The Hemingses of Monticello: An American Family (110 page)

33.
Ibid., 170–71.

34.
Ibid., 100–102, 216.

35.
Nellie Jones to Stuart Gibboney, July 29, 1938, Aug. 10, 1938; Stuart Gibboney to Nellie Jones, Aug. 1, 1938, Nov. 1, 1938, correspondence in the University of Virginia Library, Accession No. 6636-a-b, Box No. Control Folder, Folder Dates 1735–1961. Nellie Jones was Madison Hemings’s granddaughter. She wrote to Gibboney, the then president of the Thomas Jefferson Memorial Foundation, offering to donate mementos that her great-grandmother Sally Hemings had saved and given to their son: a pair of his glasses, an inkwell, and a silver buckle. Gibboney referred the matter to Fiske Kimball, then "Chairman of the Restoration Committee." Kimball wrote to Gibboney on Oct. 28, 1938, "Nellie Jones: This very resptctable [
sic
] colored woman writes a letter much more intelligently than members of our own race. Her story was very straight (except that I was not aware that Jefferson took any slave to France—but that’s not the crucial point. [
Oh, but it was!
] I see no harm in letting her send on the things, for inspection as she is willing to do. It might be that the buckle is identical with one of the buckles we have, which would thus authenticate the whole lot. As to purchasing them, and fixing a price, we really have
quite enough of these little mementoes
so that it would be indifferent whether we bought any more" (emphasis added). On the strength of that analysis Gibboney wrote to Jones, saying, "Under the circumstances, therefore, we will not be interested in buying these relics, but we will keep your letters in our file in case we hear of someone who would be interested in acquiring them, should you not dispose of them yourself in the meantime." It is not clear what the state of affairs was in 1938 with respect to "relics," but it is hard to imagine that the museum devoted to TJ’s life could really have had too many pairs of his eyeglasses lying around.

36.
Burstein,
The Inner Jefferson
, 61–62.

1.
Colin Jones,
Paris: The Biography of a City
(New York, 2005); Alistair Horne,
Seven Ages of Paris
(New York, 2002), 155; David Garrioch,
The Making of Revolutionary Paris
(Berkeley, Calif., 2002), 45; Malone,
Jefferson
, 2:205–6.

2.
MB
, 723 n. 31; Malone,
Jefferson
, 2:206.

3.
In a postscript to that same letter written on Dec. 15 that he was unable to send until Jan. 11, because of lack of a "conveiance," he reported (no doubt after receiving his new thermometers) that the temperature had dropped to "9
¹
/2 degrees below zero." TJ to Francis Eppes, Dec. 15, 1788,
Papers,
14:358.

4.
Horne,
Seven Ages of Paris
, 155–56. See William Doyle,
Origins
, 168, suggesting that "as many as 30,000 more immigrants than usual may have been present in Paris as a result of the economic crisis." See also Doyle’s chap. 12, outlining the state of affairs in 1788–89 in Paris.

5.
TJ to Andre Limozin, May 3, 1789,
Papers
, 15:86; William Short to TJ, Oct. 8, 1789, ibid., 511; Thomas Carlyle,
The French Revolution
, 212; Georges Lefebvre,
The Coming of the French Revolution
, 199–205.

6.
TJ to Lucy Paradise, Sept. 10, 1789,
Papers
, 15:412; TJ to Thomas Paine, Sept. 13, 1789, ibid., 424.

7.
William Short to John Hartwell Cocke, Aug. 12, 1826, Cocke Papers, University of Virginia, quoted in "Thomas Jefferson and William Short," at Monticello.org.

8.
TJ to Montmorin, July 8, 1789,
Papers
, 15:260.

9.
John Jay to TJ, June 19, 1789,
Papers
, 15:202. TJ’s SJL lists the letter as having been received on Aug. 23.

10.
Brodie,
Thomas Jefferson
, 243;
MB
, 247; TJ to John Trumbull, Sept. 9, 1789,
Papers
, 15:407.

11.
MB
, 247.

12.
See, e.g., Brodie,
Thomas Jefferson
, 43, 114–16. For a discussion of TJ’s health problems in later years, see Andrew Burstein,
Jefferson’s Secret Death and Desire at Monticello
(New York, 2005), The relationship between TJ’s physical illnesses and stress was not strictly a psychological matter. Modern scientists have noted, and are still attempting to understand more clearly, the role that stress plays in compromising the human immune system, making certain people more prone to illness during times of emotional upheaval.

13.
Gordon-Reed,
TJ and SH
, 246.

14.
Herbert E. Sloan,
Principle and Interest: Thomas Jefferson and the Problem of Debt
(New York, 1995), 13–14.

15.
James Madison to TJ, May 27, 1789,
Papers
, 15:153; TJ to James Madison, Aug. 29, 1789, ibid., 369; TJ to James Madison, Jan. 9, 1790, ibid., 16:92–93 ("I expect with anxiety the President’s ultimate determination as to what is to be done with me. I cannot bring myself to be indifferent to the change of destination, tho’ I will be passive under it"); Malone,
Jefferson
, 2:248–49.

16.
TJ,
Autobiography
, in
Writings
, 98.

17.
TJ to Joseph Delaplaine, April 12, 1817, LOC, 37369.

18.
TJ to James Maurice, Sept. 16, 1789,
Papers
, 15:433.

19.
MB
, 743–47.

20.
Ibid.

21.
Jared Sparks,
The Life of Benjamin Franklin, containing the Autobiography, with Notes and a Continuation
(Boston, 1848), 509.

22.
"Extract from the Diary of Nathaniel Cutting at Le Havre and Cowes,"
Papers
, 15:490, 494

23.
MB
, 745.

24.
TJ to William Short, Oct. 7, 1789,
Papers
, 15:509; "Extract from the Diary of Nathaniel Cutting," ibid., 495.

25.
TJ to William Short, Oct. 7, 1789,
Papers
, 15:509.

26.
TJ to Madame de Corny, Oct. 14, 1789,
Papers
, 15:520;
MB
, 745.

27.
TJ to Madame de Corny, Oct. 14, 1789,
Papers
, 15:520.

28.
MB
, 747; John Trumbull to TJ, Sept. 22, 1789,
Papers
, 15:468.

29.
MB
, 555. In addition to keeping a daily log of the latitude, longitude, distance traveled, temperature, and wind direction, TJ noted sightings of sea creatures observed each day.

30.
TJ to William Short, Oct. 23, 1789,
Papers
, 15:527;
MB
, 747; TJ to Nathaniel Cutting, Nov. 21, 1789, ibid., 551–52;
MB
, 747; Martha Jefferson Randolph’s reminiscences,
Papers
, 15:560–61.

31.
TJ to William Short, Oct. 4, 1789,
Papers
, 15:506; "List of Baggage Shipped by Jefferson from France" [ca. Sept. 1, 1789], ibid., 375–77. See also Stein,
The World of Thomas Jefferson
.

32.
TJ to John Trumbull, Nov. 25, 1789,
Papers
, 15:560; Martha Randolph Jefferson reminiscences, ibid., 560.

33.
"Address of Welcome of the Officials of Norfolk," Nov. 25, 1789; "Jefferson’s Reply to the Foregoing Address of Welcome," Nov. 25, 1789,
Papers
, 15:556, 556–67.

34.
Martha Randolph Jefferson’s reminiscences, ibid., 560–61;
MB
, 748, 748–49.

35.
William L. Shirer,
Love and Hatred: The Tormented Marriage of Leo and Sonya Tolstoy
(New York, 1994).

36.
Brodie,
Thomas Jefferson
, 248.

1.
Farm Book
, 24;
MB
, 749.

2.
Gordon-Reed,
TJ and SH
, 254.

3.
Henry S. Randall,
The Life of Thomas Jefferson
, 3 vols. (1858; reprint, New York, 1972), 1:552, Martha J. Randolph on the homecoming; Wormley Hughes on the homecoming, ibid., 552–53.

4.
TJ to Nicholas Lewis, Dec. 16, 1788,
Papers
, 14:362.

5.
Randall,
Life
, 1:552, 553.

6.
Ibid., 553. See also Stanton, "The Other End of the Telescope," 56 (2000): 139–52, 150–51. Stanton, who with Dianne Swann Wright has collected a multitude of family stories from the descendants of people who were enslaved at Monticello, as well as some stories from TJ’s white descendants, has found that the story of TJ’s return has survived for two hundred years among black and white families, who interpret the meaning of the recollection differently. TJ’s white descendants tell it as an example of the extreme loyalty of slaves. The descendants of slaves tell it as a story that illustrates TJ’s dependence upon their family members.

7.
Randall,
Life
, 552.

8.
Stanton,
Free Some Day
, 133–36, 143–44.

9.
Malone,
Jefferson
, 2:253.

10.
TJ to Randolph Jefferson, Jan. 11, 1789,
Papers
, 14:433–34.

11.
See Morris,
Southern Slavery and the Law
, 347–48, discussing the southern attitude about teaching slaves to read, noting that "half of the slave states did not prohibit teaching slaves to read and write." Virginia, for example, never made it completely against the law to teach slaves to read. Unlawful assembly laws were directed chiefly at stopping the creation of schools for blacks. Whites were interested primarily in black labor and rarely had the incentive to teach blacks to read. Those blacks who did learn often taught others.

12.
See
Papers
, 28:223, listing the dates the letters were written and the dates they were received as recorded in the SJL.

13.
Gordon-Reed,
TJ and SH
, 139–40, 149.

14.
First page of James Hemings’s inventory of kitchen utensils (in the first insert).

15.
Gordon-Reed,
TJ and SH
, 247.

16.
"Life among the Lowly,"
Pike County (Ohio) Republican
, March 13, 1873.

17.
See Hemings family tree in this book; Lucia Stanton, "Monticello to Main Street, 123.

18.
TJ to William Short, Dec. 14, 1789,
Papers
, 16:26; "Address of Welcome by the Citizens of Albemarle and Jefferson’s Response," Feb. 12, 1790,
Papers
, 16:177.

19.
MB
, 749.

20.
Thomas Bell to TJ, June 12, 1797,
Papers
, 29:427; Stanton, "Monticello to Main Street," 123 (although Bell’s grandson’s recollections refer to visits that would have taken place after Bell’s death, it is apparent from the tenor of the two men’s letters, and the fact that Bell’s store was attached to his home, that TJ visited Bell’s home in the 1790s as well); TJ to Thomas Bell, March 16, 1792,
Papers
, 20:758–59; TJ to Archibald Stuart, Dec. 2, 1794, ibid., 28:214; TJ to Thomas Mann Randolph, Aug. 20, 1795, ibid., 28:214, 439; James Madison to TJ, Dec. 25, 1797, ibid., 29:591.

21.
Stanton, "Monticello to Main Street." 100.

22.
See, generally, Joshua Rothman,
Notorious in the Neighborhood
, on the attitudes in TJ’s immediate community about interracial relations.

23.
Robinson,
Dangerous Liaisons
, 101.

24.
TJ to Francis C. Gray, March 4, 1815, LOC, 36173.

25.
See Edgar Woods,
Albemarle County in Virginia
(1901; reprint, Berryville, Va, 1984), 276, listing Bell as a magistrate, one of the "County Officers" in 1791. In 1794 he was part of a commission to "study how to reinstate" records that were lost owing to the "wanton ravages of the British troops near the close of the Revolutionary War" (p. 25). The following year Bell was chosen with, among others, Wilson Cary Nicholas, to study the question of public education. Other jurisdictions were hesitant even to talk about it, because it would require raising taxes. The matter died a quick death. Ironically, in 1849 the issue arose again, and Thomas Jefferson Randolph was one of the leading opponents to bringing public education to Charlottesville, which put him on the opposite side of Dr. William H. McGuffey, a professor at the University of Virginia, which Randolph’s grandfather, of course, had founded (p. 90).

26.
Stanton, "Monticello to Main Street," 100; Gordon-Reed,
TJ and SH
, 138.