John Hemings
| John Hemmings | |
|---|---|
| Born | 1776 Monticello, Albemarle County, Virginia |
| Died | 1833 (aged 56–57) |
| Nationality | American |
| Occupation | Carpenter, cabinetmaker |
| Parent(s) | Betty Hemings, Joseph Neilson |
| Relatives |
Sally Hemings (half-sister) James Hemings (half-brother) Mary Hemings (half-sister) Madison Hemings (nephew) Eston Hemings (nephew) John Wayles Jefferson (great-nephew) Frederick Madison Roberts (great-great-nephew) |
John Hemmings (also spelled Hemings) (1776 – 1833) was born into slavery at Thomas Jefferson's Monticello as a member of the large mixed-race Hemings family. He trained in the Monticello Joinery and became a highly skilled carpenter and woodworker, making furniture and crafting the fine woodwork of the interiors at Monticello and Poplar Forest.
Hemmings also served as the master joiner to apprentices Beverley, Madison and Eston Hemings, Jefferson's sons by Sally Hemings.
After decades of service, John Hemmings was freed in 1826 by Jefferson's will and given the tools to the joinery. He remained at Monticello until about 1831 and died in 1833.
John Hemmings was born into slavery at Monticello on April 24, 1776. He was the youngest son of the mixed-race slave Betty Hemings and his father was Joseph Neilson, an Irish workman and Jefferson's chief carpenter at Monticello. Hemmings was the eleventh of Betty's children and half-brother to her six children by her late master John Wayles, including Sally Hemings, as well as to the oldest four by an unknown father. Because of a 1655 Virginia House of Burgesses law that determined an individual's slave or free status through the individual's mother, John Hemings was considered a slave despite his three-quarters European heritage. The Hemings family had come to Monticello through the Wayles family, when John Wayles's daughter Martha Wayles married Thomas Jefferson.
The vast majority of the Hemings family stayed within close proximity of each other for much of their lifetimes, as Thomas Jefferson's slave rolls at Monticello rarely changed. In fact, as many as 70 family members comprising five different generations of the family lived at Monticello. Due to this stability, the members of the Hemings family would have interacted with each other every day.
Hemings children grew up with the understanding that the girls would become house servants and that the boys would become butlers or valets, or perhaps artisans who worked in the many outbuildings on Mulberry Row. Jefferson allowed the Hemings family members a greater amount of agency than was typical for the time period: the men were allowed to travel by themselves, learn trades, and hire themselves out on free days and keep the extra wages. The Hemings women were not responsible for any agricutural work, and instead performed chores and housework like childcare, sewing, and baking.
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