Thomas Jefferson Papers
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https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Jefferson/03-02-02-0098

Thomas Jefferson to Elizabeth Eppes, 9 January 1810

To Elizabeth Eppes

Monticello Jan. 9. 10.

Dear Madam

Your favor of Dec. 9. did not get to hand till the day before yesterday, and then without the article for Francis said to be inclosed. whether forgotten to be inclosed or lost by the way yourself will be able to know. Francis had written his first letter to his papa, his second to his Mama, and had been promising to prepare one for yourself for a day or two before the reciept of yours. it is now inclosed. he has enjoyed the most perfect & constant health. writes much in the day, and reads a great deal; led to it of his own accord by the little books of amusement his cousins furnish him. it has been a great pleasure to me to have him with me: & indeed he has enamoured us all by his excellent dispositions. I shall restore him to you in April, in person, when it is expected another meeting will be necessary on the subject which procured me the pleasure of visiting you last autumn. the same circumstance reconciles me to the next journey, or I should leave the business to the young people. forty years of pure friendship have, in my feelings, identified yourself and family with my own: and certainly there is no portion of my life on which I look back with such heart-felt satisfaction as that during which ourselves & families were the most intimately associated. time, in wearing away our impressions, seems kindly to leave the earliest for the last. that you may enjoy, in health & happiness as many years as yourself may desire, for the comfort of your family & friends, is the sincere prayer of your affectionate & constant friend

Th: Jefferson

PoC (CSmH: JF); at foot of text: “Mrs E. Eppes”; endorsed by TJ. Enclosure not found.

Elizabeth Wayles Eppes (1752–1810), the half sister of TJ’s deceased wife Martha, married TJ’s close friend Francis Eppes (ca. 1747–1808) about 1769 and moved with him around 1780 to Eppington, on the Appomattox River in southern Chesterfield County. TJ’s youngest daughter, Lucy Elizabeth Jefferson, died at Eppington in 1784 while he was in France (Dorman, Eppes Descendants, 2:397–8; PTJ description begins Julian P. Boyd, Charles T. Cullen, John Catanzariti, Barbara B. Oberg, and others, eds., The Papers of Thomas Jefferson, 1950– , 31 vols. description ends , 1:86–7; TJ to Archibald Thweatt, 14 June 1810).

Eppes’s favor of dec. 9, not found, is recorded in SJL as received from Eppington on 7 Jan. 1810. In October 1809 TJ visited Eppington going to and returning from a meeting in Richmond concerning the estates of Bathurst Skelton and John Wayles (MB description begins James A. Bear Jr. and Lucia C. Stanton, eds., Jefferson’s Memorandum Books: Accounts, with Legal Records and Miscellany, 1767–1826, 1997, The Papers of Thomas Jefferson, Second Series description ends , 2:1248–9).

Index Entries

  • clothing; socks search
  • education; at Monticello search
  • Eppes, Elizabeth Wayles (TJ’s sister-in-law; John Wayles Eppes’s mother); and F. Eppes search
  • Eppes, Elizabeth Wayles (TJ’s sister-in-law; John Wayles Eppes’s mother); identified search
  • Eppes, Elizabeth Wayles (TJ’s sister-in-law; John Wayles Eppes’s mother); letters from accounted for search
  • Eppes, Elizabeth Wayles (TJ’s sister-in-law; John Wayles Eppes’s mother); letters to search
  • Eppes, Francis Wayles (TJ’s grandson); education of, at Monticello search
  • Eppes, Francis Wayles (TJ’s grandson); relationship with father search
  • Eppes, Francis Wayles (TJ’s grandson); socks sent to search
  • Eppes, Francis Wayles (TJ’s grandson); TJ’s relationship with search
  • Eppes, John Wayles (TJ’s son-in-law); relationship with son search
  • Eppes, Martha Burke Jones (John Wayles Eppes’s second wife); and F. Eppes search
  • Eppington (Eppes’s Chesterfield Co. estate); TJ visits search
  • Gilliam v. Fleming; and settlement of accounts search
  • Jefferson, Thomas; Family & Friends; friendship with E. Eppes search
  • Jefferson, Thomas; Family & Friends; relations with grandchildren search
  • Monticello (TJ’s estate); schooling at search
  • Skelton, Bathurst; and Gilliam v. Fleming search
  • Wayles, John (TJ’s father-in-law); and Gilliam v. Fleming search
  • women; letters to; E. Eppes search