Jefferson's Daughters
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Wormley prepared the beds TJ to ACR, 16 February 1808, Betts and Bear, Family Letters, 328.
Jefferson’s “own eye” EWRC to Henry Randall, n.d., Randall, Jefferson, 3:347.
delight over the rich colors Ibid.
CHAPTER 9: AN ENLIGHTENED HOUSEHOLD
dismay of many a guest Margaret Bayard Smith, “The Haven of Domestic Life,” in Visitors to Monticello, ed. Merrill D. Peterson (Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 1989), 48.
move their family from Edgehill Kierner, Martha Jefferson Randolph, 146–47.
impossibly narrow staircase The stairs are only twenty-five inches wide.
“Septimia pitied her self” Virginia Jefferson Randolph to Jane Hollins Nicholas Randolph, 18 February 1816. FLDA.
an architectural flaw McLaughlin, Jefferson and Monticello, 5–7.
a “very self-centered” William L. Beiswanger, Monticello in Measured Drawings (Charlottesville: Thomas Jefferson Memorial Foundation, 1998).
precedents of seventeenth-century Rome Patricia Waddy, Seventeenth-Century Roman Palaces: Use and the Art of the Plan (Cambridge, Mass.: The MIT Press, 1990), 25, 28, 30.
his expectations that Maria TJ to Catherine Church, 11 January 1798, PTJDE.
“great advocate of light and air” TJ quoted by Colonel Isaac A. Coles to General John Hartwell Cocke, 23 February 1816, Acc. 640, ViU.
“seem never to leave her” Bayard Smith, “Haven of Domestic Life,” 48.
“has never been a subject” TJ to Nathaniel Burwell, 14 March 1818, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC.
had been translated Trouille, Sexual Politics in the Enlightenment, 238.
transformational impact of education Suellen Diaconoff, Through the Reading Glass: Women, Books, and Sex in the French Enlightenment (Albany: State University of New York Press, 2005), 99, 98.
“gave the mother” Spencer, French Women and the Age of Enlightenment, 92.
Martha’s reading suggestions TJ to Burwell, 14 March 1818, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC.
Martha assigned the works of Molière Ibid.
Her emphasis on classical learning Primary sources included: Tully (Cicero)’s Offices (in English); LaGrange’s translation of Seneca; Dryden’s Virgil; Pope’s Iliad & Odyssey; Titus Livey (in English); Sallust [histories] [trans] by Thomas Gordon [in English]; Plutarch’s Lives; Tacitus by [Arthur] Murphy; Seutonious’s [Lives of the Poets], trans. by [Alexander] Thomson. TJ to Burwell, 14 March 1818, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC.
“my heart would swell” EWR to Nicholas P. Trist, Monticello, 22 December 1823, FLDA.
an “ancient Italian” MJR to TJ, 25 March 1787, 27 May 1787, and 8 March 1787, in Betts and Bear, Family Letters, 33, 42, 32. Interestingly, TJ had told TMR not to bother learning Italian if he already mastered Spanish and French, even as he was admonishing Martha not to give up on her ancient Italian Titus Livy. TJ to TMR, 6 July 1787, PTJDE.
“all the other luxuries” TJ to John Brazier, 24 August 1819, in Ford, Works 10:1423. Ellen also recalled that he frequently said the same to her in their conversations at Poplar Forest.
Abigail Adams complained Winterer, Mirror of Antiquity, 20.
when she wanted something MJR to Virginia Jefferson Randolph, Monticello, 10 January 1822, FLDA.
Anne was translating ACR to TJ, 26 February 1802. She was translating Marcus Junianus Justinus, De historiis Philippicis et totius Mundi originibus. Betts and Bear, Family Letters, 217.
“poured over volumes” EWR to MJR, Poplar Forest, 18 July 1819, FLDA.
“between a glass” EWR to MJR, 11 August 1819, FLDA.
“the precious time” Mary J. Randolph to Virginia J. Randolph (Trist), 31 January 1822, FLDA.
Jefferson sent his nephew TJ to Peter Carr, 19 August 1785, PTJDE.
Two years later TJ to Peter Carr, 10 August 1787, PTJDE.
And when his grandsons MJR to TJ, 16 April 1802. “Jefferson is reading latin with his Papa but I am seriously uneasy at his not going to school.” Betts and Bear, Family Letters, 222.
“with aunt and cousins” TJ to John Wayles Eppes, 1 June 1815. Copy at ICJS.
“advance the arts” TJ, “Report to the Commissioners,” 4 August 1818, in Roy J. Honeywell, The Educational Work of Thomas Jefferson (NY: Russell and Russell, 1964), 250.
“resort to professions” TJ to Thomas Mann Randolph, Monticello, 30 July 1821, Jefferson Papers, LOC.
“load him on his departure” TJ to EWE, 31 October 1790, PTJDE.
ask the occasional question EWRC to Randall, 1856, in Randall, Jefferson, 3:342.
“the elegant and agreeable” TMR to ACR, 1788. Quoted in Jan Lewis, The Pursuit of Happiness: Family and Values in Jefferson’s Virginia (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1983), 150.
“perhaps one of the best” Eliza House Trist to Catherine Bache, 22 August 1814, FLDA.
Martha’s program for her daughters Martha Laurens Ramsay’s sons read the New Testament in Greek, but she confined her daughter’s language training to French. Winterer, Mirror of Antiquity, 70; Kerrison, Claiming the Pen, passim.
The 1820s was a crucial Kelley, Learning to Stand & Speak, 28. See also Mary Kelley, “Female Academies and Seminaries and Print Culture,” in A History of the Book in America, vol. 2, An Extensive Republic: Print, Culture, and Society in the New Nation 1790–1840, eds. Robert A. Gross and Mary Kelley (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2010), 336–38. Thomas Woody’s survey of seminaries shows Latin, Greek, and French appearing in female seminaries but in an even later period, 1830–1871. Thomas Woody, A History of Women’s Education in the United States (1929; repr., New York: Octagon Books, 1980), Appendix.
“your own notes” Mary J. Randolph to EWRC, 10 November 1825, FLDA.
These pursuits Susan M. Stabile, Memory’s Daughters: The Material Culture of Remembrance in Eighteenth-Century America (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2004), treats the significance of the ways in which women preserve the historical memory of their families in eighteenth-century Pennsylvania.
“is believed to have received” EWRC to MJR, 19 August 1828, FLDA.
His continued efforts Kierner, Martha Jefferson Randolph, 144, 162, 192.
“mind would sink” EWR to MJR, 28 January 1818, FLDA.
writer Judith Sargent Murray Judith Sargent Murray, “On the Equality of the Sexes,” Massachusetts Magazine, or, Monthly Museum of Knowledge and Rational Entertainment (March 1790): 132–35.
“with a head full of something” Eliza Southgate to Moses Porter, May 1801, in Root of Bitterness: Documents of the Social History of American Women, eds. Nancy F. Cott, Jeanne Boydston, Ann Braude, Lori D. Ginzberg, and Molly Ladd-Taylor, 2nd ed. (Boston: Northeastern University Press, 1996), 100.
“Ancient history was acceptable” Winterer, Mirror of Antiquity, 14–15.
Genlis parted company with Trouille, Sexual Politics in the Enlightenment, 243.
For Genlis, all reading Diaconoff, Through the Reading Glass, 99, 98.
needed to work to earn Trouille, Sexual Politics in the Enlightenment, 245.
But this approach Clarissa Campbell Orr, “Aristocratic Feminism, the Learned Governess, and the Republic of Letters,” in Knott and Taylor, Women, Gender, and the Enlightenment, 319.
some American women nonetheless Kerber, Women of the Republic and Zagarri, Revolutionary Backlash.
Anne Willing Bingham’s gatherings Branson, Those Fiery Frenchified Dames, 133–41.
Federalist women Daniel Kilbride, “Cultivation, Conservatism, and the Early National Gentry: the Manigault Family and their Circle,” Journal of the Early Republic 19 (1999): 221–56. Alice Izard, a New Yorker married to South Carolina’s Ralph Izard, and her daughter, Margaret Izard Manigault, were two examples of this.
But the salons survived Catherine Allgor, Parlor Politics: In Which the Ladies of Washington Help Build a City and a Government (Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 2000). Martha herself would make use of her connections to secure a pla
ce in the Navy for her son George Wythe, but that did not denote a sense of political participation.
“It is curious indeed” Quoted in Trouille, Sexual Politics in the Enlightenment, 245.
“Mrs. Randolph was just like” Pierson, Jefferson at Monticello, 87.
“fairy palace” VJR to Nicholas P. Trist, 5 June 1823, FLDA.
“to cultivate the good” MJR to Septimia Randolph, 30 July 1832, Acc. 4726b, ViU.
“preferred a thousand times” Quoted in Trouille, Sexual Politics in the Enlightenment, 245.
“She is our sun” VJRT to Nicholas P. Trist, 12 July 1832, Acc. 2104, SHC.
“education and the influence” EWR to MJR, 28 July 1819, FLDA.
designed to convey messages Robert F. Dalzell, Jr., “Constructing Independence: Monticello, Mount Vernon, and the Men Who Built Them,” Eighteenth-Century Studies: Special Issue: Thomas Jefferson, 1743–1993: An Anniversary Collection 26 (Summer 1993): 554; Leslie Kanes Weisman, Discrimination by Design: A Feminist Critique of the Man-Made Environment (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1992), 86.
scattered all over the house Elizabeth V. Chew, “Inhabiting the Great Man’s House: Women and Space at Monticello,” in Structures and Subjectivities: Attending to Early Modern Women, eds. Adele F. Seeff and Joan Hartman (Newark: University of Delaware Press, 2007), 223–52.
It was Jefferson’s intention Hugh Howard pointed out that Jefferson the architect “knew intuitively that nowhere in his life had he a better chance at achieving order than in architecture.” Howard, Thomas Jefferson, Architect, 20.
“gendered spaces separate” Daphne Spain, Gendered Spaces (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1992), 3, 15–16.
“one of the most troublesome” VJRT to EWRC, 3 September 1825, FLDA.
“carried the keys” Mary Jefferson Randolph and VJRT to EWRC, 11 September 1825, FLDA.
“books lying covered” Cornelia Jefferson Randolph (CJR) to EWRC, 24 November 1825, FLDA.
to change places Spain, Gendered Spaces, 16.
A retreat Jefferson built S. Allen Chambers, Poplar Forest and Thomas Jefferson (Little Compton, R.I.: Fort Church Publishers, 1993).
This was a house TJ to MJR, 31 August 1817, in Betts and Bear, Family Letters, 419.
“the pleasure of passing” MJR to TJ, 31 January 1801, Betts and Bear, Family Letters, 193.
“Our cold dinner” VJRT to Nicholas P. Trist, quoted in Randall, Jefferson, 3:344.
Ellen managed to persuade EWR to MJR, 14 April 1818, FLDA.
list of taxable items 1815 Bedford County, Northern District: Personal Property Tax books, in Virginia State Library, Reel 37. I am grateful to Gail Pond for allowing me access to Poplar Forest research notes.
“be falling” EWR to MJR, 24 August 1819, FLDA.
“as long as” CJR to VJR, 18 July 1819, FLDA.
“little English dictionary” CJR to VJR, 25 October 1815, FLDA. The work was probably Willich’s Domestic Encyclopedia with Maese’s Additions. I am indebted to Gail Pond, Poplar Forest, for sharing her notes on the Poplar Forest library with me.
When Jefferson sold Hayes, Road to Monticello, 556.
cheaper, smaller, and easier Kerrison, Claiming the Pen, 61.
“cheerful and uneventful” EWRC to Henry Randall, in Randall, Jefferson, 3:343.
“interested himself” Ibid.
She roamed nostalgically EWR to MJR, 18 July 1819, FLDA.
four times the leisure EWR to MJR, 24 August 1819, FLDA.
“are the severest students” TJ to MJR, 31 August 1817, in Betts and Bear, Family Letters, 419.
“her highly polished” Isaac Briggs, “A Cordial Reunion in 1820,” in Peterson, Visitors to Monticello, 92.
“Bonaparte might die” EWR to VJR, 9 January 1820, FLDA.
Jefferson had chosen Malone, Jefferson, 6:399.
“more and more pleased” CJR to EWRC, 3 August 1825, FLDA.
“no very great acquisition” Mary Jefferson Randolph to EWRC, 16 April 1826, FLDA.
“as we become” CJR to EWRC, 3 August 1825, FLDA.
Jefferson intended Jennings L. Wagoner, Jr., “ ‘That Knowledge most useful to us’: Thomas Jefferson’s Concept of ‘Utility’ in the Education of Republican Citizens.” Curry School of Education, UVA. (Prepared for the conference “TJ and the Education of a Citizen in the American Republic,” Library of Congress, 13–15 May 1993, 36–37.) Copy at ICJS.
he did excuse Malone, Jefferson, 6:465.
“the effect of” Mary Jefferson Randolph to EWRC, 6 June 1826, FLDA.
“it is forbidden” Mary Jefferson Randolph to EWRC, 23 October 1825, FLDA.
A grand dinner Eliza House Trist to Sarah M. Thompson, 1 December 1824, Acc. 5385-ac, ViU.
“golden November day” Jane Blair Cary Smith, “Carysbrook Memoir,” n.d., Acc. 1378, ViU.
CHAPTER 10: DEPARTURE
the stone cottage TJ Insurance plat, 1796, in FB, 6; McLaughlin, Jefferson and Monticello, 158–59, believed the house was built in 1770, but current estimates are 1776–1778. My thanks to Lucia Stanton for the correction.
building had been reconfigured TJ to John George Baxter, 16 July 1815, Farm Book, 490.
“spinning girls” FB, 135.
Madison Hemings recalled Hemings, “Memoirs,” 248.
“the boys make nails” FB, 77.
deviated significantly Jefferson apparently did not keep regular records in his FB during these years, resuming in 1815, so it is possible that Harriet began work there before that year. However, I follow Madison Hemings’s testimony that his siblings generally started work at age fourteen.
Beverley, Sally’s eldest child FB, 128; “roll of Negroes. 1810. Feb. in Albemarle.”
When they were young boys TJ to Yancey, 13 September 1816, PTJDE; TJ to Francis Eppes, April [6, 1825], in Betts, Garden Book, 616.
Sally’s sons learned Gordon-Reed, Controversy, 52; FB, 77, 152. TJ’s notations on page 152 are undated but lie in pages between those dated 1814 and 1816; Hemings, “Memoirs,” 248.
spent time with their father Gordon-Reed, Hemingses, 617–18.
“essay in architecture” TJ to Benjamin Latrobe, 10 October 1809, PTJDE.
“had but little taste” Hemings, “Memoirs,” 247.
“it was his mechanics” Susan Kern, “The Material World of the Jeffersons at Shadwell,” William and Mary Quarterly 62 (2005): 24.
between six and seven thousand TJ to Philip Mazzei, 29 December 1813, PTJDE.
proudly reduced his own reliance TJ to William Thornton, 14 January 1812, in Farm Book, 469.
“The embargo has set” ACR to TJ, 18 March 1808, in Betts and Bear, Family Letters, 334.
Jefferson boasted TJ to Philip Mazzei, 29 December 1813, PTJDE.
looked to Philadelphia TJ to James Ronaldson, 13 October 1808, in Farm Book, 466; Philip Scranton, Proprietary Capitalism: The Textile Manufacture at Philadelphia, 1800–1885 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1983), 75–134.
His own daughter’s household TJ to Charles Willson Peale, 8 May 1816, in Farm Book, 492.
Jefferson gave his instructions TJ to Jeremiah Goodman, 5 March 1813, Farm Book, 483.
“2000 yards of linen” TJ to Thaddeus Kosciuszko, 28 June 1812, Farm Book, 478.
Jefferson set up a factory TJ to William Thornton, 9 June 1814, Farm Book, 486; ibid., 465; TJ to Philip Mazzei, 29 December 1813, in PTJDE.
each inventor eagerly assuring See Farm Book, 469–78.
“antient Jenny” TJ to William Thornton, 9 June 1814, Farm Book, 486.
By March 1814 TJ to William Maclure, 16 October 1813, and TJ to “Whoever it concerns,” Farm Book, 484–86.
“a girl younger than herself” TJ to Jeremiah Goodman, 5 March 1813, Farm Book, 483; on Maria and Sally, see FB, 129. I thank Lucia Stanton for the suggestion that Harriet may have been Maria’s teacher. Maria’s twelve-spindle machine was the Barrett, used to spin wool.
Her co-workers were young Jefferson, “Memoirs,
” 250.
Agnes Gillette FB, 128, 152; Stanton, “Free Some Day,” in “Those Who Labor,” 159. See also TJ’s estimates on production in FB, 116, and information on Monticello’s website: monticello.org/site/plantation-and-slavery/mary-hern, accessed 15 July 2013.
Ten-year-old Eliza monticello.org/mulberry-row/work/spinning-and-weaving, accessed 15 July 2013.
“work used to be” Sarah Nicholas Randolph to [H.S. Randall], quoting EWRC, 30 [sic] February 1876, Acc. 1397, ViU.
As early as 1815 TJ to James Maury, 16 June 1815, in Farm Book, 490; Pierson, Jefferson at Monticello, 69.
“we were so bad” Quoted in Stanton, “Free Some Day,” in “Those Who Labor,” 160.
that were primarily female Helen Bradley Foster, “New Raiments of Self”: African American Clothing in the Antebellum South (New York: Berg, 1997).
added to the boisterousness Stanton, “Free Some Day,” in “Those Who Labor,” 160.
relaxed but still very productive Sarah Nicholas Randolph to [H.S. Randall], quoting EWRC, 30 [sic] February 1876, Acc. 1397, ViU.
It is the easiest Interview, Linda Eaton, Head Curator of Textiles, Winterthur Museum, 6 April 2009.
“never did any hard work” Pierson, Jefferson at Monticello, 48, 110.
no evidence that she absented Gordon-Reed, Hemingses, 601.
“I cannot now even” EWR to TJ, 26 February 1808, Betts and Bear, Family Letters, 330.
“cultivate their lands” TJ to Handsome Lake, 3 November 1802, PTJDE.
“a peculiar fact” Fossett, “Once the Slave of Thomas Jefferson.”
whipping of Jame Hubbard TJ to Reuben Perry, 16 April 1812, Farm Book, 34.
“I had him severely flogged” Ibid., 35.
“favorite servant” Stanton, “Free Some Day,” in “Those Who Labor,” 149–50.
“All circumstances convince me” TJ to Reuben Perry, 16 April 1812, in Farm Book, 35.
“there can be great comfort” Gordon-Reed, Hemingses, 603.