The pull of his late mother's still undistributed legacy, and the uncollected debt owed jointly by his two former gentlemen-planter employers, took Joseph Hanks out of Hampshire County and back to his native Richmond County late in 1782. There can be no question that he spent several months-at minimum from December, 1782 through April, 1783, living in precisely the same neighborhood as before. This is known with certainty from the following records:
1)The county court's account of "The Estate of Catherine Hanks, In Acco't with Joseph hanks adm'r" contains a subscript dated December 23, 1782. The subscript is addressed "to the worshipfull Justices of Richmond County," and is signed by William Miskell, Griffin Fauntleroy, and John Davis-three of the four men who had been appointed to divide the estate. They certified that they had questioned Joseph Hanks, the estate's administrator, under oath, and examined the accounts and papers produced by him relative to estate's disposition. They indicated they were satisfied that the proceeds from the sale of Katherine Hanks' items of personal estate, together with a few coins found in her house-a total of about 74 pounds-which monies had been "in the hands of Joseph Hanks, administrator," were now "equally divided as appears to us among the several claimers thereto particularly mentioned." This statement strongly implies that Joseph Hanks was in Richmond County in or a little before December, 1782.
2)The year 1781 had seen the death of one of Joseph Hanks' close neighbors in North Farnham Parish for many years, yeoman planter George Davis. Not long afterwards, Davis' widow also died. Since one of Davis' sons was under age, the county court required that John DAvis, the elder son and estate executor, keep written accounts of the income and expenses of the estate until the younger son, also named George, was of age. These account records reveal that during April of 1783, Joseph Hanks purchased unspecified items from the estate, for ten shillings. There is also in the compiled accounts "An account of Sales of the late George Davis' Estate which was not divided-made on the 12 Nov'r 1782 & the 8th & 17th January 1783." The account lists, in semi-alphabetical order, sixty Richmond County individuals, many of them neighbors, who made purchases from the estate on the three cited dates in November of 1782 and January of 1783. The last name on the list under the "H's" is that of Joseph Hanks: he purchased "1 Raw hide" for the price of ten shillings on one of those dates.
3)The most convincing proof that Joseph Hanks, son of Katherine Hanks, and the father of Lucey Hanks, was back in Richmond County during the winter and spring of 1782-83 is found in the county court records of the session held April 8, 1783. The case: Archibald Ritchie, plaintiff, vs Thomas Hanks, defendant. The order book's minutes of case testimony are worthy of extensive quotation:
"Upon an attachment abtained by the Plaintiff against the Defendant's Estate, he [Thomas Hanks] having privately removed himself out of this County, or so absconds that the ordinary process of Law cannot be served upon him-This day came the plaintiff by his attorney, and Charles McCarty, under-Sheriff having made return that by Virtue of said attachment to him directed, he had attached [it] in the hands of Joseph Hanks; and Summoned him to appear as a Garnishee; and the said Garnishee, [Joseph Hanks] being sworn, saith that he hath in his hands the Defend'ts [his brother Thomas Hanks'] proportion of his mother Catherine Hanks' Estate, and no more. Whereupon, it appearing to the Court that the Defendant is Indebted to the Plaintiff the Sum of Ten pounds Fifteen Shillings and five pence Curr't money with lawfull Interest thereon to be Computed from the Thirtyeth day of November 1770 till the time of payment. Tis Considered by the Court that the plaintiff recover the same against the said Defendant, Together with his Costs by him in this behalf Expended, and ordered the said Garnishee [Joseph Hanks] pay to the plaintiff [Archibald Ritchie, merchant-creditor] his Debt and Costs aforesaid, if Sufficient in his hands, and return the Overplex (if any) to the Defend't [Thomas Hanks] on his order."
In other words, when he had returned to Richmond County late in 1782, Joseph Hanks had retained, with the permission of those appointed by the court, both his own share of his mother's inheritance (2 shillings, 3 and 1/4 pence in coin specie; and 10 pounds, 9 shillings, and 5 and 1/4 pence in paper money), and his absent brother's share (an equal amount) as well. But wealthy, influential Rappahannock valley merchant Archibald Ritcie (who appears in the well-konw 1773-74 Journal and Letters of Philip Vickers Fitian) had found out about the legacy, since one of the men appointed by the court to equitably divide it amond the heirs, William Miskell, was one of his agents. The old debt from 1770 was discovered, and Ritchie-the same tight-fisted Scotsman who had foreclosed two decades earlier on Joseph Hanks' father-in-law William Lee-now decided to move against Thomas Hanks, who had married another daughter of the olde slave-killer Lee. The merchant of Hobbs Hole on the Rappahannock had legally humiliated a second generation of the Lee-Hanks clan.