CHAPTER ONE THE VIRGINIAN Thomas Jefferson was born on April 13 1743 in Albemarle County in Virginia the first of the thirteen British colonies These colonies would become the United States Thomas was the third of ten children and the eldest son of Peter Jefferson and Jane Randolph Jefferson Jane Jefferson had been born in London England but her family immigrated to Virginia when she was a child Peter Jefferson was a self educated plantation owner surveyor and slaveholder Europeans had brought the first enslaved Africans to the colonies in 1619 to Virginia According to family legend Thomas Jefferson’s first memory was of being carried on a pillow by one of his family’s slaves from Shadwell the plantation where he had been born to the family’s new home at nearby Tuckahoe Plantation Education Thomas like many children of his social class began his schooling with a tutor at home At the age of nine he began boarding at a school run by William Douglas a local Christian clergyman and teacher Thomas studied the classical languages Latin and Greek which was typical for a well-educated man 10
Thomas was born at Shadwell a plantation in Virginia This illustration shows the mill and farmhouse at Shadwell of his time When he was fourteen his beloved father died The future president then started taking lessons from another clergyman James Maury an old friend of his father who provided Thomas with further education in the classics Thomas found Maury’s religious views too narrow however In March 1760 Jefferson moved to Williamsburg then the capital of Virginia to study in the philosophy department of the College of William Mary He also studied natural philosophy as the study of science was then called and the study of natural phenomenon would become a lifelong love Almost seventeen years old Jefferson enjoyed socializing but he was a diligent student Awake from dawn until two o’clock in the morning he studied fifteen hours a day practiced his violin for three and slept and took meals during the other six His friend John Page said that Jefferson could tear himself away from his dearest friends to fly to his studies 11
Jefferson graduated from college in two years and began studying law under George Wythe a distinguished lawyer who introduced Jefferson to other leaders of the colony After almost five years of studying with Wythe Jefferson was admitted to the bar to practice law in 1767 A Young Statesman In 1768 Virginians elected twenty-five-year-old Thomas Jefferson to serve in the colony’s legislature the House of Burgesses Jefferson put his writing talents to work by drafting resolutions and laws for the colony He associated with fellow legislators George Washington Patrick Henry and other like-minded men who opposed the rule the royal governor placed on them Tensions were rising in the colonies over British-imposed taxation which upset many colonists because the colonies had no representation in the British Parliament Jefferson helped The House of Burgesses met at the old Capitol in Virginia The building was later destroyed by a fire 12
organize protests against British policies that he saw as unjust Meanwhile the young legislator began designing a house to be built on land his father had left him The property was on a mountaintop across the river from Jefferson’s birthplace so he named the estate Monticello meaning little mountain in Italian He relied on slaves to farm tobacco and other crops on his 5,000-acre 2,023-hectare plantation Slaves also helped construct the house and outbuildings and eventually even made nails and bricks in Monticello’s workshops On January 1 1772 Jefferson married young widow Martha Wayles Skelton who came from a wealthy prominent family of planters She and Jefferson shared a love of music He played the violin and she played the harpsichord John Wayles Jefferson’s father-in-law died in 1773 and left his daughter extensive amounts of property By law a married woman’s property belonged to her husband Besides the land Thomas Jefferson gained possession of 135 slaves one of the colony’s largest holdings of slaves Among them were Elizabeth Hemings and her children John Wayles was widely believed to be the father of several of Hemings’s children making these children the enslaved half siblings of Thomas Jefferson’s wife Martha Lucy Cottrell left was born at Monticello and was later sold at a public auction She is holding the granddaughter of George Blaetterman her enslaver after 1826 13
