Lucy Jefferson Lewis

Lucy Jefferson (October 10, 1752–1811), also known as Lucy Jefferson Lewis, was a younger sister of United States President Thomas Jefferson and the wife of Charles Lilburn Lewis.

Contents

Early life and education

Born in Albemarle County, Virginia, she was the eighth of Peter Jefferson and Jane Randolph Jefferson's 10 children.[1][2] She was born into an elite planter family and would have been educated at home by her mother, together with her sisters. Their father died when they were young.

Marriage and family

At age 17, Jefferson married her first cousin, Charles Lilburne Lewis, on September 12, 1769.[3] The couple eventually had eight children: Randolph, Isham, Jane Jefferson, Lilburne, Mary Randolph, Lucy B., Martha, and Ann (Nancy).[3]

The family, except for Jane and Mary, who had married, moved to Livingston County, Kentucky in 1806 or 1808, following their grown sons Randolph and Lilburne and their families.[3] They built a plantation called "Rocky Hill" near the present-day town of Smithland. Her older brother Thomas Jefferson took an interest in the education of her sons, and encouraged them in their studies.

President Jefferson had named a daughter, Lucy Elizabeth Jefferson I (1780–1781), after his sister. After she died as an infant, he named his next daughter after Lucy, too, and gave her the middle name of their sister Elizabeth. The second Lucy died at the age of 3.[4]

Lucy Jefferson Lewis died in 1811. She was buried on the grounds of the plantation, but the gravesite has been lost. The estate is now in ruins.[5]

In 1812, the year after their mother and brother Randolph had died, Lilburne and Isham Lewis were drinking and argued with and murdered a slave named George. The crime brought the entire family into disrepute. They had tried to hide the youth's remains, but his skull was revealed by the collapse of a chimney during the second New Madrid earthquake. The brothers were arrested but bailed out.[6] Lilburne urged Isham to join him in a suicide pact, but died almost by accident, and Isham did not go through with it. Held as an accessory in his brother's suicide while it was investigated, Isham escaped from jail and disappeared.

Commemoration

Ancestry

See also

References

  1. ^ a b c Teitloff, Faye Tramble (2009) "North Livingston County" The Images of America: Livingston County Charleston, South Carolina: Arcadia Publishing pp. 55–56 ISBN 0738567027, 9780738567020 http://books.google.com/books?id=IX8q3ZI8hw8C&lpg=PP1&pg=PA55#v=onepage&q&f=false 
  2. ^ "Jane Randolph Jefferson" Monticello, Home of Thomas Jefferson Charlottesville, Virginia: Thomas Jefferson Foundation, Inc. February 2003 http://www.monticello.org/site/jefferson/jane-randolph-jefferson. Retrieved November 1, 2010 
  3. ^ a b c Sorley, Merrow Egerton (2000) [1935] "Chapter 13: Col Charles Lewis of Buck Island" Lewis of Warner Hall: The History of a Family Baltimore, Maryland: Genealogical Publishing Co. ISBN 0806308311, 9780806308319 http://books.google.com/books?id=yeWgvfDpwbwC&lpg=PP1&pg=PA345#v=onepage&q&f=false 
  4. ^ Quinn-Musgrove, Sandra L.; Kanter, Sanford (1995) "Thomas Jefferson's Children" America's Royalty: All the Presidents' Children (2 ed.) Greenwood Publishing Group pp. 21–22 ISBN 0313295352, 9780313295355 http://books.google.com/books?id=D6egBFIqZJQC&lpg=PP1&pg=PA17#v=onepage&q&f=false 
  5. ^ Lucy Jefferson Lewis monument, cited at flickr
  6. ^ a b Stewart, David, and Knox, Ray, The Earthquake America Forgot, Marble Hill, Missouri: Gutenberg-Richter Publications, 1995, pp. 25–31