1Thomas Jefferson to John Wayles Eppes, 24 July 1809 (Jefferson Papers)
I recieved some time ago a summons from Commissioner Ladd to attend a settlement in the case of m r Wayles & mr Skelton ’s accounts on the 1 st of Aug. I expressed to him, in answer, my extreme anxiety to have that settlement made, & that I would attend any meeting which promised to be effectual; that I doubted whether in the sickly season an effectual meeting could be had at Richmond , &...
2Thomas Jefferson to John Wayles Eppes, 8 December 1809 (Jefferson Papers)
I should sooner have informed you of Francis’s safe arrival here but that the trip you meditated to N. Carolina rendered it entirely uncertain where a letter would find you. nor had I any expectation you could have been at the first meeting of Congress till I saw your name in the papers brought by our last post. disappointed in sending this by the return of the post, I avail myself of General...
3Thomas Jefferson to John Wayles Eppes, 25 December 1809 (Jefferson Papers)
Our letters crossing each other on the road have anticipated the grounds of mutual excuse for their being the first which were written. my occupations are now almost entirely without doors, in the farms the garden, the shops E t c. I shut up my room on going to breakfast & scarcely enter it again but to dress for dinner, after which I read little, & never write. this of course withdraws me...
4Thomas Jefferson to John Wayles Eppes, 17 January 1810 (Jefferson Papers)
Your’s of the 10 th came safely to hand, and I now inclose you a letter from Francis . he continues in excellent health, and employs his time well. he has written to his Mama & grandmama . I observe that the H. of R. are sensible of the ill effect of the long speeches in their house on their proceedings. but they have a worse effect in the disgust they excite among the people, and the...
5Thomas Jefferson to John Wayles Eppes, 26 January 1810 (Jefferson Papers)
Your letter of the 21 st brought to my mind Col o Bentley’s business. I immediately examined the papers, & calculated the balance due, a small one, and wrote to mr James Pleasants a statement of the account, authorising him on paiment of the balance to Gibson & Jefferson in Richmond , to convey the lands to Col o Bentley discharged of all further claims on my part. Francis
6Thomas Jefferson to John Wayles Eppes, 21 April 1810 (Jefferson Papers)
I found here your letter of the 2 d on my return from a three weeks visit to Bedford : and as I see by a resolution of Congress that they are to adjourn on the 23 d I shall direct the present to Eppington where it may meet you on your passage to Carolina . mr Thweatt is to let me know when I am to set out for
7Thomas Jefferson to John Wayles Eppes, 10 May 1810 (Jefferson Papers)
M r Thweatt’s letter with your P.S. came to hand late last night, and I shall dispatch Francis tomorrow morning in the care of one of the most trusty servants I have. it will take to-day to have Francis’s affairs ready for the road, & he will be obliged to make but two days of the journey to arrive at Eppington on the eve of your departure for Carolina . considering the shortness of the time...
8Thomas Jefferson to John Wayles Eppes, 16 July 1810 (Jefferson Papers)
I recieved in May last the inclosed letter from mr Thomas Wilson agent for Speirs & co. with two other papers the copy of which is now inclosed, the originals being returned to him at his request. I wrote in answer that your father had solely gone through the administration of mr Wayles’s estate, or had left so little to do that I expected you would do that, as the papers were in your hands,...
9Thomas Jefferson to John Wayles Eppes and William B. Giles, 12 November 1810 (Jefferson Papers)
You have heard of the suit brought by E. Livingston against me on the subject of the Batture . this has rendered it necessary for me to make a statement of the facts for the use of my Counsel; and the justification which these offer being derived from certain systems of foreign law in force at N. Orleans , which I have had more time to enquire into than they, I have been led into a full...
10Thomas Jefferson to John Wayles Eppes, 7 December 1810 (Jefferson Papers)
Your letter of Nov. 19. desiring me to send to Haden’s for Francis on the 29 th did not get to my hands till the evening of that day Wormeley set off the next morning and I was happy to find he was in time to recieve him. he got here to breakfast the morning after he parted with you. I did not write to you by Wormley because I supposed you would have passed on. on the 12 th of Nov. I had...
11Thomas Jefferson to John Wayles Eppes, 5 January 1811 (Jefferson Papers)
Your two letters of Dec. 14. reached this place just after I had left it for Bedford . this has occasioned the delay of the answer. I now inclose you the paper you requested on the boundaries of Louisiana . it is a bad Polygraph copy; however it is legible. there is nothing secret in the paper and therefore may be freely used as you please, except that I would not have it printed, but with the...
12Thomas Jefferson to John Wayles Eppes, 10 January 1811 (Jefferson Papers)
By the post succeeding my last letter to you , I recieved one from my counsel in Livingston’s case requesting me to prepare a statement of all the facts which will be to be proved in that case to be forwarded with commissions to N. Orleans to have the depositions regularly taken. this it is not in my power to do without the aid of the statement of the case sent to mr Giles & yourself, of which...
13Thomas Jefferson to John Wayles Eppes, 24 January 1811 (Jefferson Papers)
The Chronological appendix to the paper I sent you on the subject of Louisiana had been retained, as I conjectured, in the Secretary of State’s office, from which I have since recieved it, & now inclose it to you. it is an indispensable companion to the other as referring to the authorities for the several facts stated in that. the subject of your closed doors is perfectly secret here. I...
14Thomas Jefferson to John Wayles Eppes, 24 March 1811 (Jefferson Papers)
Your servant arrived here the day before yesterday, since which the weather has been showery, & is now threatening & uncertain if tomorrow is promising, Francis will set out. we part with him with more regret after every visit. while the cold weather kept him pretty much in the house, I made him do a little in the Latin grammar, merely to begin to exercise his memory. as soon as you think him...
15Thomas Jefferson to John Wayles Eppes, 30 March 1811 (Jefferson Papers)
The inclosed letter came to my hands a few days before Francis left us, & was reserved to go by him. it was however forgotten. I hope you will be my apologist with mrs Eppes and that she will pardon this omission of a declining memory, and accept the assurance of my respects. my constant affections attend on yourself. PoC ( MHi ); dateline at foot of text; endorsed by TJ. The inclosed letter...
16Thomas Jefferson to John Wayles Eppes, 6 September 1811 (Jefferson Papers)
I had before learned with great concern your affliction with the rheumatism. your remedy of the cold bath is new to me, except a single instance of the wife of an overseer of mine who uses the cold bath every day of her life, and the day she omits it, has a return of Rheumatic symptoms. I have had an attack of it myself for two months past, confined a part of the time, without fever, and...
17Thomas Jefferson to John Wayles Eppes, 29 September 1811 (Jefferson Papers)
The inclosed letter came under cover to me without any indication from what quarter it came. Our last latest arrival brings information of the death of the king of England . it’s coming from Ireland & not direct from England would make it little worthy of notice, were not the event so probable. on the 26 th of July the English papers say he was expected hourly to expire. this vessel sailed from
18Thomas Jefferson to John Wayles Eppes, 3–5 June 1812 (Jefferson Papers)
I learnt accidentally a day or two ago that you were proposing to sell Pantops , and had offered it to some persons in this neighborhood. this is done, I have no doubt, after mature consideration, and under the view that it will be most beneficial to Francis , of whose interests no one can be a more faithful depository than yourself. candor obliges me to say that an estate so closely and...
19Thomas Jefferson to John Wayles Eppes, 25 June 1812 (Jefferson Papers)
I recieved a week ago your favor of the 15 th and should sooner have answered it, but that I have been awaiting the issue of a negociation between Jefferson and his uncle T. E. Randolph for a relinquishment of his lease of Pantops . the result of this is too doubtful to detain me longer from notifying my acceptance of your offer of Pantops on the terms of your letter, that is to say, for ten...
20Thomas Jefferson to John Wayles Eppes, 18 September 1812 (Jefferson Papers)
I deferred answering your letter of July 11 because I had learnt there were several points of difference of opinion between mr T. E. Randolph and yourself as to the conditions of the lease of Pantops , & I thought it proper that these should be explained & settled between yourselves before a third party intervened. I wrote to mr Randolph accordingly, to ask his understanding of the lease that...
21Thomas Jefferson to John Wayles Eppes, 18 April 1813 (Jefferson Papers)
I have been in the less haste to answer your last letter , because it appeared from that as if the farther we proceeded in our negociation, the wider we got apart. in the early part of the letter you state justly as the only point of difference, the condition of providing the same quantity of open lands on the Tomahawk tract as there is on Pantops . the practicability of effecting this by...
22Thomas Jefferson to John Wayles Eppes, 26 April 1813 (Jefferson Papers)
We are just now packing your Commode & two presses. strange as it may seem, altho’ it required but 4. or 500 feet of plank to make the packing boxes, yet so difficult is that article here, and that I never have been able to command that quantity bef beyond my own constant & pressing wants till I got a saw mill of my own to work. this has enabled me now to pack them and my boat will be sent off...
23Thomas Jefferson to John Wayles Eppes, 24 June 1813 (Jefferson Papers)
This letter will be of Politics only. for altho’ I do not often permit myself to enter that field think on that subject, it sometimes obtrudes itself and suggests ideas which I am tempted to pursue. some of these relating to the business of finance, I will hazard to you, as being at the head of that committee , but intended for yourself individually, or such as you trust, but certainly not for...
24Thomas Jefferson to John Wayles Eppes, 11 September 1813 (Jefferson Papers)
I turn with great reluctance from the functions of a private citizen to matters of state. the swaggering on deck, as a passenger, is so much more pleasant than clambering the ropes as a seaman, & my confidence in the skill and activity of those employed to work the vessel is so entire, that I notice nothing, en passant, but how smoothly she moves. yet I avail myself of the leisure which a...
25Thomas Jefferson to John Wayles Eppes, 6 November 1813 (Jefferson Papers)
I had not expected to have troubled you again on the subject of finance; but since the date of my last I have recieved from mr Law a letter covering a memorial on that subject which from it’s tenor I conjecture must have been before Congress at their two last sessions. this paper contains two propositions, the one for issuing Treasury notes bearing interest, & to be circulated as money; the...
26Thomas Jefferson to John Wayles Eppes, 16 July 1814 (Jefferson Papers)
M r Estin Randolph has shewed me a letter from you, proposing to sell him Pantops , o i n order to lay out the money in lands in your neighborhood for Francis . I had hoped that we had concurred in our purposes on that subject, altho’ we did not in the immediate execution of them. my view & wish was when Francis should come of age, or the Pantops lease expire, or whenever else you pleased, to...
27Thomas Jefferson to John Wayles Eppes, 9 September 1814 (Jefferson Papers)
I am sorry to learn by Francis’s letter that your you are not yet recovered from your rheumatism, and much wonder you do not go and pass a summer at the Warm springs . from the examples I have seen I should entertain no doubt of a radical cure. the transactions at Washington and Alexandria are indeed beyond expectation. the circumjacent country is mostly disaffected, but I should have thought...
28Thomas Jefferson to John Wayles Eppes, 1 June 1815 (Jefferson Papers)
For want of time to consult you on it, I have taken a measure of great responsibility on my self as to Francis , for your pardon for which I must rely on the motives, and what I hope will be the effect of it. French is become the most indispensable part of modern education. it is the only language in which a man of any country can be understood out of his own; and is now the preeminent...
29Thomas Jefferson to John Wayles Eppes, 30 [March] 1816 (Jefferson Papers)
Francis returns as much improved, I am in hopes, as you will have expected. he reads French with so much ease as to read it for amusement, has not much occasion for his dictionary, pronounces generally well, the few defects remaining being such as will be easily corrected hereafter. being kept almost entirely at French, he could afford only the time before breakfast for keeping up his Latin....
30Thomas Jefferson to John Wayles Eppes, 30 April with 7 May 1816 postscript (Jefferson Papers)
Yours of the 8 th was recieved here on the 19 th inst. the information you have had as to the schools at Staunton and Lexington is correct. the latter has been at all times under the direction of an infuriated Presbyterian bigot and tory, better fitted to fanaticise than to instruct youth in useful knolege. when I was last here, I heard of their expelling two or three youths for the heinous...