The Road to Monticello

by Hayes, Kevin J. ;

  Having established the express post between Richmond and Cape Henry, Jefferson informed Washington that he would be able to send or receive intelligence between Richmond and Cape Henry in twenty-three hours.12 That’s what he said: not one day or within a day but in twenty-three hours. The figure reveals Jefferson’s careful planning and precision, yet such precision would doom him to disappointment. His mathematical calculation of twenty-three hours takes the loyalty and efficiency of the post riders as constants, not variables.

  Events during the next week reinforced his decision to establish a system of express riders. The first Monday in June, twenty-four days after the fact, he learned of the fall of Charleston. That same day—though it is unclear how much time passed before Jefferson heard about it—Congress resolved that the governors of Maryland and Virginia engage trusty persons to forward intelligence to Congress as expeditiously as possible. Congress was unaware that the governor of Virginia had already put a system of forwarding intelligence to Congress into place.

  This Congressional resolution contains a key component that determines whether this system of communicating military intelligence would work: trusty persons. If only one rider along the line is unreliable or duplicitous, then the whole system fails. Aware of the inherent dangers of such a system yet convinced of its potential value and confident that he could find such persons, Jefferson, with characteristic thoroughness, went well beyond what Congress mandated and sought to establish as many lines of rapid communication as possible and necessary.

  Most important, he needed to establish communication between Richmond and the general vicinity of Charleston in order to track the position of the enemy. To head up the operation, he required someone with military knowledge as well as keen powers of judgment. As he told James Wood, “I think the most essential measure is to procure a judicious, sensible officer, not likely to listen to idle tales nor to take alarm at specious dangers.” This officer should be dispatched to the vicinity of the British camp

  with a sufficient number of horsemen to leave one at every 40 miles distance, reserving one to be always with himself at the other end of the line for the purpose of conveying his letters from himself to the horse man at the first post. Let him remain as near the enemy as he can safely and shift his position as they shift theirs, always sending proper instructions to the horsemen to make the necessary changes in their stations in order to streighten the line of communication. Let him through these communicate to you from time to time every important movement of the enemy … If your horsemen are sent on immediately to gain intelligence it should seem that they might obtain and communicate it to you very early, if the enemy should really approach your post.13

  In this letter to Wood, Jefferson did not mention that he knew someone who could fill the role of “judicious, sensible officer.” But he did. The following day he offered the position to an ambitious young man with an eye toward military glory, a twenty-two-year-old Virginian named James Monroe.

  A student at William and Mary when the war broke out, Monroe had left college to become a soldier, participating in the campaigns of 1777 and 1778 and rising from lieutenant to major in the process. After serving the governor as a scout, Monroe would begin studying law with Jefferson. The two developed a friendship that would last a lifetime. Speaking of Monroe many years later, Jefferson characterized him as a man with the capacity “to embrace great views of action” and applauded “his character, his enterprise, firmness, industry, and unceasing vigilance.”14 Clearly, Jefferson had already recognized such qualities in him by 1780.

  James Monroe, engraved by H. B. Hall’s Sons, New York. From Lyon Gardiner Tyler, Encyclopedia of Virginia Biography (1915). (Collection of Kevin J. Hayes)

  Informing Washington of the express lines between Cape Henry and Richmond and also between Richmond and Cross Creek, Jefferson conveyed his plan to establish another line of rapid communication from Richmond to Washington’s headquarters at Morristown, New Jersey. “Perfect and speedy information of what is passing in the South,” Jefferson hoped, would aid Washington’s military decision-making process.15 Jefferson’s words emphasize the value of gathering detailed, up-to-date information for planning and finely adjusting an overall military strategy. Furthermore, he shrewdly foresaw that the course the war took in the South would determine its eventual outcome. Writing to the governors of Maryland and North Carolina the following month, he explained his plans for additional lines of communication. He also informed Congress of his communication schemes. Before the end of June, Congress approved the lines of communication Jefferson had formed and stipulated that they remain open until further notice.

  Had Jefferson been able to find more trusty persons like Monroe, he need not have worried about communication breakdowns, but the typical express riders were scarcely so diligent. Many important messages never made it to the governor or, at least, did not make it there expressly. Even when messages made it through, they could be misinterpreted. Such was the case in Major Galvan’s situation.

  With the arrival of the French fleet, Washington wrote Jefferson to inform him of the fact, but in so doing apparently made no mention of a second French division yet to arrive. Jefferson dispatched an extract of Washington’s letter to Galvan, who interpreted it to mean that his mission at Cape Henry was over. Galvan left for Philadelphia, where his unrequited love for a beautiful widow led him to suicide. Upon leaving Virginia, Galvan disbanded the line of expresses between Richmond and Cape Henry. Consequently, when the second French division arrived, there was no one to herald their arrival and no one there to greet them.

  Belatedly, Jefferson wrote the Chevalier d’Anmours, whom the French appointed Vice-Consul to the State of Virginia, to welcome him and apologize for the unintended neglect. He informed the chevalier that the expresses were being reestablished, starting with this very letter. Jefferson also let him know about the checks he had built into the express system, specifically, his requirement that each rider who receives and delivers a communiqué should inscribe the time on it so that sources of delay can be pinpointed and eliminated. “In this way,” Jefferson assured d’Anmours, “if they do their duty intelligence should pass between us in 24 hours.”16 Compared with his earlier twenty-three-hour pronouncement to Washington, this one is much less certain and incorporates a big “if.” In this letter, Jefferson also let d’Anmours know that along the express line he had established between Richmond and Philadelphia, messages could pass in three days.

  Jefferson’s comments reflect his wishful thinking more than the reality of the situation. The elaborate communication network he put in place was breaking down, and at the worst possible time—just as British forces were beginning to invade Virginia. In the fall of 1780, about halfway through his second term as governor, Jefferson wrote one correspondent, “I begin to apprehend Treachery in some part of our Chain of Expresses.” Thomas Nelson, Jr., now head of the Virginia militia, informed Governor Jefferson the third week of October that British forces had landed. Nelson closed this letter on an ominous note: “I never was in so bad a part of the Country for Intelligence. The Enemy might have secured every pass before I had any Account of their landing. Their numbers I cannot learn, but from their Ships and bringing light Horse with them, I suppose they mean to make their Winter Quarters in this State.”17

  The British arrival, and the failure of intelligence to inform the governor of that fact, reinforced the importance of reestablishing the lines of communication. Jefferson contacted those men responsible for maintaining the lines of express riders and urged them to do their utmost to keep the lines up and running.

  Led by the traitor Benedict Arnold, British forces returned to Virginia at the end of December. Once again, communication failed the governor, who did not learn of their arrival for several days. Summing up the situation, Jefferson concluded, “To want of intelligence may be ascribed a great part, if not the whole of the Enemy’s late successful incursions to this place.” Writing to Governor Jefferson
again, Nelson spoke bluntly, “Our Expresses behave most infamously and in what manner to act with them I know not. Unless some rigorous measures are taken with them we shall have no regularity.”18

  References to the system of express riders in Jefferson’s official correspondence as governor over the next several months, while the British invasion escalated and intensified, form a chronicle of disappointment. One man Jefferson called upon to establish an express route complained that he had no horses, no money to buy horses, and nowhere to get horses. The man to whom Jefferson gave the responsibility for correcting abuses informed him that the evils inherent in the express system had taken such deep root that it was virtually impossible to destroy them. Another of Jefferson’s wartime correspondents reported that one express line was being maintained for about half its length but after that it just petered out, leaving no evidence where either its riders or its horses had gone.

  Jefferson’s efforts to establish efficient express routes were by no means the only official activities occupying him during his tenure as Virginia governor. In terms of his literary life, the story of the express routes may be the most pertinent aspect of Jefferson’s governorship, but his endeavor to establish lines of communication parallel his other endeavors as wartime governor, virtually all of which involved similar frustrations. His strenuous efforts to fill the ranks of the depleted militia, for instance, encountered similar disappointments in terms of manpower, horsepower, and monetary resources.

  The encroachment of British troops forced the governor and the Virginia legislators to flee Richmond for Charlottesville around mid-May. After nearly two terms, Jefferson had had enough of being governor. He was overtired and anxious for another to assume leadership of the state. Given the uncertain state of Virginia and its government, he feared that he might end up serving a third term should the Assembly be unable to meet and choose a replacement. Admittedly unprepared for military command by either education or experience, Jefferson believed a military man, specifically, his old friend Thomas Nelson, Jr., would make a better wartime governor. “The union of the civil and military power in the same hands,” Jefferson asserted, “would greatly facilitate military measures.”19 When the few state legislators who could make it gathered in Charlottesville late that May, Jefferson placed Nelson’s gubernatorial nomination before the Assembly.

  Given the chaotic state of affairs in Virginia, Jefferson’s departure from the office of governor was not a smooth one. As his second term expired the first of June, he considered himself out of office. Since his successor had yet to assume the governorship, Virginia was effectively without an executive. The British did not know that, however. On Saturday, the second, Lord Cornwallis dispatched Colonel Banastre Tarleton and his mounted regiment to surprise Jefferson and the legislators at Charlottesville.

  Captain John Jouett, Jr., a Virginia militiaman, happened to be at the Cuckoo Tavern in Louisa when Tarleton and his men passed by on the main road. Louis Hue Girardin, who heard Jouett’s story from Jefferson himself, related, “It was natural enough for him to suspect the enemy’s destination. Acquainted with every path and bye road in that part of the country, and mounted on a very fleet horse, he hastened to Charlottesville by a disused and shorter route, and made known the approach, of the British several hours before their arrival.”20 Jouett reached Monticello in time to warn Jefferson of the approaching enemy. If Jefferson had had such dedicated men as Captain Jouett for express riders, the British troops might never have come this far.

  To protect his family, Jefferson had already sent them away, remaining at Monticello himself until the last moment. Upon hearing what Jouett had to report, he left Monticello as quickly as possible. Afterward, his political enemies in Virginia decided that he had left his home too hastily and virtually accused Governor Jefferson of both desertion and cowardice—he should have stayed to fight it out with the British cavalry, they claimed. Aware that these accusations were politically motivated and not based on fact, Jefferson found them absurd. He refuted these charges with recourse to literature: the only individual he could think of who would be so foolhardy as to take on British troops single-handedly was not a real person but a fictional character, that renowned knight of La Mancha, Don Quixote. Describing the British forces’ approach to Monticello, Isaac Jefferson keenly observed, “It was an awful sight—seemed like the Day of Judgment was come.”21 Did Jefferson’s political enemies really expect him to stand and fight such a menace when he was equipped with neither “the enchanted arms of the knight, nor even with his helmet of Mambrino”?

  He escaped on Caractacus, a favorite riding horse. The name of the horse reflects its rider’s veneration of ancient British history and his attention to Tacitus, whose Annals remains virtually the only source for information about Caractacus, a preeminent British chieftain. Besides reflecting Jefferson’s literary and historical interests, the horse’s name also reflects the political situation around the time it was foaled six years earlier. Sired by Fearnought and foaled just a few days after news of the Battle of Lexington and Concord had reached Virginia, Jefferson named it for the first-century chieftain of western Britain who actively resisted the Roman invasion. What Caractacus lacked in strength he made up for in cunning and topographical knowledge. Ultimately taken prisoner by the Romans, he demonstrated his noble spirit in a speech before Claudius that so impressed the emperor that he released him.

  In a memoir of events concerning his last days as governor and the British invasion of Virginia, Jefferson explained that as he departed atop Caractacus, he took a route through the woods and along the mountains. His political enemies accused him of avoiding the public road like a coward, but Jefferson well knew that had he taken the public road, both he and his family might have been detected and taken prisoner. At Enniscorthy, John Cole’s plantation, Jefferson overtook his family and dined with them. The next day they traveled together as far as Geddes, the home of Hugh Rose. Learning that the British forces had left Monticello after a short stay, Jefferson returned home briefly but soon rejoined his family at Geddes and escorted them to Poplar Forest, where they would be relatively safe from further depredations on the part of the British.

  CHAPTER 17

  Notes on the State of Virginia

  Jefferson stayed with his family at Poplar Forest through June of 1781. It was during this time that he was thrown from his horse, suffered a bad fall, and broke his arm—not during his retreat from Monticello, as his detractors charged. The injury debilitated him for months but also provided some unexpected leisure, time enough to resume a major writing project he had begun while in the governor’s office. This literary effort ultimately took shape as Notes on the State of Virginia. In his writings, Jefferson usually refers to this work in the plural, suggesting that he considered it a collection of notes rather than a unified whole. In his preface to the first London edition, he hesitated to mention “the circumstances of the time and place of their composition,” which, he asserted, would “open wounds which have already bled enough.” Privately, he was more blunt: he told Giovanni Fabbroni the work was written “while our country was wasting under the ravages of a cruel enemy, and whilst the writer was confined to his room by an accidental decrepitude.”1 Unable to leave Poplar Forest, Jefferson was not only physically handicapped, but also handicapped by his separation from most of his books and papers, which he had sent away to distant parts of Virginia for safekeeping in the face of invading British forces. Still, he had enough ideas in mind and enough research materials on hand to get a good start on the manuscript.

  For many years, he had accumulated materials pertinent to the history of Virginia. Besides gathering books and manuscripts devoted to its legal and political history, he had collected much additional Virginiana in the form of miscellaneous handwritten notes. Years later he explained, “I had always made it a practice whenever an opportunity occurred of obtaining any information of our country, which might be of use to me in any station public or private, to commit
it to writing. These memoranda were on loose papers, bundled up without order, and difficult of recurrence when I had occasion for a particular one.”2

  There’s no telling when Jefferson might have given these random notes coherence, but the curiosity of the French regarding their new ally motivated him to assemble his notes and broaden his research. François Marbois, Secretary of the French Legation at Philadelphia, had circulated questionnaires regarding all thirteen states among delegates to the Continental Congress the previous year. Joseph Jones, then serving with Virginia’s Congressional delegation, recognized the importance of answering Marbois’s queries and realized that, in terms of both knowledge and passion for the subject, no one was more qualified to respond than Governor Jefferson. Consequently, Jones recopied Marbois’s questionnaire and sent his transcription to Jefferson. Upon receiving these queries, Jefferson realized that answering them would provide an excellent opportunity for him to assemble his voluminous notes and give them coherence.

  Major obstacles prevented him from answering Marbois upon receiving the questionnaire. His gubernatorial responsibilities had left him little time for literary pursuits. During much of his second term, Virginia was besieged by enemy forces. Remarkably, he did manage to find time between invasions to begin drafting his response to Marbois. In late November 1780, after invading British forces had withdrawn yet before Benedict Arnold’s invasion the following month, Jefferson was filling in his few spare moments by drafting his notes on Virginia. “I am at present busily employed for Monsr. Marbois without his knowing it,” he informed the Chevalier d’Anmours and, in so doing, acknowledged his debt to Marbois “for making me much better acquainted with my own country than I ever was before.”3