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The women Jefferson loved / Virginia Scharff.

by Scharff, Virginia.

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Jefferson, Thomas, 1743-1826 -- Relations with women.

Jefferson, Thomas, 1743-1826 -- Family.

Jefferson family.

Presidents -- United States -- Biography.

Contributor biographical information

Publisher description

xxiv, 464 p. : ill. (some col.) ; 24 cm.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

I. Jane : The planter's daughter ; The planter's wife ; The widow Jefferson ; The revolutionary's mother -- II. Martha : The debt collector's daughter ; Bride and widow ; Mr. and Mrs. Jefferson ; Martha's property ; His world and hers ; Domestic tranquility ; The war comes home ; The butcher's bill -- III. Sally : Stories and shadow families ; Summoned and sent ; Paris ; Amazons versus angels ; Sally's choice ; Coming home -- IV. Patsy and Polly : Patsy and Polly ; Trouble in the neighborhood ; Domestic tranquility, revisited ; Danger ; Scandal ; Motherhood and mortality -- V. A house divided : Domestic diversification ; The pursuit of happiness ; The perils of matrimony ; The capriciousness of fortune ; When we think how we liv'd but to love them.

Throughout his life, Thomas Jefferson constructed a seemingly impenetrable wall between his public legacy and his private life. Now Virginia Scharff breaks down the barrier between Jefferson's public and private histories to offer an intriguing new portrait of this complicated and influential figure, as seen through the lives of a remarkable group of women. Scharff brings together for the first time in one volume the stories of these diverse women, separated by race but related by blood, including Jefferson's mother, Jane Randolph; his wife, Martha; her half sister, Sally Hemings, his slave mistress; his daughters; and his granddaughters. "Their lives, their Revolutions, their vulnerabilities, shaped the choices Jefferson made, from the selection of words and ideas in his Declaration, to the endless building of his mountaintop mansion, to the vision of a great agrarian nation that powered his Louisiana Purchase," Scharff writes. Based on a wealth of sources, including family letters, and written with empathy and great insight, The Women Jefferson Loved is a welcome new look at this legendary American and one that offers a fresh twist on American history itself.

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