Letter from Thomas Jefferson, Washington, D.C., to Rufus King, 1802 July 13 : autograph manuscript signed.

Writing of revolts by enslaved people in the West Indies and a recent revolt in Virginia (most likely, the Easter Plot of 1802); writing that the execution of many of the participants "could not but excite sensibility in the public mind, and beget a regret that the laws had not provided, for such cases, some alternative combining more mildness with equal efficacy"; saying the Virginia legislature has considered the matter and communicated to Jefferson "their wish that some place could be provided, out of the limits of the US. to which slaves guilty of insurgency might be transported; and they have particularly looked to Africa as offering the most desirable receptacle"; asking King to make overtures to individuals connected to the Sierra Leone Company, in the hopes that the company would agree to accept Black Americans in the colony of Sierra Leone; describing how he envisions making this plan financially feasible, namely by requiring enslaved people to work as indentured servants in Sierra Leone against the cost of their transport; writing that the Virginia legislature is also considering the consequences of expanded emanicipation and he and they believe "we should be free to expatriate this description of people [i.e. formerly enslaved individuals] also to the colony of Sierra Leone"; expressing his confidence in King as Minister and asking him to do everything to further cordial relations between the United States and Britain.