THORNTON MITCHELL Thornton Mitchell joined the staff of the Department of Archives and History in 1961. He served as State Archivist from 1973 until his retirement in 1981. Mitchell was responsible for pursuing the State of North Carolina v. B.C. West Jr. replevin case.

North Carolina v. B. C. West Jr.: Modern Replevin Precedent

n May 1974, archivist Paul Hoffman learned of an upcoming New York auction scheduled to include a 1790 letter from George Washington to the governor and council of state of North Carolina. With confirmation that the letter was still available, the state began negotiating for its return. According to Thornton W. Mitchell, then state archivist, "there were no modern precedents supporting the civil recovery or replevin of public records in case law." Nevertheless, the Attorney General's Office recommended that recovery of the letter be pursued.

Separately, in June 1974 the State Archives discovered a major theft of state documents. In hopes of locating some of the stolen records, staff members began scrutinizing catalogs offering manuscripts for sale. In January 1975 archivist George Stevenson noticed two items—indictments signed in 1767 and 1768 respectively by William Hooper, later a signer of the Declaration of Independence—for sale by B. C. West Jr., an autograph dealer in Elizabeth City. Although the two items West offered for sale were not casualties of the 1974 theft, they were, nevertheless, bona fide public records that had fallen out of the state's custody. Assisting in what had become a division-wide effort to seek the return of the eighteenth-century indictments, Colonial Records Project editor William S. Price Jr. investigated the historical background of the common law in relation to public records. Robert J. Cain, colonial records researcher stationed in London, procured copies of British Records related to replevin—the legal process of recovering goods or chattels claimed to be wrongfully taken or detained—of documents.

In a strategic move not fully appreciated at the time, Mitchell decided to pursue the Hooper indictments through litigation. Many believed that if the state lost the West case, then surely it would fail to reclaim the prized Washington letter. Furthermore, Mitchell set himself up as the main antagonist in the matter. It was possible that the case could drag on for years, and he knew that his career had peaked. Thus he was willing to put his professional reputation on the line, knowing that if he succeeded, then the State Archives (if not all state archives) would benefit, and if not, he would retire in 1981 in hopes of minimizing the negative impact on the agency.

North Carolina v. B. C. West Jr. was heard for two days in the Pasquotank County Court. At the close, Judge John Webb ruled that while the law favored the state, his decision would uphold the position of the defendant because of the age of the documents and the lack of information as to when and how they left the state's custody. The state appealed and won the case the following year. West appealed that decision to the North Carolina Supreme Court, which in June 1977 in a five-to-two decision upheld the ruling of the court of appeals. The state's progress in the matter of the 1790 Washington letter in New York wavered, but once the West case was decided, the competing claims for ownership of the letter were concluded promptly in an out-of-court agreement. Thornton Mitchell flew to New York in July 1977 to escort the letter personally. Mitchell enjoyed the one great irony of the replevin matters of the late 1970s. Who alerted Paul Hoffman to the rare personally handwritten Washington letter that initiated the events? It was none other than B. C. West Jr.

Ansley Herring Wegner
Research Branch

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