Sally Phillips <[log in to unmask]> wrote:  Would it be fair to say that residents of Cumberland County, Virginia, and
other counties well west of the fall line, in the 50 or so years following
the Revolution, would be more independent-minded, more free-spirited, less
bound to the 100-year-old traditions of the more easterly counties? I am
trying not to use the word "liberal" as it is used today, because I don't
know what "liberal" meant in 1800. But that is what I'm getting at. I am
researching an inter-racial family where the father/owner and the
mother/slave and the offspring lived publicly as a family. As well as I
can tell from the records, they seem to have been at least tolerated.
They appear to have functioned well in the community. Although Cumberland
County was far from the frontier in 1800-1825, had it been settled by
frontier-seekers who simply didn't care that much about traditions? Is
there a book that deals with this subject?

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I am sure that you have heard of Sally Hemmings, thus as follows. I am sure there are books out there on her life and those about her.

  From Famous People:

  Sally Hemings   1773-1835  Sally Hemings was born circa 1773 in Virginia, the daughter of Elizabeth (Betty) Hemings, and according to family legend, John Wayles. Madison Hemings, one of Sally’s sons, told his family history in an article published in 1873. He stated that his great-grandmother was a fullblooded African and the property of John Wayles. She became pregnant by an englishman, Captain Hemings, and had a daughter, Elizabeth (Betty) Hemings. The family used the Hemings name from that time. According to Madison, family legend is that Captain Hemings wanted to buy his daughter Elizabeth from John Wayles, but Wayles was curious to see how a mixed-race child would develop, and would not sell. John Wayles was said to have thwarted a kidnapping scheme planned by Captain Hemings by moving Elizabeth and her mother into his house, where they worked as indoor servants. Madison Hemings states that after John Wayle’s wife died he took Elizabeth as concubine. Elizabeth had
 six children fathered by John Wayles, one of whom was Sally Hemings.
  Thomas Jefferson had married John Wayle’s widowed daughter Martha Skelton. When John Wayles died, she inherited 135 slaves, among them Elizabeth Hemings and her children. They were brought to Monticello around 1775.
  In 1787 Sally Hemings traveled with Jefferson’s daughter Mary to France where Thomas Jefferson was serving as minister for the United States. Madison Hemings states that while in France Thomas Jefferson took Sally as concubine. If Madison Hemings is correct, Sally was the half-sister of Thomas Jefferson’s deceased wife Martha. In France, slavery was illegal, and therefore Sally was free there. Madison Hemings states that in order to persuade Sally to return with him to the United States, Thomas Jefferson agreed to free her children by the age of twenty-one.
  In 1802, while Thomas Jefferson was President of the United States, published stories of a relationship between Jefferson and Sally Hemings began to appear in newspapers. Thomas Jefferson never confirmed or denied the stories, remaining silent on the issue.
  Madison Hemings reported that Sally had three sons and one daughter by Thomas Jefferson: Beverly, Harriet, Madison, and Eston. Beverly went to Washington, D. C. and passed into white society. Harriet married a white man in the Baltimore area. After Thomas Jefferson’s death in 1826 Madison and Eston rented a house near Monticello where Sally lived until her death in 1835. Madison and Eston left Virginia and settled in Ohio.
  Biographers of Thomas Jefferson often discounted the connection between Sally Hemings and Thomas Jefferson by citing his writings in which he stated that slavery was wrong and the system should be ended, and also his statements that mixing races was immoral. They also cite his legitimate descendant’s denials of the relationship, or the possibility of such a relationship. However, Thomas Jefferson owned slaves all his life, and only the Hemings slaves were given freedom during his lifetime or in his will. The other slaves owned by Jefferson, numbering over 200, were sold at auction after his death. DNA testing done in 1998 with male descendents of Sally Hemings indicates that Thomas Jefferson (or a related Jefferson male) was the father of some of Sally Heming’s children.

  I am sure you will find what you seek.


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