Solidor Milon to Thomas Jefferson, 5 January [1819]
From Solidor Milon
Baltimore Le 5. Janvier 1818. [1819]
honorable Monsieur Jefferson,
Je vous demande pardon de la liberté que j’ose prendre en vous écrivant, Sans avoir l’honneur d’être connu de vous; mais ayant appris que vous etiés en recherche de maîtres capables d’instruire les Elèves du Collège que vous avez fait Elever, et me Sentant dans le cas de repondre à une partie de vos desirs, en enseignant le dessin, les belles Ecritures, la Science de la musique, le Chant, le forte-Piano, le violon, la Guittare, et la Danse; je m’offre à l’épreuve pour un mois, Sans aucun interêt Si vous n’êtes point Satisfait de ma personne, de ma manière d’enseigner, et des méthodes que je pratiquerai.
Je suis Italien, ayant fait mes Etudes et reçu mon Education en france, jeune homme, âgé de trente un an, je n’ai d’autres recommendations à vous offrir qu’une Conduite honorable et des mœurs intègres. J’ai été amené en Amerique par feu Mr George Crowninshield, lors de Son retour d’Europe Sur le Cleopras Barg de Salem. Mr Binjamin Crowninshield, Son frère, Ex Secretaire de la marine, que vous Connaissés Sans doute, pourra vous donner des renseignemens Sur ma personne et mes capacités, Si vous daignés lui en écrire.
En daignant prendre en Consideration la proposition que j’ai l’honneur de vous faire à mon égard, j’ose espérer que vous aurez lieu de vou[s] [a]pplaudir d’avoir employé un homme qui n’a d’autres ressources que dans Ses faibles talents, et d’autre recommendation que Sa vie privée, qui etant Connue de vous, pourra, peut’être, Elle Seule, Suffire pour lui meriter votre Consideration et votre Estime.
honorez-moi, je vous prie, d’une reponse, Et croyez-moi votre tres-Respectueux Serviteur.
S. Milon
P. S. Dans quelques mois encore d’étude de la langue anglaise je pourrais enseigner les langues Italienne, et francaise, ainsi que l’arithemétique.
Editors’ Translation
Baltimore 5. January 1818. [1819]
honorable Mr. Jefferson,
Forgive me for taking the liberty of writing without having the honor of being known to you; but having learned that you were looking for teachers capable of instructing the students at the college you have built and feeling that I could satisfy some of your requirements by teaching drawing, penmanship, music theory, singing, the pianoforte, violin, guitar, and dancing, I offer myself on a one-month trial basis, with no obligation if you are not satisfied with me, my manner of teaching, and my methods.
I am Italian, educated in France, a young man of thirty-one, with no recommendations to offer you other than an honorable conduct and moral integrity. The late Mr. George Crowninshield brought me to America when he returned from Europe on the Cleopatra’s Barge of Salem. Mr. Benjamin Crowninshield, his brother, the former secretary of the navy, whom you undoubtedly know, can inform you of me and my abilities, if you deign to write him on the subject.
By condescending to consider my proposition, I dare hope that you will congratulate yourself for employing a man with no resources other than his feeble talents and no recommendation other than his private life, which, once known by you, will perhaps, by itself, suffice to merit your consideration and esteem.
S. Milon
P. S. After a few more months studying the English language I will be able to teach Italian and French, as well as arithmetic.
RC (MoSHi: TJC-BC); misdated; hole in manuscript; endorsed by TJ as a letter of 5 Jan. 1819 received five days later and so recorded in SJL. RC (DLC); address cover only; with PoC of third page of TJ to Joseph C. Cabell, 1 Mar. 1819, on verso; addressed: “To the honorable Mr Thomas Jefferson Esqr Monnt-Cello. Virginia”; franked; postmarked. Translation by Dr. Genevieve Moene. Enclosed in TJ to John Patterson, 31 Jan. 1819, and Patterson to TJ, 9 Feb. 1819.
Solidor Pierre (or Pierre Solidor) Milon (1787–1887), musician and educator, was born in Nice, then part of the kingdom of Sardinia, and may have studied music in Naples before serving in Napoleon’s army. He met George Crowninshield when the latter toured Europe on his yacht, Cleopatra’s Barge, and he returned with him to the United States, arriving in 1818 at Salem, Massachusetts. Soon thereafter Milon was granted a 160-acre tract in present-day Alabama at the French settlement known as the Vine and Olive Colony, but he sold this land in 1819 without ever having visited it. He was initially peripatetic, singing, performing on stringed instruments, and giving music lessons in Baltimore, Richmond, Norfolk, and Charleston, South Carolina. Except for some years in New York City, he spent his later decades in Philadelphia, performing and teaching in both cities. In 1831 Milon published a pamphlet, General Considerations on the Most Remarkable Natural or Artificial Defects to Which Singers are Liable. Later in life he claimed that on his arrival in the United States he worked as a secret agent for Napoleon’s brother Joseph Bonaparte and traveled on his behalf to Mexico and South America (Francis B. Crowninshield, ed., The Story of George Crowninshield’s Yacht Cleopatra’s Barge [1918], 223; Rafe Blaufarb, Bonapartists in the Borderlands: French Exiles and Refugees on the Gulf Coast, 1815–1835 [2005], 178, 214; Baltimore Patriot & Mercantile Advertiser, 24 Sept., 27, 31 Oct. 1818, 25 Feb. 1819; Albert Stoutamire, Music of the Old South: Colony to Confederacy [1972], 101, 123, 268; American Beacon and Norfolk & Portsmouth Daily Advertiser, 24 Nov. 1819; Charleston City Gazette and Commercial Daily Advertiser, 28 Dec. 1819; DNA: RG 29, CS, Pa., Philadelphia, 1830, 1860–80, N.Y., New York, 1850; New York Herald, 11, 25 Mar. 1843, 8 Feb. 1844, 21 Mar. 1845; Thomas Louis Ogier, “A Reminiscence of Napoleon’s Russian Campaign,” Potter’s American Monthly 11 [1878]: 52–4; Philadelphia Inquirer, 18, 19 Mar. 1887; Philadelphia North American, 21 Mar. 1887).
Index Entries
- Cleopatra’s Barge (yacht) search
- Crowninshield, Benjamin Williams; as character reference search
- Crowninshield, George; andCleopatra’s Barge search
- dancing; instructors for University of Virginia search
- drawing; instructors for University of Virginia search
- French language; applicants to teach at University of Virginia search
- French language; letters in, from; S. P. Milon search
- guitars search
- Italian language; applicants to teach at University of Virginia search
- Jefferson, Thomas; Correspondence; letters of application and recommendation to search
- mathematics; University of Virginia professorship of search
- Milon, Solidor Pierre; identified search
- Milon, Solidor Pierre; letter from search
- Milon, Solidor Pierre; seeks position at University of Virginia search
- music; guitar search
- music; instructors of for University of Virginia search
- music; piano search
- music; violin search
- patronage; letters of application and recommendation to TJ search
- penmanship; instructors of for University of Virginia search
- pianos search
- violins; instruction on search
- Virginia, University of; Faculty and Curriculum; faculty applicants search