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Sheet of lined paper, with rules in ink, filled out in ink, docketed on verso. 31.5x39.5 cm (12½x15½"), set loose in modern custom-made cloth folder.

Accounting of expenses and bills for John Charles Frémont's Mariposa Estate, rich in gold but steeped in legal controversy, which he acquired (somewhat by mistake through his agent Thomas Oliver Larkin) in 1847. The discovery of gold suddenly made the rancho of great value, and there were legal challenges to his title. The defense of his claim was to reach the U.S. Supreme Court by 1854, where arguments by California lawyer Rufus A. Lockwood prevailed and Frémont's claim was confirmed. For his service Lockwood was allegedly paid the astronomical fee of $100,000 (as a side note, he died in 1857 during a storm while traveling to New York via the Isthmus, having gotten his wife and child into a lifeboat but choosing to go down with the ship rather than risk capsizing the small craft). But challenges to the integrity of the Mariposa Estate continued, and Frémont battled against  encroaching miners, squatters and other claimants, all while running for U.S. President as the first candidate of the Republican Party. The present document has the names of Frémont and Lockwood at the top, as well as Frémont's agent J.E. Clayton, the latter being his mining engineer who also  discovered  three groves of Sequoia of the same class as the Mammoth Trees of Mariposa. This was Rufus Lockwood's final case before his death in November 1857 in the aforementioned tragedy at sea. Expenses include Tools, Powder, Hay, 2 Mules & Waggin, payments to various employees, etc. The docketing on the verso reads "Statement of Act. Rendered before the Bills were all settled. Feby. 1 1857. From Nov. 17 to Jany 17."