Children: Jefferson
Quotations
1787 Feb. 7. "In America, on the other hand, the society of your husband, the fond cares for the children...fill every moment with a healthy and an useful activity." (TJ to Anne Willing Bingham, B.11.123)
1787 Mch. 28. "No body in this world can make me so happy or so miserable as you." (TJ to MJR, B.11.251)
1792
Jan. 15. "...And dear little Anne [grandaughter, age 1], with
whom even Socrates might ride on a stick without being ridiculous."
(TJ to MJR, B.23.44)
1793 Jan. 26. "You were never more mistaken than in supposing you were too long on the prattle &c. of little Anne. I read it with quite as much pleasure as you write it." (TJ to MJR, FAM110)
[1801] Jan. 4. "For be assured that no considerations in this world would compensate to me a separation from yourself and your sister." (TJ to MJEppes, FAM190-1)
1807 July 12. "My happiness at Monticello (if I am able to go there) will be lessened by not having yourself and Francis [grandson, age 5] there....He will ever be to me one of the dearest objects in life." (TJ to JWEppes, Ford.10.457)
1807 Oct. 8. "I sincerely congratulate you on the addition to your family announced in the last. The good old book speaking of children says 'happy is the man who hath his quiver full of them.'" (TJ to Caesar Rodney, Ford.10.502)
1808 Dec. 25. "An only daughter and numerous family of grandchildren, will furnish me great resources of happiness." (TJ to Charles Thomson, Ford.11.84)
1810 Feb. 12. "The boys of the rising generation are to be the men of the next, and the sole guardians of the principles we deliver over to them." (TJ to Samuel Knox, L&B.12.360)
1812 Jan. 21. "...I live in the midst of my grandchildren, one of whom has lately promoted me to be a great grandfather." (TJ to John Adams, Writings, 1260)
1820 Dec. 27. "My daughter Randolph, whom you knew in Paris a young girl, is now the mother of eleven living children, the grandmother of about half a dozen others, enjoys health and good spirits, and sees the worth of her husband attested by his being at present Governor of the State in which we live. Among these, I live like a patriarch of old." (TJ to Maria Cosway, L&B.18.309)
--Kristen K. Onuf, Monticello Research Department, 22 March 1991
Pictured: Baby shoes worn by Jefferson's granddaughter, Martha Jefferson Trist; photograph by H. Andrew Johnson