American Historical Ephemera & Photography

1p, 8 x 10 in. (toning, creasing at folds, chipping at edge lines). Top third showing payment due from "Commissary's Department Northwestern Army / The United States & Governor Scott / To the Agent of Ky Penetentiary [sic]" for "123 Axes Handled and Ground" and "25 Canteens" followed by notation in separate hand indicating  receipt of payment for the full amount due. Signed "Samuel J. M. Major / Agent Kenty Penit." Lexington [Kentucky], 24 September 1812. Witnessed by John Bryant. Verso docketed with "Agent Ky. Penatentiary [sic] / Rect. 24th Septr. 1812 / No.34." 

Completed ca 1799, the original Kentucky State Penitentiary in Frankfort was the first prison built west of the Alleghenies. Under provisions of a revised penal code which was designed to reform criminals, repay the public for the cost of prosecution, and deter future crimes, prisoners in the penitentiary were utilized to provide goods and services to the community. An 1817 report describing activities of the prisoners at the penitentiary indicates that convicts were engaged in nail manufacturing, stonecutting, shoemaking, chairmaking, and blacksmithing, among other trades. The receipt offered here seems to indicate that the labor of the convicts was being utilized to provide goods and services to the US Army as well. Later, the Kentucky Penitentiary would hold prisoners detained during the War of 1812.