Rawleigh William Downman (1762–1838)
In 1790 Bushrod Washington wrote to Rawleigh William Downman regarding the former's debts.
Rawleigh William Downman was born on 10 March 1762 in West Ham, Essex, England. He would settle in Lancaster County, Virginia, and acquire large tracts of land. Downman also served in the Virginia House of Delegates from 1795 to 1796. Following the War of 1812, he wrote to President James Madison, seeking redress for eleven of his slaves which British forces had carried off in December 1814.
Horace Edwin Hayden, Virginia Genealogies: A Genealogy of the Glassell Family of Scotland and Virginia (Wilkes-Barre, PA: 1891), 102.
"To James Madison from Rawleigh W. Downman, [ca. 1 August 1815]," Founders Online, National Archives, https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Madison/03-09-02-0491. [Original source: The Papers of James Madison, Presidential Series, vol. 9, 19 February 1815–12 October 1815, ed. Angela Kreider, J. C. A. Stagg, Mary Parke Johnson, and Anne Mandeville Colony. Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press, 2018, pp. 502–504.]
A Guide to the Letter to Rawleigh W. Downman, 1790, Albert and Shirley Small Special Collections Library, University of Virginia, Charlottesville (Archival Resources of the Virginias).
Richmond Enquirer, 10 January 1839, page 3, column 5 (Newspapers.com).
Richmond Enquirer, 16 April 1839, page 1, column 1 (Newspapers.com).
Rawleigh William Downman in Virginia Wills and Probate Records, 1652–1900 (Ancestry.com).
Rawleigh William Downman at Early Colonial Settlers of Southern Maryland and Virginia's Northern Neck Counties.
Rawleigh William Downman at House History.
Rawleigh William Downman at FamilySearch.