Although Jefferson was obviously a gifted and intelligent man who played a crucial role in our country, he was perhaps one of the greatest politicians who ever lived. Slate is published by The Slate Group, a Graham Holdings Company.Slate relies on advertising to support our journalism. Please try againSorry, we failed to record your vote.

She enlists historic and political dimensions and details for explanation of the fact of the Hemings existence abd particular hopes and trials in their geneologicy.

This was one of the more even handed and well written attempts I've read.

It is important to remember this biography might also qualify as a microhistory, for the life of Sally Hemings was “exceptionally normal” in many ways: Her master/owner fornicated, reproduced and socialized with her, creating a murky line between slavery and something else altogether in the process. By 1789, when they witnessed the outbreak of the French Revolution, the Hemings siblings had seen “more of the world and experienced more of what was in it than the vast majority of their countrymen, white or black.” That fateful year, the 16-year-old Sally became pregnant by then 46-year-old Jefferson (such age differences were not uncommon at the time), and the two Hemingses returned to the United States. One of Elizabeth’s sons became Jefferson’s butler and another his valet, while James, a third, became a personal servant. A Fascinating History of Thomas Jeffeson and His "Family" Please try againSorry, we failed to record your vote. Albeit a heavy book it is very worthy of reading. interesting although I would have preferred the primary sources set out in more detail the footnotes were not sufficient to satisfy me. Please try againSorry, we failed to record your vote. This epic work-named a best book of the year by the Washington Post, Time, the Los Angeles Times, Amazon, the San Francisco Chronicle, and a notable book by the New York Times-tells the story of the Hemingses, whose close blood ties to our third president had been systematically expunged from American history until very recently.

This was a great followup to Jon Meacham's book on Jefferson.

Harriet Tubman: The Road to Freedom



Korea, Republic of She makes a convincing argument for genuine affection between Jefferson and Hemings. History can be so interesting if told in a way to make the people come to life.

While her patient assessment of the strengths and weaknesses of various interpretations often slows the book’s pace to a crawl, her caution is understandable. I think his affair with Sally Hemings is not hard to understand as she was related to Jefferson's late wife. Please try againSorry, we failed to record your vote.





There was a notification when I started reading that illustrations had been left out due to 'licensing restrictions', but surely this is not the case for tangible copies of this book. Over the course of their years together, Sally bore Jefferson seven children, four of whom lived into adulthood and resembled him more than his legitimate descendants, both physically and temperamentally. Please try againSorry, we failed to record your vote. Read excerpts from Annette Gordon-Reed’s The Hemingses of Monticello on The Root.

The Hemingses of Monticello will give you much to think about.

Now some of the negative reviews seem to complain that this was too dry and boring ( disappointed lovers of historical fiction? How many times need a reader be told 1770 is not 2000? Jefferson promised her a comfortable home surrounded by kin and freedom to their children—both promises he kept.
Just MHO of course.

In exploring the history and experience of her family line, both before and after her position in it, Gordon-Reed has documented the experience of a slave in America. The author fleshes out the lives of Sally Hemings and those around her without ever coming close to turning it into historical fiction. Then you can start reading Kindle books on your smartphone, tablet, or computer - no Kindle device required.

The tedium renders what could have been a lovely story a model of prolixity. In contrast to so much popular work on the Revolutionary era, history is viewed here not through the eyes a Founding Father but through those of the people he enslaved. As Jefferson climbed the political world, becoming secretary of state and later president, the Hemingses continued their strange existence “at once at the center and periphery of momentous events in the life of the nation.” James cooked the food over which the famous “dinner table bargain” among Jefferson, James Madison, and Alexander Hamilton was settled.

You're listening to a sample of the Audible audio edition.Something went wrong. Not having yet finished the book, it seems that the author went to great length to analyze the relations between Jefferson and Sally Hemings based on all the knowledge that she got, not only from that personal history but also from the whole slavery system.

Having said that, if you can filter out the redundancy and push on, the book has an important message, not only about the horrors of slavery but about human nature and what people are able to overcome if given half a chance. She does not shy away from controversy and is very fair in her approach to Jefferson’s contradictions. She masterfully fills in gaps from fragmentary evidence.

In order to navigate out of this carousel please use your heading shortcut key to navigate to the next or previous heading.This shopping feature will continue to load items when the Enter key is pressed. His 14-year-old sister, Sally, joined him three years later, escorting Jefferson’s daughter (and her half-niece) Polly. This book is, of course, extraordinarily detailed; the author has indeed amassed an astounding amount of background material, despite the fact that early American slave-owners like Jefferson, while being exhaustively detailed about documenting "white" family matters, were typically extremely reticent or negligent concerning their servants. Their story is powerful and enlightening.