Common Questions

What was the nature of the connection between Sally Hemings and Thomas Jefferson?

“Certainly a relationship between a master and his slave is one that’s incredibly unbalanced in terms of power. I have no idea what kind of affection or love was involved. But he made a promise that he would free her children when they turned 21. And he did so.”

When it comes to the specific dynamic between Jefferson and Hemings, descendants and historians have a range of opinions. Some believe that Hemings had more agency than might be imagined. Others consider any connection of this type a form of assault or rape. And there are many opinions in between. The reality is, we just don’t know.

Look Closer: Sex, Power, Slavery

How do we know that Jefferson was the father of Sally Hemings’s children?

The historical evidence points to the truth of Madison Hemings’s words about “my father, Thomas Jefferson.” Although the dominant narrative long denied his paternity, since 1802, oral histories, published recollections, statistical data, and documents have identified Thomas Jefferson as the father of Sally Hemings’s children. In 1998, a DNA study genetically linked one of Hemings’s male descendants with the male line of the Jefferson family, adding to the wealth of evidence.

Look Closer: Read more about the evidence in Thomas Jefferson and Sally Hemings: A Brief Account

Were people aware of the connection between Thomas Jefferson and Sally Hemings at the time?

“He talks about Jefferson keeping a woman as a substitute for a wife ... and he described this as something as being prevalent and not uncommon in the south.”

Yes. Prior to James Callender’s 1802 article, which pointedly identified both Thomas Jefferson and Sally Hemings, newspaper articles, vulgar poems, and local gossip alluded to the matter. Historians assert that Callender confirmed the details he published about Jefferson and Hemings by speaking with Jefferson’s Albemarle County neighbors. Similarly, in his 1811 visit to Charlottesville, Elijah Fletcher heard about Thomas Jefferson, Sally Hemings, and their children from people he met. Decades later, Jefferson’s close friend John Hartwell Cocke commented twice about Jefferson and Sally Hemings in his diary.

What did Sally Hemings look like?

We don’t know. There are no known images of Sally Hemings from her lifetime, and her appearance was described by only two individuals who knew her:

“Sally was mighty near white...Sally was very handsome, long straight hair down her back.” Formerly enslaved blacksmith Isaac (Granger) Jefferson (1847)

“Light colored and decidedly good looking.” Jefferson’s grandson Thomas Jefferson Randolph (ca. 1851)

Although evocative, these descriptions leave out nearly every detail—height, frame, eye color, hair color, and the shape of her face and its features—needed to construct an adequate representation of her looks.

Where did Sally Hemings live at Monticello?

Sally Hemings may have lived in the stone workmen’s house (now called the “Textile Workshop”) from 1790 to 1793, when she—like her sister Critta—might have moved to one of the new 12’ × 14’ log dwellings farther down Mulberry Row. After the completion of the South Wing, Hemings lived in one of the “servant’s rooms” there.

How do we know Sally Hemings lived in the South Wing?

Evidence that Sally Hemings lived in one of the spaces in the South Wing comes from Jefferson’s grandson Thomas J. Randolph through Henry S. Randall, who wrote one of the first major biographies of Thomas Jefferson and was in contact with many members of the Jefferson family. Randolph did not specifically point out the exact room, but the description related through Randall suggests that Sally Hemings and her children occupied one of two rooms in the South Wing.

Was Sally Hemings ever freed?

Sally Hemings was never officially freed. However, after Jefferson’s death, she was allowed to live in Charlottesville in unofficial freedom with her two sons, Madison and Eston, who were granted freedom in Jefferson’s will.

Did Sally Hemings and her children receive special treatment at Monticello?

No, and yes. Jefferson’s written records indicate no special treatment for Sally Hemings or her family. They received the same provisions of food, clothing and housing as other enslaved individuals at Monticello.

But in his recollections, Madison Hemings stated that Jefferson promised Sally Hemings “extraordinary privileges” for returning to Monticello from Paris. Chief among these were freedom for her children who “were free from the dread of having to be slaves all our lives long” and were “always permitted to be with our mother who was well used.”

All of their children learned skills that could support them in freedom. Harriet Hemings spun yarn and wove cloth, an occupation that was not solely associated with slavery. Plenty of white women spun and wove. Their male children learned woodworking under the direction of their uncle John Hemmings, a master carpenter and joiner. Woodworking at Monticello likely brought them in regular contact with their father. Madison noted that his father “always had mechanics at work for him, such as carpenters, blacksmiths, shoemakers, coopers, &c. It was his mechanics he seemed mostly to direct, and in their operations he took great interest.”

All four surviving children of Jefferson and Hemings were granted their freedom, either being allowed to leave Monticello with Jefferson’s knowledge and assistance, or through his will.

What was Sally Hemings’s racial identity?

We don’t know how Sally Hemings would have identified herself. She was three-quarters-European and one-quarter African. In two separate censuses taken near the end of her life, Hemings’s race is recorded as white in one and as mulatto in the other, hinting at shifting notions of her identity. Of her surviving children, who were 7/8 European and 1/8 African, three passed as white and one identified as black.

Race did not cement Beverly, Harriet, Madison, and Eston Hemings’s status as slaves; it was the fact that their mother was enslaved. Children, no matter their racial background, inherited slavery from their mothers.

Was Jefferson a racist?

Like many other 18th-century intellectuals in Europe and North America, Jefferson believed blacks were inferior to whites. In his only book, Notes on the State of Virginia (1785), Jefferson expressed racist views of blacks’ abilities, though he questioned whether the differences he observed were due to inherent inferiority or to decades of degrading enslavement. He also believed that white Americans and enslaved blacks constituted two “separate nations” who could not live together peacefully in the same country. Of this inevitable rift, he wrote:

“Deep rooted prejudices entertained by the whites; ten thousand recollections, by the blacks, of the injuries they have sustained ... will divide us into parties, and produce convulsions, which will probably never end but in the extermination of one or the other race.”

Look Closer: Learn more through our additional resources.