1To Thomas Jefferson from William Short, 6 May 1826 (Jefferson Papers)
It has given me infinite pleasure to hear from you by the letter which you were so good as to send by M r Randolph, dated March 24. He gave it to me a few days ago only, on his return from Boston; having passed through this City without stopping on his way thither. I was indeed very anxious to hear of you & of your health, though unwilling to trouble you with a letter & impose on you the tax...
2From Thomas Jefferson to William Short, 24 March 1826 (Jefferson Papers)
My grandson Th: J. Randolph the bearer of this letter is too well known to you to need a letter of introduction. he is going Northwdly on the business which was the subject of your kind letter of the 4 th . my unskilful stewardship of Agricultural property, and the interception of attention to it by imperious and higher duties have, in a course of 60 years much involved my capital. in our...
3To Thomas Jefferson from William Short, 4 March 1826 (Jefferson Papers)
I never felt myself under the same degree of restraint in taking up my pen to write to you—for there seems a propriety in abstaining from bringing into view a subject which is painful, & at the same time I cannot be ignorant of what is a subject of public discussion. I have followed the debates of the assembly with impatience & anxiety, as I had seen a letter from a gentleman in Virginia, whom...
4From Thomas Jefferson to William Short, 18 January 1826 (Jefferson Papers)
Yours of the 11 th is recieved. those of Nov. 2. and Dec. 14. had been so in due time. I suppose I had not acknoleged them specifically from being perhaps too lazy to recur to them while writing mine of the 3 d I thank you for your information from mr Boyé and shall desire the instruments to remain in their present position until I can find a safe and gentle conveyance and give an order for...
5To Thomas Jefferson from William Short, 11 January 1826 (Jefferson Papers)
Your letter of the 3 d inst. was received here the day before yesterday. It was not until today that I was able to find Mr Boyé—Here is what I learned from him. Being desirous to return the instruments to you in person he deposited them in a place of perfect safety when he left Richmond for the North, to await his return—He feels great regret at having thus detained them from you after they...
6From Thomas Jefferson to William Short, 3 January 1826 (Jefferson Papers)
I am about to ask a friendly office of you which I hope will give you no other trouble than to change the direction of one of your daily walks. a mr Boyé, a Danish Mathematician was engaged in a survey to make a map of Virginia. I lent him a fine Borda’s Circle of reflection 2. or 3. years ago and my best telescope. he has ceased to have occasion for them a year or two. he is now in Philada...
7To Thomas Jefferson from William Short, 14 December 1825 (Jefferson Papers)
I had this pleasure on the 2 d ul to & trust that letter got safe to hand. I inclosed in it a song composed & sung at a public dinner by a man of your own age, & who to me has always professed the longest & most invariable friendship for you. I sent at the same time the discourse of a Russian on public education. I thought it might perchance amuse you to see the ideas in those climates on this...
8From Thomas Jefferson to William Short, 15 November 1825 (Jefferson Papers)
In my letter of Oct. 14. I gave you an account of the riot we had had at the University, and of it’s termination. you will however be anxious to know how it has gone off finally. with the best effects possible. having let it be understood, from the beginning. that we wished to trust very much to the discretion of the Students themselves for their own government, with about four fifths of them...
9To Thomas Jefferson from William Short, 2 November 1825 (Jefferson Papers)
I cannot too much thank you for your kind letter of the 14 th It gave me great relief from the anxiety I was under on account of reports as to your health & the affairs of the University—To the last, as mere reports, I should have paid no attention, after those which prevailed on the same subject, & without even the shadow of a foundation, some time ago. But the Richmond Enquirer which I see...
10From Thomas Jefferson to William Short, 14 October 1825 (Jefferson Papers)
Your favor of Octob.—has been duly recieved. the information which I have given you from time to time has kept you truly informed of the state of our University. it behoves me then also to mention to you a serious incident which has just taken place there; and the rather as, of the thousand versions which will be given, not one will be true. my position enables me to say what is so, but with...
11To Thomas Jefferson from William Short, 4 October 1825 (Jefferson Papers)
It is always a great gratification to me to recieve one of your letters. That of Aug: 9. I found here on my return from my summer’s excursion—It gratified me first by informing me that your long confinement had not affected your general health, of which I was very apprehensive, & secondly by the account you give me of the state of the University—That account came here most opportunely—for a...
12From Thomas Jefferson to William Short, 9 August 1825 (Jefferson Papers)
I am still a debtor for your letter of June 27. my health is some excuse, but not quite a sufficient one, because I have sometimes written to others not having an equal claim on my affections. my present indisposition, altho’ it began with strangury, as I mentioned to you, had become a more serious one of the general class of Dysury. an affection of the bladder and prostate gland has confined...
13To Thomas Jefferson from William Short, 27 June 1825 (Jefferson Papers)
Your kind letter which I last recieved from you (that of April 4) gave me much & real gratification by the details you were so good as to enter into on the subject of the University—they are indeed the most encouraging. And I beg you to believe that my absence from the State has not had the effect of diminishing in the smallest degree my earnest desire to learn all that is favorable to this...
14To Thomas Jefferson from William Short, 27 April 1825 (Jefferson Papers)
Your kind & most acceptable remembrance of the 4 th inst. calls for all my thanks. It gave me the most sincere pleasure to recieve from your hand, the details respecting the University—The first steps are always the most difficult, & these being now made with so much success, I look forward with the most sanguine hope to its future progress. I beg you to be assured that you cannot confer on me...
15From Thomas Jefferson to William Short, 4 April 1825 (Jefferson Papers)
Knowing the interest you take in the progress of our University, I will now undertake to give you some account of it; and it is not till now that any thing definitive could have been communicated. The selection of Professors from Europe has been most judiciously made. they are 5. in number, most of them a little under or over 30. years of age, one only being something over 40. of the highest...
16To Thomas Jefferson from William Short, 27 February 1825 (Jefferson Papers)
I have already had the pleasure of acknowleging & thanking you for your gratifying favor of the 8 th ult o a most clear & instructive exhibition of a subject with which I was of course little acquainted. My letter was of the 19 th of Jan y the last I have written except one of the 8 th inst.— I allow myself to give you the present trouble only on account of the occasion, which induces me to...
17To Thomas Jefferson from William Short, 19 January 1825 (Jefferson Papers)
The vol s of Hall arrived safe. I am much pleased that they gave the pleasure which I hoped, to the several readers at Monticello, & only regret that you did not keep this little work. I have learned since my return here that he is the son of the Sir James Hall who was in Paris with a son of Lord Lettish, Lord D. They were both the friends of Dugald Stewart & both inclined to republicanism—If...
18From Thomas Jefferson to William Short, 8 January 1825 (Jefferson Papers)
I returned the 1 st vol. of Hall by a mail of a week ago and by this shall return the 2 d we have kept them long; but every member of the family wished to read his book, in which case you know it had a long guantlet to run. It is impossible to read thoroughly such writings as those of Harper and Otis, who take a page to say what requires but a sentence, or rather who give you whole pages of...
19To Thomas Jefferson from William Short, 23 December 1824 (Jefferson Papers)
I send you the three letters inclosed merely because they are the complement of those I sent in my letter of the 18 th inst. They are much too prolix to insist on your reading them—Burn them therefore by way of despatching if it should best suit you. The idea of sending them to you occurred to me merely because they offered some views on what has now become a mere historical subject; which...
20To Thomas Jefferson from William Short, 18 December 1824 (Jefferson Papers)
I have abstained from acknowleging your favor of the 9 th ult o that I might not add to your already too heavy load of correspondence. Your letter however came most opportunely; for it was on the heels of a report which had just reached us the very night before, of your being very ill—Your information as to the imposthume explained the ground of this report, & your relief from it was a great...
21From Thomas Jefferson to William Short, 9 November 1824 (Jefferson Papers)
I recieve your letter of the 2 d while La Fayette is with us. our county has recieved him as handsomely as their limited means permitted. among the toasts they drank ‘a gratitude which ends not in words.’ and I think sentiment is taking in other states. the President will also give a hint on which Congress will be led to take up the subject.—M de L’Epinay is safely recieved. Hall’s book is...
22To Thomas Jefferson from William Short, 2 November 1824 (Jefferson Papers)
I had this pleasure on the 3 d ult o I do not write this in order to add to the burthen of correspondence with which I know you are already overloaded, but merely to ask you to send me one line by the ministry of one of the young Ladies, that I may know how your health is, what news you have from M r Gilmer, & whether M de d’Epinay arrived safe. I sent her in three divisions by three different...
23To Thomas Jefferson from William Short, 3 October 1824 (Jefferson Papers)
Knowing as I do, how every letter adds to the burthen which every mail you I have postponed perhaps longer than I should otherwise have done to have informed you of my arrival here, & to have enquired as to the health & present situation of yourself & your interesting family around you. Owing to the wet season & the state of the roads in consequence thereof, I had a most tedious & disagreeable...
24To Thomas Jefferson from William Short, 7 August 1824 (Jefferson Papers)
I have the pleasure of informing you of my arrival here, & thus having now approached so near to Monticello as to shew my fixed determination of attaining the point I have so long been aiming at, that it might suggest reasonable doubts of my determination. I here encounter a circumstance which will cause a few days delay however. Last year when Gen l Cocke was in Phila da , I was induced to...
25To Thomas Jefferson from William Short, 19 July 1824 (Jefferson Papers)
The date of this letter will shew that I have been detained here much longer than I had expected—Whilst the extent of this delay remained undefined I was unwilling to give you the trouble of a letter, & therefore have abstained even from acknowleging & thanking you for yours of the 17 th of May— I now think I may fix with sufficient certainty the time of my departure, to venture to mention...
26From Thomas Jefferson to William Short, 17 May 1824 (Jefferson Papers)
I recieved yesterday your favor of the 10 th instant. as soon as the vote of invitation to M. de la Fayette had passed one house, and was likely to pass the other, I wrote to the President, and to a member or two of Congress, expressing my confidence that they could not mean merely to invite him to come and dine; suggesting the scantiness of his means of meeting expence, and the necessity of a...
27To Thomas Jefferson from William Short, 10 May 1824 (Jefferson Papers)
I did not intend to have troubled you again so soon when last I had the pleasure of writing to you on the 17 th of April in acknowlegement of your kind favor of the 10 th of that month—I send this letter at a venture & merely to take the chance of finding you before you set out on your journey south—Here is the cause of it. I learned last evening from a son of Judge Peters, that his father has...
28To Thomas Jefferson from William Short, 17 April 1824 (Jefferson Papers)
Your most agreeable favor of the 10 th was recieved here two days ago. You say nothing of your health & therefore I have the gratification of believing it good—I met at the Society last evening your old friend M r Patterson of the Mint, & several other of your friends, all of whom partook with me in this pleasure, more especially Mr Patterson who is about your age, & who never fails when we...
29From Thomas Jefferson to William Short, 10 April 1824 (Jefferson Papers)
Your favor of Mar. 29. is duly recieved, and I learn from it with great gratification that we are at length to have the happiness of meeting once more. I shall visit Bedford in the months of May & June, and if you do not set out on your journey till July, you will assuredly find me here, and happy to recieve you. there are three stages a week from Richmond to Charlottesville, which will give...
30To Thomas Jefferson from William Short, 29 March 1824 (Jefferson Papers)
The last letter which I have had the pleasure of writing to you, was of the date of Octob: 9. in acknowlegement of your kind favor of the 8 th of Sept r . You are well assured that my long silence has not proceeded from indifference to the gratification of hearing from you, but from an unwillingness to add to your burthen, already too great, of correspondence with your friends. In the mean...
31To Thomas Jefferson from William Short, 9 October 1823 (Jefferson Papers)
Your kind favor of the 8 th ult o was waiting for me here, & I received & read it with those feelings which I always experience in what comes from you. I am under real obligation for the manner in which you have allowed me to substitute the next summer for this fall. For independently of the full sufficiency I have had of locomotion for the present, another obstacle would have presented itself...
32From Thomas Jefferson to William Short, 8 September 1823 (Jefferson Papers)
Your favor of July 28. from Avon came to hand on the 10 th of August and I have delayed answering it on the presumption of your continued absence. but the approach of the season of frost in that region has probably, before this time, turned you about to the South. I readily concieve that, by the time of your return to Philadelphia, you will have had travelling enough for the present, and...
33To Thomas Jefferson from William Short, 28 July 1823 (Jefferson Papers)
I am thus far on my way to the land which I mentioned to you in a former letter; & having stopped here at an early hour to repose myself I make use of a part of the after noon to have the pleasure of writing to you. Hitherto I have travelled on what are called good roads, & yet I find myself much more fatigued than I had expected to be. It is true that the carriage which I hired at Utica, in...
34To Thomas Jefferson from William Short, 12 May 1823 (Jefferson Papers)
If I could be induced by any means to attaching any value to any prophecy of mine, it would be the having led you to give me your foresight into futurity. Although I am willing to to take it with the prudent proviso which you annex to it, yet I value it most highly, as I have ever done what I have received from your for now near half a century. The ultramad ministers of France seem disposed to...
35From Thomas Jefferson to William Short, 28 March 1823 (Jefferson Papers)
From your letter of prophecies I too have caught the spirit of prophecy: for who can withold looking into futurity, on events which are to change the face of the world, and the condition of man throughout it, without indulging himself in the effusions of the holy spirit of Delphos? I may do it the more safely as, to my vaticinations, I always subjoin the Proviso ‘that nothing unexpected happen...
36To Thomas Jefferson from William Short, 17 March 1823 (Jefferson Papers)
Contrary to all precedent I have by me a letter from you which has remained for two months unanswered. I have been silent only because I feared to give you trouble. I know how laborious it is for you now to write—& I have always known how unwilling you were to employ an amanuesis. Yet I am not the less anxious to hear that you are perfectly restored to the use of your arm, & have retained your...
37From Thomas Jefferson to William Short, 29 December 1822 (Jefferson Papers)
I have duly recieved your favor of the 17 th with it’s kind enquiries as to the state in which my late accident has placed me. the fracture was of the most favorable character, of the smaller bone of the left fore-arm, without, as is still hoped, deranging those of the wrist. it was promptly and well set by a skilful surgeon, has been constantly doing well, without incurring any accident, and...
38To Thomas Jefferson from William Short, 17 December 1822 (Jefferson Papers)
Very soon after the departure of my last letter, I learned through the newspapers, the accident which had befallen you. I felt much anxiety on account of it notwithstanding these papers gave a favorable account of the turn which the disorder had taken. I wished much for more detail & for a more recent account, & was prevented from troubling you with a letter to that end, only from my...
39To Thomas Jefferson from William Short, 12 November 1822 (Jefferson Papers)
Since my return from my Canada expedition I have had the very sincere & great Pleasure of recieving your kind & friendly letter of the 19 th ul to I cannot express to you all the gratification it afforded me to learn from you that your health was perfectly re-established. I still bear a grudge against those waters & that noble bath to which I was before so partial. They made the first serious...
40From Thomas Jefferson to William Short, 19 October 1822 (Jefferson Papers)
I have waited for a frost to announce to me your return to winter quarters; and altho’ we have as yet had none here, I presume they must have reached you, in their advance towards us, by this time, and that I may now acknolege your letter written on your departure for Canada. altho’ that trip disappointed us of the expected visit to your native state, yet I hold on to the promise, as a thing...
41William Short to Thomas Jefferson, 2 July 1822 (Jefferson Papers)
It has been a long time since I have had this pleasure. It was on the 5 th of Dec r in acknowlegement of your kind & friendly favor of the 24 th Nov r . I there agreeably to your request gave you some account of your old friend Charles Thompson . I have accidentally within a few days spoken with a gentleman who went to pass a day with him, & I availed myself of this to make further enquiry for...
42William Short to Thomas Jefferson, 5 December 1821 (Jefferson Papers)
I return you a thousand thanks for your kind & friendly letter of the 24 th ult o . The details as to the state of your health I had been long wishing for—they are now doubly gratifying to me, as they inform me that you have so perfectly recovered from the only inroad I had ever known on your constitution. And this attack I percieve was brought on by an inattention to the sound maxim— il n’y a...
43Thomas Jefferson to William Short, 24 November 1821 (Jefferson Papers)
Your welcome favor of the 12 th came to hand two days ago. I was just returned from Poplar Forest which I have visited four times this year. I have an excellent house there, inferior only to Monticello , am comfortably fixed and attended, have a few good neighbors, and pass my time there in a tranquility and retirement much adapted to my age and indolence. you so kindly ask an explanation of...
44William Short to Thomas Jefferson, 12 November 1821 (Jefferson Papers)
If I knew any other way less troublesome to you, of hearing of you & the state of your health, I would not intrude this letter on you, knowing, as I do, how much you are oppressed by correspondence. Since my return from a summer excursion of more than three months, I have enquired at different times of such of your friends here as were in the way of hearing from you, but there is not one that...
45William Short to Thomas Jefferson, 25 October 1820 (Jefferson Papers)
I could hardly have thought it possible that a letter from you could have remained in my hands unacknowleged so long, as I find your last to be, which I have now before me. It is of the 4 th of August last , but was not recieved by me until the 23 d . I was then on the sea shore, whither I had fled from the heats of Philadelphia , in pursuit of cool air—As this is a retired part of the state...
46Thomas Jefferson to William Short, 4 August 1820 (Jefferson Papers)
I owe you a letter for your favor of June 29. which was recieved in due time, and there being no subject of the day of particular interest I will make this a supplement to mine of Apr. 13. my aim in that was to justify the character of Jesus against the fictions of his pseudo-followers which have exposed him to the inference of being an imp o stor, for if we could believe that he really...
47William Short to Thomas Jefferson, 29 June 1820 (Jefferson Papers)
I had the pleasure of thanking you in part in my letter of May 2. for your most invaluable favor contained in yours of April . I say in part; for it would take more than one letter to contain the whole of my gratitude for this most acceptable mark of your friendship. I have read it over & over again; always with delight & instruction, & a renewed sense of my obligation to your amiable...
48William Short to Thomas Jefferson, 2 May 1820 (Jefferson Papers)
I had the very sincere pleasure of recieving some days ago your kind favor of the 13 th ul to covering the syllabus. It has been a source to me of much gratification & instruction also. the subject has been always one on which I have postponed to aim at information, because I felt in limine the conviction that it was impossible to attain such a degree of certainty as would be satisfactory to...
49Thomas Jefferson to William Short, 13 April 1820 (Jefferson Papers)
Your favor of Mar. 27. is recieved, and my grandaughter Ellen has undertaken to copy the Syllabus, which will therefore be inclosed. it was originally written to D r Rush . on his death, fearing that the inquisition of the public might get hold of it, I asked the return of it from the family, which they kindly complied with . at the request of another friend , I had given him a copy . he lent...
50William Short to Thomas Jefferson, 27 March 1820 (Jefferson Papers)
It has been a long time indeed since I have had the pleasure of hearing from you, or of your health. Since my last of Dec: 1. I have remained betwixt the desire of writing to you & the fear of giving you trouble; knowing how much of this, the correspondence of your friends imposes on you. I remember well how independent you formerly kept yourself of an amanuensis. At present an aid of this...