by Andrea Wulf
126 “as a token of gratitude”: Waterhouse 1811; Benjamin Waterhouse to JA, 12 March 1811, Ford 1927, pp. 54–55.
127 “at so early a day”: JM to Benjamin Waterhouse, 27 December 1822, DLC.
128 JA and seed exchange: William Cunningham to JA Adams, 27 March 1804, MHS AP reel 403; JA to William Bentley, 8 October 1809, private owner; William Bentley to JA, 1 November 1809, MHS, Misc. Bound Coll., and 11 April 1810, MHS AP reel 409.
129 “they will be an ornament”: JA to William Bentley, 10 November 1811, Sabetta private collection.
130 “J.A. In the 89 year”: JA to TJ, 10 November 1823, Cappon 1987, p. 602.
131 “I can not see the Wood”: JA to TJ, 9 July 1813, Ibid., p. 350.
132 “Whether you or I were right”: JA to TJ, 1 May 1812, Ibid., p. 301.
133 “I walk little”: TJ to JA, 21 January 1812, TJ Papers RS, vol. 4, p. 429.
134 “every fair day”: JA to TJ, 3 February 1812, TJ Papers RS, vol. 4, p. 475.
135 JA’s difficulties writing and reading: JA to Francis Adriaan van der Kemp, 15 December 1809, MHS AP reel 118.
136 “I call for my Leavers”: JA to Benjamin Rush, 27 February 1805, MHS AP reel 118.
137 “for a future race”: TJ to Andrew Ellicott, 24 June 1812, TJ Papers RS, vol. 5, p. 166.
138 “So good night”: TJ to JA, 1 August 1816, Cappon 1987, p. 485.
9 “BALANCE OF NATURE”: JAMES MADISON AT MONTPELIER
1 party at Montpelier: The following description is based on Mary Cutts’s account of a party in summer 1817, to which I have added other visitors’ accounts from different years—nothing is invented, but the party is a composite of several parties that happened over the years in Montpelier. (Cutts 1817; DM to Anna Payne Cutts, 5 July 1816, DMDE; Margaret Bayard Smith, Hunt 1906, pp. 81–83, 233–37.)
2 DM an “Amazon” and JM a “puny” knight: Abraham Joseph Hasbrouck to Severyn Bruyn, 29 January 1814, DMDE.
3 “a withered little apple-John”: Washington Irving to Henry Brevoort, 13 January 1811, Hellman 1915, p. 24.
4 DM’s “turban”: Anne Mercer Slaughter, 1825, Slaughter 1937, p. 35.
5 JM old-fashioned clothes: Henry D. Gilpin to Joshua Gilpin, 16 September 1827, Gray 1968, p. 470; Paul Jennings, Jennings 1983, p. 51.
6 “overflowing kindness”: Margaret Bayard Smith, Hunt 1906, p. 233.
7 JM reserved and relaxed: Baron de Montlezun, 16 September 1816, Moffatt and Carriere 1945, p. 199; James K. Paulding, Ketcham 1959, p. 432.
8 “little blue eyes sparkled”: Margaret Bayard Smith to Mrs Boyd, 17 August 1828, Hunt 1906, p. 236.
9 “fond of a frolic” and following quotes: Margaret Bayard Smith to Mrs. Boyd, 17 August 1828, Hunt 1906, p. 236; see also Cutts 1817.
10 “I do not”: Anne Mercer Slaughter, 1825, Slaughter 1937, p. 35; John H. B. Latrobe to Charles Carrol Harper, August 1832, Semmes 1917, p. 240.
11 “ever blooming roses”: Cutts 1817; for other plants see also Anne Mercer Slaughter, 1825, Slaughter 1937, p. 35; DM to Mary Estelle Elizabeth Cutts, 16 September 1831, DMDE.
12 “contrasting shades of color” and following quote: Baron de Montlezun, 16 September 1816, Moffatt and Carriere 1945, p. 198.
13 visitors commenting on forest: Baron de Montlezun, 16 September 1816, Moffatt and Carriere 1945, p. 198; Judith Page Walker Rives, 1820s, Autobiography of Mrs. William Cabell Rives, 1861, DLC; Henry D. Gilpin to Joshua Gilpin, 16 September 1827, Gray 1968, p. 469; Margaret Bayard Smith, Hunt 1906, pp. 233–37; George Shattuck to Dr. G. C. Shattuck, 24 January 1835, MHS George Shattuck Papers; Letters of a Convalescent, October 1839, Peter Force Scrapbook, ViU.
14 trees at Montpelier: Cutts 1817; Margaret Bayard Smith, Hunt 1906, p. 233.
15 JM and Corrèa de Serra: José Corrèa de Serra to JM, 12 February 1819, JM Papers RS, vol. 1, p. 414.
16 “ornamental trees”: Margaret Bayard Smith, Hunt 1906, p. 233.
17 tulip poplar “twins”: Cutts 1817.
18 vegetables and fruits in horseshoe-shaped garden: in general, Cutts 1817; Scott 1907; Judith Page Walker Rives, 1820s, Autobiography of Mrs. William Cabell Rives, 1861, DLC; for cucumber 7 April 1791, JM, Meteorological Journal of James Madison at his plantation 1789–1793, APS; for pineapples, Margaret Bayard Smith, Hunt 1906, p. 81; for seeds from Algiers, James Leander Cathcart to JM, 25 June 1804, JM Papers SS, vol. 7, p. 371; for giant beetroot, Joel Barlow to DM, 21 December 1811, DMDE.
19 “a paradise of roses”: Cutts 1817.
20 “Hudson bay strawberry”: George Divers to JM, 11 October 1819, JM Papers RS, vol. 1, p. 531.
21 JM and Latin names: Peter Minor to JM, 12 January 1822, DLC.
22 JM and Botanic Garden in Madrid: Mariano la-Gasco y Segura to JM, in Richard S. Hackley to JM, 23 May 1819, JM Papers RS, vol. 1, p. 462. Later JM would also receive seeds from the Jardin du Roi in Paris. (Eyrien Frères & Cie to JM, 2 April 1821, DLC; see also José Corrèa de Serra to JM, 12 February 1819, JM Papers RS, vol. 1, p. 414.)
23 “more united at home”: Albert Gallatin, 17 July 1817, JM Papers RS, vol. 1, p. 91.
24 $9 million surplus: JM, Eighth Annual Address, 3 December 1816.
25 “Never did a government commence”: James Monroe, First Inaugural Address, 4 March 1817.
26 “has acquired more glory”: JA to TJ, 2 February 1817, Cappon 1987, p. 508.
27 population more than doubled: North 1966, p. 75.
28 number of post offices: Cunningham 1996, p. 24.
29 “schools, roads and canals”: TJ to Alexander von Humboldt, 13 June 1817, de Terra 1959, p. 795.
30 “I am not afraid”: TJ to Robert Fulton, 17 March 1810, TJ Papers RS, vol. 2, p. 301.
31 “render our country the garden”: TJ to Joshua Gilpin, 15 March 1810, TJ Papers RS, vol. 2, p. 296.
32 JM invested $500: Robert Patton to JM, 17 March 1818, JM Papers RS, vol. 1, p. 238. JM had bought five shares worth $500 in March 1815.
33 JM supports John Stevens: JM to John Stevens, 17 November 1818, JM Papers RS, vol. 1, p. 380.
34 “playful as a child”: James K. Paulding, Ketcham 1959, p. 435.
35 “If ever man rejoiced”: Ibid.
36 “patched at the knees”: D. N. Logan, 22 November 1824, quoted in Ketcham 1990, p. 621.
37 JM at Montpelier: Cutts 1817; “Madison’s Servant. Uncle Ben Stewart talks about his Master and Mistress,” in Decatur Republican, 14 June 1888.
38 “like Adam and eve”: Eliza Collins Lee to DM, 30 March 1819, DMDE.
39 “on your return to your books”: TJ to JM, 15 April 1817, JM Papers RS, vol. 1, p. 28.
40 “He has no particular Business”: William Thornton to JM, 18 June 1817, JM Papers RS, vol. 1, p. 67.
41 “few visit our country without”: Margaret Bayard Smith, Hunt 1906, p. 235; another visitor noted that Madison was “keeping tavern here.” (Richard Rush to Charles J. Ingersoll, 9 October 1816, Ketcham 1990, p. 608.)
42 Montpelier a great place for parties: DM to Anna Payne Cutts, 5 July 1816, DMDE.
43 “cheering smile”: Margaret Bayard Smith, Hunt 1906, p. 81; see also Cutts 1817.
44 alterations to house: Mark and Maul 2008 (unpublished manuscript, Archaeology Department, Montpelier); Hyland 2007; Ketcham 2009, pp. 4–9; Green and Miller 2007; see also TJ to JM, 19 April 1809, TJ Papers RS, vol. 1, p. 155; Dinsmore to JM throughout 1809, JM Papers PS, vol. 1.
45 new garden at Montpelier: Reeves 2009 (online report), Reeves 2008 (unpublished manuscript, Archaeology Department, Montpelier). Archaeologists used the examination of stratigraphy, ceramics, nails, mortar, brick rubble, as well as other artifacts to date different elements in the garden.
46 “and when those he contemplates”: Anna Thornton, September 1802, quoted in Green and Miller 2007, p. 8. Thornton presented the watercolor to Madison in February 1803. (Green and Miller 2007, p. 37.)
47 work on the rear lawn: In spring 1809, Hugh Chisolm began the underpinning of the mansion and replaced
several layers of brick—archaeological evidence shows that this brick rubble was used to level the lawn at the back. The clay used to fill the dips was from the basement excavations and from the hill. The work was finished by 1810. (Reeves 2009 [online report], pp. 9–10, 14–16; Reeves, Tinkham and Marshall 2009 [online report], chaps. 2, 4, 6.)
48 “his vision is too imperfect”: James Monroe to JM, 25 July 1810, JM Papers PS, vol. 2, p. 437.
49 Bizet at Montpelier: Bizet remained for several years at Montpelier, but there might have been some problems. In 1813 a friend from Richmond apologized to Madison for talking to Bizet about possible employment. “I understood that his Service with you would soon expire,” he wrote to Madison, “I shall not receive him until he brings me a certificate, that you have no further claims upon him.” At the end of October 1817, Madison wrote that “Bizet has indicated a disposition to remain with us,” but by 1822 Bizet was listed in the Washington Directory as “gardener to president.” He remained James Monroe’s gardener at the White House until 1825 when John Quincy Adams became president. (James Monroe to JM, 25 July 1810, JM Papers PS, vol. 2, p. 437; Cutts 1817; George Hay to JM, 28 September 1813, DLC; JM to Richard Cutts, 12 October 1817, JM Papers RS, vol. 1, pp. 139–40; Delano 1822, p. 18; Joseph Elgar to JQA, 30 July 1825, NA Record Group 42.)
50 “blowing a rock”: James Monroe to JM, 25 July 1810, JM Papers PS, vol. 2, p. 437; JM’s letter to Monroe asking about Bizet is privately owned, dated 16 July 1810.
51 Archibald Blair: He had worked for John Hartwell Cooke in 1817; Archibald Blair to John Hartwell Cooke, 20 August 1825, ViU; JM to James Maury, 24 March 1823, DLC. For Scottish gardeners: even Joseph Banks, the nominal director of Kew Gardens in London, preferred Scottish gardeners and plant hunters for their “habits of industry attention & Frugality.” (Banks to George Harrison, 1 September 1814, Chambers 2007, vol. 6, pp. 141–42.)
52 “wonderful march of national prosperity”: James Preston to JM, 28 February 1817, Brant 1941–61, vol. 6, p. 419.
53 “a statue of Liberty”: Cutts 1817. The temple was part of the new landscape design and built in 1810–11; see Dinsmore and Nielson’s account with JM, 28 September 1811, JM Papers PS, vol. 3, p. 472.
54 blacksmith workshop: Reeves 2009 (online report), p. 5. Next to the temple archaeologists found slag, iron artifacts, nails and horseshoes, spreading out across an area of two acres.
55 lack of shrubberies: None of the visitor accounts mentions flowering shrubs but only trees.
56 “I would advise that”: and following quotes, William Thornton to TJ, 27 May 1817, DLC.
57 slave village: An 1837 insurance policy (taken out by Dolley Madison) included a map that depicted the exact location of the slave quarters. We know that the floors were raised because of the brick foundation of the chimney as well as the lack of burned soil in the chimney area (which indicates that the hearth was in a crib); the amount and type of nails used suggest a substantial frame building, and the large amount of window glass found in the ground indicates that the windows were glazed. Archaeologists also discovered door hardware and the insurance policy of 1837 described the dwellings as “of wood covered with shingles.” At the same time, the existence of an insurance indicates that the dwellings were regarded as being valuable enough to be insured. Large amounts of the Madisons’ Davenport china was found around the location of the slave village—by contrast, so far not a single shard was discovered near the field cabins. Archaeologists found a surprisingly small amount of trash in the slave village. Matthew Reeves (Director of Archaeology at Montpelier) concludes that this indicates constant sweeping of the yard. Final analysis of this village will only be possible by mid-2014, when the slave quarter excavations at Montpelier and their comparative study will be completed. Reeves 2008 (unpublished manuscript, Archaeology Department, Montpelier); Reeves 2010 (conference paper); Trickett 2009a (online report). The 1924 copy of the 1837 Montpelier Insurance Map is reprinted in Trickett 2009a (online report), p. 12.
58 “Granny Milly” and following quote: Cutts 1817.
59 “an object of interest” and following quote: Ibid.
60 “besides bad habit”: GW to William Pearce, December 1793, Conway 1889, p. 23.
61 detached kitchen: Archaeological digs have revealed the exact location of the kitchen (corresponding with the map in the 1837 insurance policy), the position of the lattice screen (also to be seen on an 1818 watercolor by Baroness Hyde de Neuville) and the exact line of the pine allée. Marshall 2009 (online report). The rows of trees were also described in visitor accounts: Cutts 1817; John H. B. Latrobe to Charles Carrol Harper, August 1832, Semmes 1917, p. 239.
62 JM and slavery: McCoy 1989, pp. 260–86.
63 “stain” and “blot”: JM to Lafayette, 1821, DLC.
64 visitors writing about slave cabins: For example, Louis-Philippe 1797, pp. 31–32; Julian Ursin Niemcewicz 1798 in Lee 2006, pp. 77–79; Sir Augustus John Foster, 1807, Davis 1954, pp. 141–42.
65 “whipped all day”: JM on his slaves as recounted by Harriet Martineau, Martineau 1838, vol. 1, p. 193.
66 “beyond comparison”: JM to Robert Walsh Jr., 2 March 1819, JM Papers RS, vol. 1, p. 428; JM told Harriet Martineau the same in 1835, Martineau 1838, vol. 1, p. 192.
67 slave rebellion in Haiti: Matthewson 1995, p. 238; Matthewson 1996, p. 23.
68 “It is high time we”: TJ to James Monroe, 14 July 1793, TJ Papers, vol. 26, p. 503.
69 changing demographics in Virginia: McCoy 1989, p. 272.
70 “increases far faster”: JM on slave population as recounted by Harriet Martineau, Martineau 1838, vol. 1, p. 191.
71 “dammed up in a land of slaves”: Spencer Roane to James Monroe, 16 February 1820, quoted in McCoy 1989, p. 273.
72 revolts in Virginia: Matthewson 1995, p. 238; Matthewson 1996, pp. 22–25.
73 “total revolution of property”: Price 1797, p. 3.
74 “a real credit” and following quote: Kent 1775, p. 238.
75 “great agricultural merits”: JM to Isaac Coffin, 1 October 1819, JM Papers RS, vol. 1, p. 519. Madison sent wild turkeys from Montpelier to Thomas Coke and enjoyed reading the pamphlet Holkham: Its Agriculture (1819). (Richard Rush to JM, 8 September 1819, JM Papers RS, vol. 1, p. 519; JM to Richard Rush, 12 August 1820, DLC.)
76 Coke’s model cottages: Wade Martins 1980, p. 212.
77 British model villages: Some model villages were created for paternalistic reasons; others on purely aesthetic grounds. Whole villages were razed and rebuilt elsewhere to make space for landscape gardens. Early model villages in Britain were Nuneham Courtenay for the Earl of Harcourt in Oxfordshire, Harewood for the Earl of Harewood in Yorkshire, Milton Abbas for Lord Milton in Dorset and Lowther in Westmorland for Sir James Lowther in the 1760s, as well as the picturesque village of Blaise Hamlet in Somerset for the Quaker banker John Scandrett Harford in 1809. Not only landowners built model villages—in 1770 potter Josiah Wedgwood built the village Etruria for his workmen in Staffordshire.
78 pattern for model cottages: Kent 1775; Gandy 1805; Wood 1781; Soane 1793; Pocock 1807; Middleton 1795; Dickson 1805, vol. 1.; Plaw 1800; Miller 1787; Communications of the Board of Agriculture, vol. 1, 1797; Arthur Young’s Annals of Agriculture.
79 Communications of the Board of Agriculture: For GW: Griffin 1897, p. 91; for TJ: John Sinclair to TJ, 15 July 1797, TJ Papers, vol. 29, p. 480, John Sinclair to TJ, 6 June 1800 (in this letter Sinclair also mentions that he sent the publication to JA, TJ Papers, vol. 32, p. 14); for JM: in 1819 after Richard Rush, the American Minister in London had given Sinclair a copy of Madison’s Address to the Agricultural Society of Albemarle, Madison wrote to Rush “I owe perhaps an apology for not doing it myself; having being favored with several marks of that sort of an attention from him”—he also referred to other pamphlets that Sinclair had sent in his Address, JM, Notes on Agriculture, ante 12 May 1818; JM to Richard Rush, 10 May 1819, JM Papers RS, vol. 1, pp. 256, 453. Several other publication
s refer to the Communications as the reason to publish patterns of cottages such as Gandy 1805, p. 3; Dickson 1805, vol. 1, p. 77; Plaw 1800.
80 JM receiving books: GW to JM, 10 January 1794, JM Papers, vol. 15, p. 175; GW to JM, 6 December 1795, JM Papers, vol. 16, p. 140.
81 suggested design of cottages: Communications of the Board of Agriculture, vol. 1, 1797, pp. 115–16. The only aspect that JM changed was to make his cottages bigger. For construction details of the slave village at Montpelier, see Reeves 2008 (unpublished manuscript, Archaeology Department, Montpelier).
82 slave housing West Indies: Chapman 1991; Higman 2001, p. 244.
83 “sober, industrious, and healthy” and following quote: John Townsend in Communications of the Board of Agriculture, vol. 1, 1797, p. 106.
84 size of Montpelier: Not much work has been done on the exact acreage of Madison’s plantation. Thomas C. Chapman, research coordinator at Montpelier, estimates the size of the plantation at the beginning of Madison’s retirement around 3,000 acres or a little more. See also Miller 1985 (unpublished manuscript held at Montpelier Foundation).
85 field cabins at Montpelier: Reeves and Barton 2009 (online report).
86 “I would buy a maid”: DM to Anna Payne Cutts, 23 July 1818, DMDE.
87 JM and slaves at Montpelier: Ketcham 2009, p. 45.
88 “true course’ ”: JM to Edward Coles, 3 September 1819, JM Papers RS, vol. 1, p. 505.
89 slaves to be settled in a New African country:” Madison wrote extensively about this; see for example JM to Robert Evans, 15 June 1819, JM Papers RS, vol. 1, p. 469, and also JM’s letters to Robert Walsh Jr. in JM Papers RS, vol. 1; McCoy 1989, p. 281.
90 “regarded every where as a nuisance”: JM to Lafayette, 1821, DLC.
91 “dilute the evil”: TJ to Lafayette, 26 December 1820, McCoy 1989, p. 270.
92 TJ and mixing slave blood: TJ to John Lynch, 21 January 1811, TJ Papers RS, vol. 3, p. 318; Rochefoucauld-Liancourt, June 1796, Stanton 1993, p. 174. This was somehow hypocritical, since Jefferson was most certainly the father of his slave Sally Hemings’s six children. DNA tests in the late twentieth century, together with oral history of the Hemings family and Jefferson’s presence at Monticello at time of conception of all children, confirmed that he was most likely the father. All slaves he freed were members of the Hemings family. (Stanton 2009, pp. 91–92; Gordon-Reed 1997, pp. 59ff. and 210ff.)