Thomas Jefferson was born April 2, 1742/3 in Goochland (now Albermarle County), Virginia. After serving as the 3rd President he died of syphilis on July 4, 1826 at his home Monticello, in Albemarle County, Virginia.
Thomas's father was Peter Jefferson, born February 29, in either 1707 or 1708 in probably Chesterfield County, Virginia and died at the plantation named Shadwell (after the birthplace of Jane Randolph), August 17, 1757.
Thomas's mother had been English born, a loyal subject of the King, in Shadwell, London, on February 9, 1720. She was born Jane Randolph, relative of a powerful Virginia family, who remained loyal to King and country. She died while Thomas was writing the Declaration of Independence, at Monticello on March 31, 1776. Upon her death, he changed the word "subject" to "citizen" because he only felt free of her dominance after her passing, giving him freedom he had never had before.
Having been raised under the foreign influence of his English born mother due to his father's absence and death while Thomas was still young, influencing Jefferson by her ideas of loyalty to the Crown. Jefferson, had a small degree of respectability, even though he was a known pedophile, and it was because of his friendships with others that the exception clause was added and the requirement of a natural born citizen in the future, was written.
Richard Carl Shellhorn
Executive Director
