456:. Thomas J. Randolph had purchased Archy from Monticello after his grandfather Jefferson's death in 1826, when 130 slaves were sold to pay off debts of the estate. Archy Granger matches in age the plantation records of Archy, the son of the slaves Bagwell and Minerva of Monticello. (He was the grandson of Great George and Ursula.) In addition, Randolph family letters document an Archy Granger and his family at their plantation of Edgehill. He appears to have been the nephew of Isaac (Jefferson) Granger, and his use of the Granger name is another indication that it was originally adopted within the family.
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By 1796, Granger had a wife named Iris and a son Joyce. He was working extra hours in the blacksmith shop to make chain traces, for which
Jefferson paid him three pence a pair. According to Jefferson's records, Granger was a most productive nailer. In the first three months of that year, he made 507
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Twenty-first century research by the staff at
Monticello discovered that Isaac Jefferson may have taken the name Isaac Granger in freedom or used it before that in the slave community. Someone else may have later mistakenly assigned him the name of Jefferson. The 1840 census of Petersburg, Virginia
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In the early 1840s, Granger was working as a free man in
Petersburg as a blacksmith, when he was interviewed by Charles Campbell, who published the account that year as the memoir of Isaac Jefferson. Granger did not say whether he took the surname Jefferson by choice or whether a white man imposed
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Isaac
Jefferson died in 1846. According to a document from August 20, 1846, "Isaac Jefferson having been dead more than three months & no person having applied for administration of his estate, it is ordered that the same be committed to J Branch Sergt. of this town to be by him administered
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After the household's return to
Monticello, the president set up a tin shop. Isaac Granger/Jefferson recalled that it did not succeed economically. Training as a blacksmith under his older brother Little George, Isaac added to his skills. Sometime after 1794, he became a nailer as well, and was
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The fate of Isaac's wife Iris and their two sons is unknown. In 1840s, at the time of his memoir, Isaac was married to his second wife. Rev. Charles
Campbell wrote that Isaac Jefferson died "a few years after these his recollections were taken down. He bore a good character." Campbell may have
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of
Monticello in 1797, the only slave to reach that position under Thomas Jefferson. He was paid an annual wage of £20. In 1773, Jefferson had purchased Isaac's mother Ursula and she became a highly trusted domestic slave. She served as a pastry cook and laundress, with duties including meat
247:. Rev. Charles Campbell interviewed him there and published his memoir under the name of Isaac Jefferson in 1847 a year after Isaac's death. Granger/Jefferson describes Thomas Jefferson as a master and his part in the lives of his slaves.
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The
Monticello staff have found another reference to the Granger surname in Monticello and related records: in the 1870 census of Albemarle County, an Archy Granger and his family were living at Edgehill Plantation, then owned by
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for several years to a tinsmith, a skilled and valued trade. Isaac
Jefferson's account is the only source for this aspect of his working life. He learned to make graters, pepper boxes, and tin cups, about four dozen a day.
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In
October 1797, Thomas Jefferson gave Isaac, his wife Iris, and their sons Joyce and Squire to his daughter Maria and John Wayles Eppes as part of their marriage settlement. This was customary practice in those years by
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Isaac spent his childhood on the plantation near his parents. His early tasks included carrying fuel, lighting fires, and opening gates. Because Jefferson took Great George, Ursula, and their family with him to
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in 1798. Their daughter, Maria, was born soon after. Isaac's memoir suggests that he lived at Monticello during Jefferson's retirement years. He and his family may have been chosen to accompany
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in 1797 as a wedding gift, Isaac Jefferson/Granger appeared to gain his freedom by 1822 according to his memoir. In the 1840 census, he was recorded as Isaac Granger, a free man working in
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pounds of nails in 47 days, wasting the least amount of nail rod in the process. He earned the highest daily return for his master: the equivalent of eighty-five cents a day.
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traditions within the slave community.) Shortly after Great George's death, Thomas Jefferson gave Isaac $ 11, the value of "his moiety of a colt left him by his father."
420:. In the interview, Granger recounted details about the relationship of Thomas Jefferson and the Hemings (or Hemmings) family. He said that "folks said that"
428:. Some scholars think that adds weight to other historic testimony that Sally Hemings and her five full siblings were half-siblings of the president's wife
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In 1799 and 1800, Isaac's parents and brother Little George all died within a few months of each other. While ill, the family members consulted a black
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Edited by James Adam Bear, Jr., Charlottesville, Virginia, 1967, pg. 4. This book includes recollections of Isaac Jefferson, c. 1847, and Edmund Bacon.
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and Great George (a son Archy died in early childhood before Isaac was born). His father rose in the hierarchy from foreman of labor to become
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family played at Monticello as domestic slaves, skilled artisans and craftsmen, and staff who ran the president's mansion.
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needed a blacksmith, he leased Isaac from Eppes. Isaac and his young family moved from Eppes's plantation, Millbrook, in
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and at least some of her siblings "was old Mr. Wayles' children" in reference to Jefferson's father-in-law,
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about four years before Jefferson's death, around 1822. He met and talked to the French general, the
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training in the metalworking trades. As president, Jefferson took Isaac as part of his household to
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In 1812, an Isaac belonging to Thomas Mann Randolph ran away and was caught and imprisoned in
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preservation and the bottling of cider. Isaac's older brothers were George and Bagwell.
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Jefferson at Monticello: Recollections of a Monticello Slave and a Monticello Overseer.
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Lucia Stanton, "Monticello to Main Street: The Hemings Family and Charlottesville,"
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who had sufficient slave holdings. He also gave the Eppes the 14-year-old slave
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imposed the name Jefferson to attract more attention to his published memoir.
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How Isaac gained his freedom is unknown. His memoir recounts that he left
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Although Thomas Jefferson gave Isaac and his family to his daughter
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and her children there in 1809, when she moved to help her father.
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Thomas Jefferson Foundation, Monticello Monograph Series, 2000
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living in Buckingham County. (This showed the persistence of
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Free Some Day: The African-American Families of Monticello,
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Plantation & Slavery/ African-American Family Histories
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531:. Edited by Edwin Morris Betts, and James Adam Bear, Jr.
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Born into slavery in 1775, Isaac was the fourth son of
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Probably about 1790 at the age of 15, Isaac began his
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it, as was the case with his fellow Monticello slave
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The Thomas Jefferson Memorial Foundation, Inc., 1993
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553:The Hemmings Family in Buckingham County, Virginia
544:Jefferson's Isaac: From Monticello to Petersburg,
529:The family letters of Thomas Jefferson, 1743-1826
482:"Discoveries about the Family of Isaac Jefferson"
561:The Hemingses of Monticello: An American Family,
488:, Monticello Website, accessed 28 February 2011
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635:People who were enslaved by Thomas Jefferson
180:Man enslaved by Thomas Jefferson (1775–1846)
317:assigned to both nail making and smithing.
358:to the Randolph plantation of Edgehill in
575:The Magazine of Albemarle County History,
563:New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 2008
168:Learn how and when to remove this message
66:Learn how and when to remove this message
29:This article includes a list of general
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212:who crafted and repaired products as a
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509:, Monticello, accessed 23 March 2012
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35:it lacks sufficient corresponding
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308:. He arranged to have the youth
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430:Martha Wayles Skelton Jefferson
93:needs additional citations for
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625:18th-century American slaves
600:Monticello Website Home Page
350:When Jefferson's son-in-law
595:The Thomas Jefferson Portal
454:Septimia Randolph Meikleham
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507:"Isaac Granger Jefferson"
450:Thomas Jefferson Randolph
364:Martha Jefferson Randolph
187:Isaac Jefferson, ca. 1845
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568:Slavery At Monticello,
551:Edna Bolling Jacques,
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158:August 2023
56:August 2023
48:introducing
609:Categories
460:References
302:apprentice
251:Early life
241:Petersburg
226:Monticello
218:blacksmith
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371:conjurer
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290:Yorktown
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274:Richmond
261:overseer
245:Virginia
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