On Oct 20, 2008, at 8:10 PM, Jurretta Heckscher wrote:

> Mr. Browning (or is it Dr. Browning?  sorry!),
Not relevant anyway, but no doctorate.

> I'm truly confused by your comment here.
>
>
> You quote the reporter as saying the following:
>
> 1.  Genetic evidence has linked Hemings's line to Jefferson's family.
That is true and I agree with it.

>
> 2.  Documentary evidence exists.
OK, lots of documents exist, but as evidence beyond reasonable doubt  
one way or another? Hardly.
>
> 3.  Historians say that such evidence points to Jefferson as the  
> father.
That I would heartily contest as it is hardly incontrovertible. People  
have used their interpretation of the documentary evidence as a proof  
that TJ was the father. That is just not proven, nor is it provable  
based on the documents to date, nor is the DNA evidence dispositive  
that TJ was the father. There is not sufficient evidence to prove the  
case. For each point, there is a counterpoint, apart from various  
emotional coulda/shoulda arguments because he was a bad slave owner,  
etc which are hardly taken seriously anyway.
>
> 4.  There are still some who deny the link.
Absolutely there are poor benighted out of touch souls who deny that  
TJ was the father which is the implication of the sentence.
>
>
> Which of these statements do you contest?  It seems to me that every  
> one of them can be substantiated abundantly in postings on this  
> list, from advocates on all sides of the question at hand, within  
> the past month.  Some of the historians in question have even  
> participated in that discussion, or have recently published books to  
> the same effect.
The discussion has ranged from TJ did, TJ didn't, TJ fathered 1, TJ  
fathered 7 and to all pointed in between, above, below, around and  
through. I will contest, based on the evidence to date, anything that  
explicitly says that TJ was the parent. Who the parent was is unknown  
but narrowed to less than half a dozen Jeffersons, how many children  
SH had by that Jefferson is also unknown. Yet articles, posts and  
books continue the claim that TJ was the parent when the DNA does not  
show that. That is what I will contest.
>
>
> If one wishes to continue to debate Jefferson and Hemings, surely  
> one can come up with something more salient than a bald factual  
> statement from a reporter -- a welcome exception, moreover, to the  
> general tendency of reporters to misreport complicated historical  
> issues.
The reporter wrote what I thought was a good piece, apart from the TJ  
statement with which I took issue. It is not the SH/TJ issue I wish to  
continue debating. Reporters need to get their facts straight and not  
go beyond the evidence. Too much second-hand chatter does us all no  
good.

I have long advocated digging up TJ and anybody else who can help with  
the solution and testing them.

My peeve is directed at the reporter stating as factual that which has  
not yet been proved beyond reasonable doubt and which takes the DNA  
evidence beyond what it allows.

Stuff gets into print that isn't so and has a life of its own. In  
1930, Kathleen Bruce published a book called Virginia Iron Manufacture  
During the Slave Era. In it, she said that Tredegar was the oldest  
ironworks south of the Rappahannock. That is demonstrably false as I  
have proved. What she did was look at Land Tax Records for the year or  
so when the Belle Isle Iron and Nail Works had burned and was being  
rebuilt. BIINW started in 1816 or so and operated continuously and  
were thus 20 years ahead of Tredegar. But because it is in print and  
because Bruce was an excellent researcher, it has become fact. It is  
endlessly quoted by folks who look at secondary literature and see it  
as factual background.

That is precisely the problem with going beyond the evidence in the TJ  
case and that is what I contest.
>
>
> I say this, for what it's worth, as someone who finds this  
> individual's claim of Madison descent dubious in the extreme.  (I  
> cannot find the Times-Dispatch article, but am familiar with the  
> claim as recorded in other recent news reports.)  The (apparent)  
> entire absence of supporting contemporary evidence -- i.e., evidence  
> from Madison's own time -- renders it most likely to be, in my view,  
> what several people on this list would have us suppose the Hemings- 
> Jefferson link to be: a historically baseless family story founded  
> in misdirected ancestral pride.
I have no vested interest either way in whether TJ fathered children  
with SH. I am not in agreement with the unreasoning veneration of St.  
Thomas on his pedestal. I don't think either that he should be judged  
by presentist attitudes. I do not agree that it is an honorable aim to  
destroy his entire reputation as some have been quoted as advocating.  
If he and SH had children, so be it. I simply don't care. But I do  
care when scientific evidence is taken out of context and misused.
>
>
> The same goes for the story about a supposed George Washington slave  
> liaison that Henry Wiencek has perhaps too dutifully (sorry, Henry)  
> laid forth in An Imperfect God: the contemporaneous, or even more  
> recent historical, supporting evidence that might lead a reasonable  
> researcher to accept the tale's essential veracity simply does not  
> exist.
>
> The Jefferson-Hemings link is of an entirely different order, and it  
> is frankly an insult to the professional integrity of historians to  
> pretend otherwise.
I believe Kevin Hardwick attempted to lay out in bullet points what  
the current level of understanding was and largely succeeded. I find  
that admirable to be able to cut through the bloviation and get to the  
facts that are the basis that today we agree with so that we can take  
our collective step towards the next interpretative level.

Historians without scientific backgrounds tend to leap on the  
headline, and do not understand the limitations or nuances of the  
technique and use that to bolster their arguments. That is both bad  
science and bad history. What the historians on this list have done is  
to try to explain how they got to their conclusions. It is also  
abundantly clear that wishing something were so, or were not so has  
clouded objective reasoning.

I hope you are less puzzled by my comments. My peeve is that incorrect  
statements need to be called out each time they're made until what is  
currently understood to be the truth is what is put forth. When we can  
advance the interpretation, then we begin again with another round.

Lyle Browning


> Sorry to be peevish.  My peeve is not directed at you, Mr. Browning,  
> but my puzzlement is.
>
> -- Jurretta Heckscher
>
>
>
> On Oct 20, 2008, at 4:46 PM, Lyle E. Browning wrote:
>
>> Today's Richmond Times Dispatch had an article about a  
>> Massachusetts pediatrician who claims via oral history to be  
>> descended from James Madison's father and from James Madison.  
>> Difficulties in getting genetic testing done and by whom, etc. are  
>> preventing forward motion at the moment.
>>
>> The Washington Post's Jonathan Mummolo wrote the article and in it  
>> was a paragraph: "Despite genetic evidence that has linked  
>> Hemmings' line to Jefferson's family, and documentary evidence that  
>> historians say points to Jefferson as the father, there are still  
>> some who deny the link."
>>
>> The first part about linking SH's line to Jefferson's family is  
>> true via DNA. The second part about documentary evidence is highly  
>> contested and cannot be ascertained with certainty. The third part  
>> goes completely off the rails by tarring those who might deny that  
>> TJ was the father.
>>
>> Of such things is disinformation promulgated. The first step is to  
>> make a statement that is true. Then you warp it one degree as the  
>> second part did, and then the third part is introduced as the new  
>> "truth" and we're off to the Goebbels finals with a flourish.
>>
>> Let the fireworks begin.
>>
>> Lyle Browning
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