Buried: Monticello, Charlottesville, Virginia
Third President - 1801-1809
Born: April 13, 1743, at Shadwell, Virginia
Died: 12:50 p.m. on July 4, 1826, at Monticello, Virginia
Age at death: 83
Cause of death: Heart failure
Final words: “Is it the Fourth?”
Admission to Monticello:
November-February: $15.00
March-October: $20.00
The election of Thomas Jefferson as our third president in 1800 signaled the young nation’s first move from republicanism to democracy. It was also a time of growth and exploration. When the new administration completed the Louisiana Purchase in 1803, the country doubled in size. Jefferson, always eager to explore new frontiers, sent Meriwether Lewis and William Clark on an 8,000 mile expedition through the western territory the following year.
Mostly satisfied with his accomplishments during his two terms, Jefferson retired to Monticello, his Virginia estate near Charlottesville. He was in debt and made a meager living from the sale of his crops. To maintain his genteel lifestyle, he eventually sold his 6,500 volume book collection to the Library of Congress for about $24,000. Despite his financial concerns, he devoted considerable energy to what would become one of his proudest achievements: the founding of the University of Virginia, which opened in 1825. Jefferson, the personification of the Age of Enlightenment, designed both the campus and curriculum.
Epitaph on Thomas Jefferson’s grave, written by Jefferson himself
Jefferson’s presence was in demand on July 4, 1826. The holiday marked the fiftieth anniversary of the Declaration of Independence. Of the fifty-six signers, only three remained: Thomas Jefferson, John Adams, and Charles Carroll. Eighty-three-year-old Thomas Jefferson, feeling “weakened in body by infirmities and in mind by age,” had declined all invitations to participate in the holiday festivities in Washington. On July 1, Jefferson began slipping in and out of consciousness. Jefferson had long suffered from rheumatism and an enlarged prostate and had regularly countered the pain with a concoction of opium and honey. During his last days, his doctor, Robley Dunglison, was on hand to administer the mixture, but Jefferson refused any medication. As though he were determined to hang on until the anniversary, Jefferson, in his lucid moments, asked several times whether it was the Fourth of July. With his family gathered at his bedside, Jefferson faded in and out of sleep. Finally, on July 4, he took his last breath; Dr. Dunglison pronounced him dead at 12:50 p.m.
As Jefferson had directed, an Episcopal rector conducted a simple graveside funeral service. He was buried in the family graveyard, next to his long-dead wife Martha, on the grounds of Monticello. The tombstone, Jefferson’s own creation, noted his involvement with the Declaration of Independence, the Virginia Statute for Religious Freedom, and the University of Virginia. Jefferson left out his service as his state’s governor and his nation’s vice president and president.
John Adams, Jefferson’s longtime political and intellectual sparring partner, also lost consciousness and died that same afternoon in Massachusetts. Adams’s last words were “Thomas Jefferson still survives….” Unbeknown to Adams, Jefferson had died just a few hours earlier.
Touring Thomas Jefferson’s Tomb at Monticello
Monticello is located off Interstate 64 near Charlottesville, Virginia. It is open daily except Christmas Day. Hours are from 8:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m., March 1 through October 31, and from 9:00 a.m. to 4:30 p.m., November 1 until February 28. The Visitors Center is open from 9:00 a.m. to 5:30 p.m., March 1 through October 31, and from 9:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m., November 1 through February 28.
Admission to Monticello is $15.00 for adults from November- February and $20.00 from March-October; it is $8.00 for children ages six to eleven year-round. Admission for children under six is free. Special rates are available for local residents and groups.
From Interstate 64: Take exit 121 to Route 20 South (if traveling westbound, turn left onto Route 20). Turn right at the first light to reach the Monticello Visitors Center. To reach Monticello, turn left on Route 53 just after the first stoplight. The entrance to Monticello will be on your right, about 1.5 miles from Route 20.
Jefferson’s gravesite is located at the Monticello cemetery. To reach the cemetery after touring the house and grounds, follow the signs from the mountain top down Mulberry Row, heading west approximately 0.25 miles. The cemetery is at the end of that path. Visitors may also take the shuttle bus to the visitor’s parking lot. Drivers stop at the cemetery, which is located about 0.3 miles from the lot.
For additional information
Monticello
Box 316
Charlottesville, VA 22902
Phone: (434) 984-9822
www.monticello.org
“‘Nothing is better than a reliable friend,’ wrote Jefferson.”
—Richard Norton Smith
All the DNA evidence in the world will tell you less about Thomas Jefferson than climbing his little mountain, where the philosopher who insisted that the earth belonged to the living made a poignant exception of an eighty-foot-square patch of blood-red soil just below its summit. “Nothing is better than a reliable friend,” wrote Jefferson. Together with his closest friend, Dabney Carr, the future president concluded an adolescent pact under whose terms the survivor would bury his companion beneath a great oak tree on the mountainside. Carr enjoyed a meteoric rise through the colony’s legal and political elite, marrying Jefferson’s sister and establishing himself as a forensic rival to Patrick Henry.
Unfortunately, everything about Carr’s life was to be premature, including death from bilious fever before his thirtieth birthday. Faithful to his promise, Jefferson moved the remains of his friend from their original grave to the hillside site hallowed by boyish memory. Simultaneously he calculated that at the rate the workmen prepared Monticello’s graveyard, a single laborer could grub an acre in four days. It was vintage Jefferson, more precise than emotional—unless one credits the latest evidence of his long rumored liaison with Sally Hemmings, whose descendants have reasons of their own for seeking a place near Dabney Carr’s oak tree.
—RNS
Thomas Jefferson’s grave on the grounds of Monticello