Thomas Jefferson Considers Gifts to His Grandchildren

Poplar Forest, a plantation Jefferson inherited at his wife's death, was a significant source of income. In 1805 he wrote to his Poplar Forest estate manager:

“The time is now approaching when I shall wish to be parceling off some of my lands to my grandchildren. This renders it necessary that I should understand the separate value of each portion of them distinctly. As no person is so well acquainted with them as yourself, I must ask a favor of you to consider the questions on the paper enclosed, and to write at the end of each the answer in figures, and to send me the same paper to Monticello, by the first post.”

The previously unknown letter is now for sale.

In that same year of 1805, Jefferson began work on this octagonal house.

 Poplar Forest
Photo via Wikimedia Commons

The Peasant Prince

Last year we mentioned the will of Thaddeus Kosciuszko, the great Polish-American patriot, and his unfaithful executor, Thomas Jefferson. Alex Storozynski has written a new biography of Kosciuszko, The Peasant Prince. Judging from Storozynski's appearance on the Diane Rehm show this morning, he spins a fascinating story of the man who believed everyone, including American slaves and European serfs, should live free.

Despite Jefferson's eventual refusal to use Kosciuszko's U.S. estate to fund freedom for slaves, he and Kosciuszko remained friends for life. Guess who gave Jefferson his sable coat.

Thomas Jefferson by Rembrant Peale, 1805

A Friend of Liberty and His Unfaithful Executor

In Maine and Massachusetts, today is a holiday. Patriots' Day marks the anniversary of The Shot Heard Round the World in April, 1775. Eleven months later, the British evacuated Boston. A few months after that, in July, 1776, the United States proclaimed its independence. The following month, a young European, recruited in France by Silas Deane and Ben Franklin, arrived in this country.

Thaddeus Kosciusko served the American cause so well that by war's end he was a brigadier general. Our grateful nation awarded him citizenship, a grant of land and a considerable sum of money. Thaddeus clearly believed that Jefferson's words in the Declaration of Independence, "All men are created equal," were the greatest ever written. He used the money to buy freedom for slaves.

Thaddeus became a close friend of Jefferson, and together they hatched a plan to change the course of history. As recounted here, the plan involved Thaddeus's will, and the will's executor was to be Jefferson. Alas, after Thaddeus died in 1817, Jefferson refused to serve.

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If Kosciusko were easier to spell, Americans would remember Thaddeus as fondly as we do the marquis de La Fayette. If you know as little about him as I did, read up on this remarkable American, Belarusian, Lithuanian, and Polish national hero.