Coopering at Monticello
Little is known about coopering at Monticello before the completion of Jefferson's merchant mill (pictured below) at Shadwell in 1807. There the market wheat of Jefferson and his neighbors was ground into flour and shipped in barrels down the Rivanna and James Rivers to Richmond to market.
Jefferson
had two cooper's shops near the Shadwell mill which provided additional
income by supplying flour barrels to the tenants of his mill.
The weekly task of each shop was fifty-four barrels, or nine each
working day.
The coopers and their assistants were Jefferson's slaves. Barnaby Gillette (b. 1783), son of Edward, a carter, and Jane, a farm laborer, started his working life as a nailmaker at age eleven and was also trained as a shoemaker. He was active as a cooper from at least 1813. As an incentive, Jefferson allowed Barnaby to keep one of every thirty-one barrels he made to sell for his own benefit.
Another cooper was Nace (b. 1796), the son of Maria, a slave at Jefferson's Poplar Forest plantation. Nace was brought to Monticello by 1810, probably to learn the carpenter's trade. He was working fulltime as a cooper by 1819, receiving the same incentive as Barnaby (in June 1821, Jefferson gave Nace an order for forty-five barrels worth about $20, his "premium" for the 1,203 barrels he had made so far that year).
Among the information found in the documentary record are the following:
Undated: "A cooper's task is 4. flour barrels a day from the rough, i.e., from the stuff merely rived out into thicknesses for 2. staves, and 6. barrels a day when the staves are drawn." (Jefferson's Farm Book, p. 106)
1813: "Promised Barnaby to give him one barrel out of every 31. he sends to the mill." (Jefferson's Memorandum Book, 17 March)
1821: "The staves of a flour barrel are got 28.I. long
and dress to 27.I.
It takes 16. or 17. staves to a barrel and 6. heading pieces,
22. or 23. in all.
A cut of a middle sized tree yields 16. or 17. bolts, which give
4. staves each.
Such a tree, midling good will yield 18. or 20. cuts.
A cut will make 3. barrels, staves and heading.
One tree with another will make 50. barrels." (Farm Book, p. 114)
Nail-making, ploughing, and textile manufacture are also featured.
--Monticello Research Department, May 1990