd Sarah his wife to Severn Martin, a coloured man, in the township of Mansfield, in the county of Burlington, for a lot of land in said township of Mansfield, containing one acre and six-hundredths of an acrem dated the eighteenth day of March, eighteen hundred and thirty-five, and recorded in book O 3 of deeds, page 76, &c., in the clerk's office of the county of Burlington, at Mount Holly, be deemed, taken, and considered as valid, effectual, and operative as if the said Severn Martin had been born free, or had been previous to the time of the execution and delivery of said deed duly and regularly manumitted according to law.
Sec. 2. And be it enacted, That the said Severn Martin be, and he is hereby declared to be entitled to all the rights, privileges, and immunities of a free coloured man of this state, may hold estates, real and personal, in his own right, and convey and dispose of the same by deed, will, or otherwise.
Passed March 6, 1837.