Randolph, Martha Jefferson (1775–1836)

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Randolph, Martha Jefferson (1775–1836)

American hostess and close companion of her father Thomas Jefferson. Name variations: Patsy Randolph. Born at Monticello, Albemarle County, Virginia, on September 27, 1775; died on October 10, 1836, and was buried in the graveyard at Monticello; eldest daughter of Thomas Jefferson (president of the United States, 1801–09) and Martha (Wayles) Jefferson (1748–1782); married her cousin Thomas Mann Randolph, Jr. (a congressional representative and governor of Virginia), on February 23, 1790; children: twelve, including Anne Carey Randolph (b. 1791); Thomas Jefferson Randolph (b. 1792); Ellen (1794–1795); Ellen Wayles Randolph Coolidge (b. 1796, who married Joseph Coolidge, Jr.); Cornelia Jefferson Randolph (b. 1799); Virginia Jefferson Randolph (b. 1801); Mary Jefferson Randolph (b. 1803); James Madison Randolph (b. 1806); Benjamin Franklin Randolph (b. 1808); Meriwether Lewis Randolph (b. 1810); Septimia Anne Randolph (b. 1814); George Wythe Randolph (b. 1818).

Martha Jefferson Randolph was born at Monticello in 1775, the eldest daughter of Thomas Jefferson, future president of the United States, and Martha Jefferson , a half-niece of Sally Hemings . A tall redhead with freckles, Martha, known as Patsy, not only resembled her father, but was apparently the most devoted to him of all the six Jefferson children. Only seven when her mother died, she accompanied her father to Philadelphia, where he attended the Continental Congress, and then sojourned with him on a five-year diplomatic mission to Paris, beginning in 1784. Thomas took a great interest in Martha's education, sending her to a series of small private schools in Philadelphia, and to the exclusive Abbaye Royale de Panthémont in Paris, where she studied a traditional feminine curriculum emphasizing the arts. While at school, Martha spent weekends with her father at the Hôtel de Longeac, and during their long separations, she corresponded with him regularly. "His letters from that period now seem excessively didactic and moralistic," writes Dumas Malone in Notable American Women, "but she took admonitions with good grace and was in all respects a dutiful daughter. The bond between them grew stronger with the passing years."

On February 23, 1790, only a few weeks following the Jeffersons' return to Virginia, Martha married her cousin Thomas Mann Randolph in a ceremony at Monticello. Young Thomas, who went on to serve as a U.S. congressional representative and the governor of Virginia, was alienated from his own father and became increasingly dependent on his father-in-law, who helped him acquire Edgehill, an estate a few miles from Monticello. Over the course of her marriage, Martha gave birth to 12 children, one of whom did not survive infancy. Although Martha and the children spent a good deal of time with Jefferson when he was at Monticello, she visited her father only twice during his presidency (1801–09): once around 1802 with her sister Maria Jefferson Eppes , and a second time between 1805–06, during which she gave birth to her eighth child.

Martha's husband Thomas was said to be of superior intelligence, but he was erratic and a poor manager of money. The family's financial situation continued to deteriorate throughout the marriage, and Thomas Jefferson assumed responsibility for the education of his grandchildren. One of them, his namesake Thomas Jefferson Randolph (b. 1792), took over the management of Jefferson's financial affairs during the last decade of his life. After her father left the White House in 1809, Martha spent most of her time with him at Monticello.

Following Thomas Jefferson's death in 1826 and the death of her husband in 1828, Martha's financial situation grew more acute. Eventually, she was awarded $10,000 from the legislature of South Carolina, which was the only thing that saved her from impoverishment. She lived out her last years with her daughters in Boston and Washington, D.C., and with her son Thomas Jefferson Randolph, who had taken over possession of Edgehill some years earlier. She died of apoplexy on October 10, 1836, and was buried in the graveyard at Monticello.