Thomas Jefferson Papers
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Memorandum to Thomas Mann Randolph, [ca. 16–24 January 1794]

Memorandum to Thomas Mann Randolph

[ca. 16–24 Jan. 1794]

The price of wheat1 and whether it can be sold for the rise of the market?2 The price of molasses.3

Whether my things from Philadelphia addressed to Colo. Gamble4 are arrived?

If they are, send them up by Henderson’s people of preference to the other things.

Send by them the sugar &c for which I wrote to Colo. Gamble.5

After the things last expected from Philadelphia I would wish to receive the tender articles, to wit, Nos. 2. 5. 10. 18. 19. 22. 25. 26. 27. 28. and next to these I wish for Nos. 45. [46.]

[on verso:]

Tell6 Dr. Currie I expect by the first post to receive a letter from Mr. Ingersoll, which alone can enable me to give him information in his matter.7

MS (DLC: TJ Papers, 232: 42031); consists of a rough fragment written by TJ on both sides of an unidentified address cover, with notations by Randolph recorded in notes below; undated and unaddressed, being assigned on the basis of internal and other evidence (see below).

TJ evidently wrote this memorandum shortly after he returned to Monticello on 15 or 16 Jan. 1794, as Randolph prepared for a trip to Richmond. On 23 Dec. 1793, TJ had sent his books and furniture that remained in Philadelphia by sloop to Robert Gamble in Richmond. As Randolph indicated (see note 4 below), they had not yet arrived on 25 Jan. 1794. Already in March 1793, TJ had sent his first large shipment of furniture and belongings, which he numbered as boxes 1 through 66, to Richmond to be stored in a warehouse until he returned to Monticello. TJ’s instructions to Randolph agree with an earlier notice he had given his daughter Martha when he wrote: “As I retained longest here the things most necessary, they are of course those I shall want soonest when I get home. Therefore I would wish them, after their arrival to be carried up in preference to the packages formerly sent” (MB description begins James A. Bear, Jr., and Lucia C. Stanton, eds., Jefferson’s Memorandum Books: Accounts, with Legal Records and Miscellany, 1767–1826, Princeton, 1997, The Papers of Thomas Jefferson, Second Series description ends , 30 Mch. 1793, 15–16 Jan. 1794; TJ to Thomas Mann Randolph, 28 July 1793; TJ to Caleb Lownes, 18 Dec. 1793; TJ to Gamble and TJ to Martha Jefferson Randolph, 22 Dec. 1793; TJ to Archibald Stuart, 26 Jan. 1794).

TJ’s letter to Colo. Gamble was probably that recorded in SJL of 17 Jan. 1794, which has not been found but may have been hand delivered to Gamble. For the tender articles, see TJ to Martha Jefferson Randolph, 12 May 1793.

Tell Dr. Currie: since 1791, TJ had attempted to help Dr. James Currie collect a debt owed him by John Tayloe Griffin. In late 1793, TJ contacted Jared Ingersoll to serve as Currie’s attorney in his suit against Griffin (note to John Tayloe Griffin to TJ, 16 June 1793; TJ to James Currie, 8 Dec. 1793). A letter from Ingersoll to TJ of 15 Jan. 1794, recorded in SJL as received 2 Feb. 1794, has not been found. According to SJL, Ingersoll and TJ exchanged eight other letters between 2 Feb. 1794 and 4 Jan. 1796, all of which are missing.

1Beginning at this point, the following is interlined in Randolph’s hand: “⅚ in Richd. at 30 days. 5/9 may be obtained at same credit in Petersg. it is said.”

2Randolph here answered: “it cannot.”

3Randolph here wrote: “¾ by the Hhd.”

4Randolph here interlined: “not arrived on Jan. 25.”

5Randolph here wrote: “directed to be sent by 1st. waggon.” He continued with the following interlineation: “and in consequence of the general inoculation it was impossible to get Porters.”

6The following appears at the top of the fragment in Randolph’s hand: “a box of the Encyclopedia sent round to—Mason in Richmond from Georgetown,” Randolph adding, probably at a later date and in a smaller hand: “-directed to be lodged at Colo. Gambles to be taken thence by the first waggon.”

7Following in Randolph’s hand: “communicated by note.”

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