Petition of Rose the mulatto daughter of Mary Davis of the province of Maryland now a servant of Mr. Henry Darnall of the County aforesaid. Hereby showeth that your petitioner being a Baptized mulatto descended by the mother of Christian race as appears from the evidence of her said mother on the other said handscribed the original whereafter she is ready to provide as well as other testimonies if need be to confirm the same and being arrived to the age of thirty one years the 11 August 1715 at in time she supposes the servitude imposed in such unhappy issue expires. She therefore humbly prays the benefit by Law allowed to those in her unhappy circumstances and that she may accordingly receive a free manumission from the said servitude which hanscribed evidence mentioned in the petition follows in the words vizt

Rose Davis was born to an indentured servant white woman and a Black man. Slave law claimed that children inherited the status of their mother, a law which enabled enslavers to control the reproductive functions of their enslaved women laborers. However, as race increasingly became a marker of slavery, even the children of free white women could be vulnerable to enslavement. Rose had been working as an indentured servant when she petitioned the court for her freedom. Instead, she was sentenced to a lifetime of slavery.