Thomas Jefferson was born April 13, 1743 to Peter and
Jane Randolph Jefferson on their estate at Shadwell, in what is
today Albermarle County, Virginia, along the banks of the Rivanna
River. It was a significant location for an aristocratic youth
in the sense that it lay within the sparsely populated Piedmont
Region, between the gentrified Tidewater coastline and the Blue
Ridge Mountains of the frontier. In keeping with his borderland
origins, Jefferson would throughout his long life occupy a political
and psychological space that balanced the responsibilities of establishment
privilege with the lures of open, unexplored territory.
Peter Jefferson, a self-educated jack of all trades, moved
from the Tidewater to the sparsely populated Piedmont in his youth,
where he made a name for himself as a cartographer and surveyor.
He had a hand in establishing the border between North Carolina
and Virginia, and his prominence in affairs of state later led to
his appointments as sheriff, colonel, and ultimately, representative
to the House of Burgesses.
Jane Randolph Jefferson came from a leading Tidewater
family, and had a noble bloodline ranging back to various locations
in England and Scotland. Family lore held her as descended from
various European royalty ranging as far back as Charlemagne, and Peter
Jefferson was thought to have descended from a line of Welsh Kings.
Ostensibly, such conspicuous antecedents would have held little
charm for the egalitarian Jefferson in his maturity, but the thought
of possessing noble blood holds a certain fascination for any child,
and is not easily outlived.
While the Jeffersons established themselves in Virginia
from the earliest colonial days, they remained British in character
down through the generations. Jane Randolph, born in London, inspired Peter
Jefferson to name the Shadwell estate after the district of her birth.
This estate, along with other family holdings on both sides, were
constructed to a plan thoroughly English in design. Yet despite
this and other attempts to retain a sense of European heritage,
life on the frontier had its effect on winnowing colonial influence.
Neighbors were few and far between, and those that were in evidence
were largely natives. To combat this influence, a series of classically
trained tutors were arranged to provide for the young Jefferson's
education.
In his second year, Jefferson's family relocated from
Shadwell to the nearby Tuckahoe estate in order to live with a
wing of Jane Randolph Jefferson's family. They remained there for
seven years. During the course of their stay, a private tutor was
hired and a family schoolhouse erected to serve the purposes of
educating the Jefferson and Randolph children. Upon returning to
Shadwell at age nine, Jefferson commenced studies under the Scottish
Reverend William Douglas. In addition to laying the foundation
for Jefferson's wide interests in adult life, Douglas saddled Jefferson
with the idiosyncratic trait of speaking French with a Scottish
accent.
Jefferson's pastoral upbringing, on the very frontier
of European settlement, likely fueled his later love of the outdoors
and of natural history. In addition, his penchant for architecture
probably grew from his early observations of the constantly expanding
family estate. Moreover, his voracious reading habits and facility
with the violin were both established in these formative years.
And his father's involvement in the House of Burgesses, like his
grandfather, great-grandfather, and great-great-grandfather before
him, must have suggested statesmanship as an obvious career path
to the young Jefferson.
