The Hemingses of Monticello: An American FamilyBy Annette Gordon-Reed WW Norton, 798pp. £21.99 THE FOUNDING fathers of the American Republic would have been shocked by the name-calling in the recent presidential election. They would have been shocked by how tame it all was. When Thomas Jefferson ran against the sitting president, John Adams, in 1800 the campaign became so vicious that the first lady, Abigail Adams, feared that it would "ruin and corrupt the minds and morals of the best people in the world" writes Patrick Geoghegan.
It was claimed that if Jefferson was elected then murder, rape and incest would become the law of the land, while Adams was accused of wanting to marry his son to a daughter of King George III and create an American dynasty.
Some of the stories were considered too outlandish to be true. It was alleged that Jefferson was living with one of his slaves and had fathered a number of children with her. Few thought this was possible of the man behind the Declaration of Independence (and the inventor of the swivel chair) and Jefferson was elected the third president of the United States.
It is only in recent years (and thanks in part to DNA testing) that the true story of Thomas Jefferson's 38-year relationship with Sally Hemings has been revealed. But the complexity of the relationship between Jefferson and the Hemingses is still only gradually emerging, for example the fact that Sally Hemings was the half-sister of his own late wife (and bore a remarkable resemblance to her). One of the leading historians involved in bringing this all to light is Annette Gordon-Reed, both a professor of law at New York Law School and a professor of history at Rutgers University. Her new book seeks to reconstruct the story of the Hemings family, from the birth of Elizabeth Hemings (Sally's mother) in 1735 to the death of Jefferson in 1826 and the emancipation of Sally's four children (the 130 other slaves were sold at auction).
Thomas Jefferson is the enigma at the heart of this story. He was uncommonly tall for the period, a little over 6ft 2in, thin, with red hair and hazel eyes. His connection with the Hemings family began when he fell in love with and married a widow, Martha Wayles Skelton, in 1772. Martha's father, John Wayles, owned a number of slaves, including Elizabeth Hemings. And what everyone knew, but never talked about, was that half of Elizabeth Hemings's 12 children had been fathered by John Wayles, including a daughter, Sarah (known as Sally). When John Wayles died the Hemingses were inherited by Martha and thus came to live at Jefferson's "quixotic dream world" of Monticello.
Monticello was more than Jefferson's home in Virginia. It was a projection of his personality: ambitious, innovative, self-indulgent, brilliant. On the top of an 867ft "little mountain", Monticello allowed Jefferson to maintain a lofty distance from the rest of the world, and reflect on life and politics. In his early days he reflected much on the problem of slavery, but concern gradually gave way to compromise, and compromise eventually became a refusal to challenge.
Jefferson's wife, Martha, died in 1782, soon after giving birth to their fourth child. On her deathbed she extracted a promise that he would never remarry, a promise that he observed to the letter, and no further. Sent to Paris as American ambassador, he was happier than perhaps at any other time of his life. He was joined there in 1787 by one of his slaves, Sally Hemings, the 14-year-old half-sister of his wife. It is impossible to date the start of their relationship, though it was certainly sexual by 1790, when she gave birth to their first child. Gordon-Reed gives Jefferson the benefit of the doubt when assessing the relationship, seeing it as a genuine love affair. Still, it is hard not to be uncomfortable about a man in his late 40s embarking on a sexual relationship with a slave girl in her teens. However, as evidence for the defence, the author notes that Hemings returned to the United States in 1790 to be with Jefferson, when she could have remained in France and be free.
By the time of the election of 1800, gossip about Jefferson and Hemings was widespread in Virginia. Jefferson was well aware that the scandal could destroy his career, especially as his opponents began hinting they had "damning proof" of his "depravity". But the story never generated enough momentum to ruin him. Jefferson spent eight years in the White House, but refused to bring Hemings or their children with him. Gordon-Reed suggests that it was because it would have "caused all sorts of complications, not the least of them cute babies running around who looked just like him". However, he was unable to stop the speculation during his time in office.
In January 2009, the cute black children of a sitting president will finally be able to run around the White House. The third president of the United States would have recognised the ending and the beginning represented by the inauguration of president number 44. Sally Hemings would have understood even better.
Patrick Geoghegan teaches American history at Trinity College Dublin. His new book, King Dan: the Rise of Daniel O'Connell, was recently published by Gill and Macmillan