Cable Address, Vellashta
2—Court Street, Boston, Mass.
March 10th, 188—
Winfred Jerrolds, Esq.,
Cf., Coutts Bros.,
Cairo, Egypt.
Dear Sir:
Pursuant to our letters to you of six weeks ago, we had our Mr. James go to the North Carolina plantation to investigate and report on the property. He was almost at once approached with offers to buy the property on terms which surprised him. He communicated with us and we took the responsibility of sending one of our best mining experts to look over the ground. We found that Pittsburg men had been making heavy purchases of land a few miles west across the range and had also been buying tracts adjacent to your lands both north and south; they had also had a party of engineers all over your lands under the guise of a fishing party.
The expert, Mr. Minton, reported that he found heavy outcroppings of coal on both sides of the valley, of excellent steaming quality. The veins apparently extend through your lands into the higher lands north and south of yours. West of you but a few miles these Pittsburg people have acquired large bodies of iron ore. But the most important fact of all is that the valley is the most practical route for a railroad across the range west of you, from the coast to the iron lands already mentioned, for many miles in either direction.
We have been negotiating for three weeks with these Pittsburg people and they have finally made us an offer which we enclose. Briefly, it amounts to $300,000 in five per cent. mortgage bonds, $250,000 in stock (this of problematic value) and a royalty of ten cents per ton on all coal mined on your lands, with an agreement to mine at least 50,000 tons annually until your coal measures are practically exhausted.