United States of America. To the Sheriff of Knox County, in the Territory South of Ohio... [caption title]

[Knoxville, Tn: George Roulstone, 1794. About very good.. Partially-printed broadside, 6.5 x 8 inches, completed in manuscript, docketed on verso in ink manuscript noting the summons was served. Modest marginal chipping, evenly tanned, old folds. An early and decidedly rare imprint from pre-statehood Tennessee, when it was known as the "Territory south of Ohio." According to the description for the copy at Middle Tennessee State (one of only two known institutional copies), the work was "Probably printed by George Roulstone in Knoxville, who was printer to the territory in at least 1794 and 1795, and printer to the state of Tennessee from 1796 to 1803." The present document was completed in manuscript on June 3, 1794. The clerk, Charles McClung, signed the bottom of the document in ink, "Chas. McClung, Ck." McClung was a surveyor who, among other activities, drew the original plat of Knoxville in 1791. He also served as the first clerk of Knox County.

The present document is a court summons for two men, William Lowry and John Sharrill to appear in a court case between the plaintiff, Colonel Samuel Wear and the defendant, Colonel Matthew Wallace. Colonel Samuel Wear (1753-1817) served in the American Revolution, various Indian wars, and the War of 1812. Colonel Matthew Wallace (ca. 1764-1840) was brother-in-law to Sam Houston, later Tennessee governor and legendary founding father of Texas. One of the two witnesses, William Lowry (1747-1820) was a native of Virginia who settled in Knoxville in 1791; he was appointed a Justice of the Peace by Governor William Blount in 1792, including the newly-formed Blount County in 1795, and to Morganton of Monroe County in 1813. A rare work of early Tennessee territorial printing, not in Evans, Bristol, Shipton & Mooney, Allen, McMurtrie, American Imprints Inventory, or ESTC. OCLC records just two copies, at the aforementioned Middle Tennessee State and also at Yale. A slightly different, re-set, and likely later edition, completed in manuscript in 1795, resides at the University of Tennessee.