Herbert --

Thank you for this lengthy exegesis on this subject. Much of it I  
knew, but some I did not. Let me reduce my thinking to a parsimonious  
essence. The present day DNA data is highly suggestive but not  
despositive. However, the science of genetics is advancing now with a  
speed that is reminiscent of laser development — in the 1960s and 70s  
— when they had to publish the time and date the paper was submitted  
because there was a chance it had been super-ceded by the time it was  
through the peer-review and publication cycle. There is much more we  
are going to learn from DNA inquiry. Of that, I think, we can be  
sure. There will be new and better tests yielding clearer, deeper  
insights.  Who did what in the beginning of this approach, a decade  
from now will become a not terribly important part of the narrative,  
except as it reveals various prejudices of the day. We must be  
patient until new data emerges. This is like discussing a baseball  
game in the seventh inning.

One thing I do know. People do not live in a Tolstoian village like  
Monticello without all of the people in the household having a  
relationship, and Sally Hemings and Thomas Jefferson had to have had  
one. Her status as his chambermaid assured that.

So I guess it gets down to whether you think he would be capable of  
such a relationship? People today have sexual relationships  all the  
time with individuals with whom they are far less involved than  
Jefferson was with Sally. And the same was true in the Elizabethan  
Age. Between 1558 and 1603, in the Country of Essex, which had  
approximately 40,000 adults, almost 38 per cent — 15,000 — were cited  
for sexual misbehavior. And it will be true 50 years from now. People  
are people, and I think Jefferson no different. Do you think he was a  
celibate? Was it coercive? By definition. But while I can see  
Jefferson as a man with secret sexual relationship, I cannot see him  
as a serial rapist, so some accommodation was reached.

Does this make him evil. I don't think so. Thomas Jefferson, no less  
that the other Founders, with the exception of Franklin, was a man of  
his time, status, and culture. What has always amazed me about these  
individuals, is that they risked everything and, in the end, rose  
above who they were to craft what they bequeathed us. Their modernity  
and relevance, lies in the question they eternally pose: Would I,  
could I, do the same?

-- Stephan


On 3 May 2008, at 17:31, Herbert Barger wrote:

> Stephan,
>
> Yes, the controversy has been with us since 1802 when Callender, "bad
> mouthed" TJ.....he personally had, to him, a good reason....TJ had
> denied him the Richmond Postmaster position. The DNA proved  
> Callender to
> be a LIAR.....there was NO Jefferson/Woodson DNA match. Thus, what we
> have remaining is a finding of a match between "A" Jefferson DNA and
> Eston Hemings DNA.
>
> As I have earlier stated in earlier posts is that Dr. Foster, in my
> opinion, (I was assisting in identifying Jefferson subjects and  
> history
> and genealogy and recommending sources for other persons of the  
> study),
> tested a known male subject of Eston Hemings, Sally's son. That son,
> according to long held family beliefs, carried the Jefferson DNA. This
> family belief was that "a Jefferson uncle", meaning Randolph, had
> fathered Eston. This family NEVER claimed descent from Thomas as his
> brother Madison had. Therefore, Dr. Foster had an assured match in  
> hand
> WELL BEFORE the lab results, however he never told Nature or anyone  
> else
> of this "line up." Dr. Foster and Mrs. Bennett (whose suggestion it  
> was
> to have the study), had a falling out over Dr. Foster's release of the
> results prior to her printing of a Jefferson book she had in the  
> works.
> Up to this point she had been financing the project. Up until her  
> death
> a few months ago, she held great resentment and hurt for her "former"
> friend. In an audio taped recording she states, "Gene, what is you  
> want,
> money, his reply according to our interview with her, was  
> NO....FAME? At
> what cost did he get fame?
>
> He never told Nature that I had recommended a meeting of all
> researchers, etc. prior to release of the story results. He blames  
> this
> on "lack of space in Nature and an unnecessary meeting." Nature never
> knew of other Jefferson suspects, otherwise there was NO way they  
> could
> have truthfully had a suggested headline, "Jefferson fathers slaves  
> last
> child." In the absence of this knowledge they went with what they had
> after the Carrs were eliminated. It just HAD to be Thomas,  
> (Randolph and
> sons were not known by Nature), there was no other Jefferson in the
> equation. In a 45 minute phone interview with Nature, immediately  
> after
> publication, they told Accuracy in Media Founder, Reed Irvine, that  
> they
> knew NOTHING of other possible Jefferson DNA. Mr. Irvine also  
> phoned Dr.
> Foster at this time and was not given a satisfactory reply. Back
> checking the many e-mails Dr. Foster and I exchanged, I found
> inconsistencies and outright different meanings to indicate to me that
> what was stated in one e-mail was not consistent with another. In  
> other
> words, it seemed to me that I "may be too concerned" of certain  
> methods,
> arrival of study results, release of study to Nature, why Science  
> in the
> United States was not used for the study, (he says they refused  
> because
> of too much advance publicity). As a source of serious research and  
> the
> fame of TJ's DNA Study in question and a need to sell publications,  
> this
> just does not "cook." Was there haste to get the results in time  
> for the
> election at that time, to support President Clinton's pending
> impeachment, as suggested by Prof. Joseph Ellis and others? Prof.  
> Ellis,
> in his book, Founding Brothers, (Smith has the sharpest pencil of  
> anyone
> around the beltway), heaps great mention of Stephan Smith (at that  
> time
> USNWR Editor), had a long multiple page article with a cover and
> including a story by Prof. Ellis accusing TJ. We might wonder how this
> issue came out before the Nature Story of Nov. 5, 1998 since they  
> had an
> embargo on the story.
>
> I am not convinced that future DNA of this particular case will be
> improved by science because "it jumped track" not in the inability of
> science to properly identify the DNA BUT in my opinion, a  
> "manipulation
> of events and denial of proper information." In my opinion the only
> thing the test proved was that the Eston Hemings family had a
> confirmation of their long held oral family beliefs.....they were
> descended from "A" Jefferson,.....Randolph, as they had ALWAYS  
> believed.
>
>
> What do you mean, "what seems clear, over the years they evolved some
> kind of bonding and relationship?" What proven bonding and  
> relationship?
> She was seldom mentioned except in slave supply lists where she  
> received
> the same similar supplies as other slaves at the house. You seem to  
> not
> contribute any importance to the five year absence of child
> bearing....why not.......from this date on through all her pregnancies
> Randolph was "between wives."
> The issue in France is very clear....Sally for 5 weeks (the necessary
> time to have conceived, a child if anything had proved this , and  
> it was
> never proven. The main thing is that this period was when she was AWAY
> from TJ. Of course Madison's mention of this is one topic that is
> questionable in his many statements which to me are questionable. We
> know his naming by Dolley Madison was not correct, so what else in the
> article is incorrect?
>
> So what if Sally did conceive, at Monticello, and we don't know WHERE
> she was, everyone came when TJ arrived. Possibly his first cousin,
> George Jefferson, his Richmond Manager, could have arrived as did
> Randolph and sons, not exactly people that would be registered, but
> "family." His nephew, Isham Randolph Jefferson, was listed in a  
> Kentucky
> History book as having been "reared" by TJ. Was he arriving when TJ  
> did
> to "rear" him? No reason to come when he was NOT there, because in  
> most
> instances  Monticello was under construction and was closed. TJ always
> stopped by daughter, Martha's home, on his travels to Monticello  
> and she
> accompanied him there with her children. Just because "he" was there
> that is no reason to ASSUME he fathered any Sally
> child.......preposterous.
>
> Some poster earlier asked about why no one mentioned Randolph prior to
> the DNA Study and Prof. Joseph Ellis asked me the same question. I  
> told
> Ellis that others had and asked if he had read "Thomas Jefferson  
> and his
> UNKNOWN Brother" and he replied NO. This Monticello book is very
> informative and this historian is ignorant of it? I was contacted by a
> co-author of, "Anatomy of a Scandal", Rebecca McMurry, just as soon as
> the story broke in the media, informing me that she and her family had
> lived in nearby Orange Co., Va. and had purchased some of the items
> auctioned at Monticello upon Mr. Jefferson's death. Since I had
> suggested in my media releases, the name of Randolph Jefferson as a
> possible father, and she had read of my research. She related to me  
> that
> her family and almost all the community believed that it was Randolph
> who fathered Sally's children.
>
> Another person contacted me, an award winning playwright and stage  
> play
> producer from the University of North Carolina, Mrs. Karyn Traut, and
> gave me details of a play, Saturday's Children", that she had produced
> in 1981 after seven years of research and that her research had led  
> her
> to conclude that it was Randolph Jefferson who fathered some of  
> Sally's
> children.
> Just because Prof. Ellis and any other unknowledgeable persons  
> choose to
> say, "why wasn't Randolph mentioned before now?" doesn't mean that he
> was suspected in a VACUUM. Until this DNA Study came before us, there
> was no need to pursue and challenge every statement made by persons
> claiming descent from a famous president rather than his not so
> important brother.
>
> I am looking at an 1883 book here before me, "Life of Thomas  
> Jefferson",
> by James Parton in which the following sentence appears in Chap. LIX,
> The Campaign Lies of 1800. Referring to a statement to two of her  
> sons,
> Col. Thomas Jefferson Randolph and George Wythe Randolph, TJ's  
> daughter,
> Martha, not long before her death, said, "She asked the Colonel if he
> remembered when Hemings (the slave who most resembled Mr.  
> Jefferson) was
> born. He turned to the book containing the list of slaves, and  
> found and
> found that he was born at the time supposed by Mrs. Randolph. She then
> directed her son's attention to the fact, that Mr. Jefferson and Sally
> Hemings could not have met, were far distance from each other, for
> fifteen months prior to the birth. She bade her sons remember this  
> fact,
> and always defend the character of their grandfather." Mr. Parton, the
> book author, states, "It so happened, when I was examining an old
> account-book of Mr. Jeffersons, I came "pop" on the original entry of
> the slave's birth, and I was then able, from well-known circumstances,
> to prove the fifteen months' separation. I could give fifty more  
> facts,
> if there were any need of it, to show Mr. Jefferson's innocence of  
> this
> and all similar instances against propriety,"
>
> Of course you may say, well who was this Hemings child referenced? My
> long and careful research indicates that the reference is to Beverly
> Hemings for various reasons.
>
> Some people claim, for obvious reasons, that TJ never clarified his
> statements regarding the many rumors against him...he did. In a cover
> letter to his Secretary of the Navy and Secretary of the Treasury he
> admits some earlier visiting when he was young and single to  
> visiting a
> married friend while her husband was away. But he says, that is the
> "ONLY ONE" of the rumors against me which is correct and I admit it as
> improper.
>
> The other rumors at the time were the Callender Campaign Lies about a
> connection to Sally Hemings. He did not feel it necessary, during the
> busy time he was running our country to debate or dignify all that and
> future rumors. A famous quote to Henry Lee on May 15, 1826, just  
> before
> his death on July 4th, says it all I think, "All should be laid  
> open to
> you without reserve, for there is not a TRUTH existing which I  
> fear, or
> would wish unknown to the whole world."
>
> Herb Barger
> Jefferson Historian
>
>
>
> Herb --
>
> The facts, such as we know them are the facts. More will emerge with
> time. I am quite familiar with Abigail Adam's comments, the words of
> a punctilious mother of daughters, deeply opposed to slavery - Sally
> is the only known slave ever to spend the night under an Adams roof -
> and, I think, appalled at a Southern culture that would condone
> sending a nine year child around the world in the care of another
> child.  She saw Sally as "15 or 16" (she was actually 14) and knew to
> a fine point how responsible 15 year old girls were. That says
> nothing whatever about the impact of Sally on Jefferson, matters of
> which she could have know way of knowing, and which would have
> offended her on several levels, had she done so.
>
> We will simply have to disagree about her parentage. Willard Sterne
> Randall offers no citation for his assertion that she was the
> daughter of Nelson Jones (probably Joseph Neilson). I think Annette
> Gordon-Reed makes a compelling case against it and, more than that, I
> find it improbable. Jones/Neilson was a carpenter. There are the age
> issues. But, mostly, I do not believe that a lower caste white would
> violate and impregnate a slave on the Jefferson plantation. I don't
> mean that such a man would cavil over moral concerns, simply that in
> a culture that sees some people as property, you would assume the
> owner would not be amused by the violation of his property.  It would
> be a significant trespass, with children as a long range consequence.
> If your rice bowl depended on the owner, I just don't think you would
> do something like that casually.
>
> I join myself with everybody else on this list who has made the point
> that you have to see these people first as human beings embedded in a
> culture. That is not romantic. We, ourselves, are similarly embedded.
> Why it matters is that these men and women, so mundanely ordinary in
> some ways nonetheless could do what they did. Using science and
> documentation to recreate that reality in order to better understand
> it seems to me a wholly admirable task.
>
> If you ask me to speculate, based on years of reading about these
> men, I would say this. Jefferson felt vulnerable. He was a fastidious
> man, and he was strongly attracted to a married woman, Maria Cosway.
> For her a physical relationship was adultery. But their mental,
> emotional, aesthetic, and physical connections were strong. There was
> also his sense of loyalty to Martha, whom he adored. My wife died six
> years ago, and I adored her in life, and cherished her more than I
> can express, and my views have not changed a whit, and have little
> relevance to the several friendships I have formed with women since
> her death. I expect Jefferson felt much the same because that is the
> way most widowers with whom I have talked describe their life
> experience, and studies provide formalization for this. Also the
> death of wives was much higher as a percentage than it is today. As
> was death in general. Jefferson is unusual only in that he did not
> remarry. Unlike, say, Mason who, we know, deeply loved his wife.
>
> Jefferson had no real idea what to expect with Sally.Prior to seeing
> her, she was probably mostly a logistical detail. Her importance, her
> reality, in his mind, lay principally in her role as a guide and
> companion for nine year old Maria. And then she was there. Pretty,
> vivacious, possibly a genetic echo of his great love. She would know
> nothing of any of this, of course. It must have been very awkward for
> him. She was completely his, literally. She was little more than a
> child. And if she was Martha's half sister she was Martha returned to
> life, as he must first have known her.
>
> What seems clear is that over years they evolved some kind of bond
> and relationship. We can't know its internals; it is entirely emic.
> But we can know certain details as to how it played out. She went
> back from France with him. She was the only person who could enter
> his private apartment in Monticello at all times. And this is true
> independent of whether there were any children.
>
> He freed her children (read into that what one will).
>
> As to why it was five years before Sally conceived. I don't know the
> answer. I don't know that it is definitively knowable. I don't see
> why it matters. There is, of course, the issue of the conception  in
> France. But, there are several possibilities. It does seem clear
> Jefferson was in residence within the nine months prior to her
> deliveries. (Brodie, 492, Miller, 170).
>
> As for paternity. I believe that advances in genetics will answer
> this question dispositively - and I am content to await its judgment.
>
> -- Stephan
>
> On 1 May 2008, at 21:56, Herbert Barger wrote:
>
>> Stephan,
>>
>> You should read a bit more about Abigail Adams comments on  
>> "attractive
>> young woman, Sally" upon her arrival. There was talk that she was so
>> young and inexperienced in the ways of being Jefferson's daughters
>> that
>> there was some consideration and suggestions of sending her back
>> home on
>> the same ship she arrived on. Read earlier posts about the half- 
>> sister
>> rumors......NO proof. This is soap opera stuff that drives believers.
>>
>> You speak of his sex drive and frequent children by Martha, then
>> tell me
>> this....WHY was it over five years before Sally had a FIRST recorded
>> child after return to Monticello?
>>
>> Herb Barger
>>
>>
>> How was it adultery? Thomas Jefferson was a widower when he and Sally
>> Hemings encountered one another in Paris, she an attractive young
>> woman virtually white in skin tone, just blossoming into beauty -
>> "Dashing Sally" - his wife's half-sibling and much the same in
>> appearance as her sister, he a man who never married again after
>> Martha's death. Just at the simple human level are we to believe
>> Jefferson lived as a celibate for two-thirds of his life (and this
>> puts aside his unquestioned, if ill-defined, connection with Maria
>> Cosway)? Jefferson was clearly strongly attracted to women, and
>> clearly a sexual being. Martha Wayles Skelton bore her first child
>> almost nine months to the day from her nuptials - by 18th century
>> calculation - and was pregnant with metronomic regularity every two
>> years until her death.
>>
>> It seems to me that the paternity issue and the sexuality issue ought
>> to be seen as very different considerations. The former may be
>> problematic to some, but the idea of Jefferson the monk seems
>> patently absurd.
>>
>> -- Stephan
>>
>>
>> On 1 May 2008, at 17:51, [log in to unmask] wrote:
>>
>>> Accusing a fine Southern gentleman, and one of the founders of our
>>> country,
>>> of adultery when he is not available to defend himself, and on
>>> assumptions
>>> rather than facts, is poor history and quite disrespectful.
>>>
>>> J South
>>>
>>>
>>>
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