Mary (Hemmings) Bell (abt. 1753 - aft. 1834)

Born about 1753 in The Forest Plantation, Charles City, Virginia

Ancestors

Wife of Thomas Bell — married about 1780 in Common Law Wife

Descendants

Died after 1834 after about age 81 in Charlottesville, Charlottesville City, Virginia, United States

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Biography

Mary Hemings was born into slavery, the daughter of Betty Hemmings, a Mulatto slave from Virginia. After being hired out by the Jeffersons to the merchant, Thomas Bell from Charlottesville, she became his Common Law Wife in the 1780s. In 1792, Bell purchased the freedom of his 'wife' and two of her children (Sarah and Robert). They lived together for the rest of their lives and he acknowledged the two children and bequeathed his estate to them.

Children:

• Daniel, 1772-, son of Mary Hemings and unknown father (Farm Book p. 24)
• Molly, 1777-, daughter of Mary Hemings and unknown father (Farm Book p.24)
• Joseph Fossett (1780-1858) (Farm Book p.24, 130) and (possibly William Fossett, a free white craftsman working at Monticello^[1]
• Betsy Hemings, 1783-, daughter of Mary Hemings and unknown father (Farm Book p. 39)
• Robert Washington Bell Hemmings (1781-1862)
• Sarah Jefferson (Hemmings) Scott (abt.1785-aft.1840)
  

  Mary (Hemmings) Bell performed Patriotic Service in Virginia in the American Revolution.

During the Revolutionary War, Mary was captured by the British during a raid of Jefferson's Monticello properties; and was later returned to Monticello. As a consequence of her imprisonment, she was the first Monticello slave to be named a Patriot of the Daughters of the American Revolution by virtue of her POW status. ^[2]

Mary Hemings Bell and her descendants occupied a house on Charlottesville, Virginia's Main Street for a century.

Slave Owners

• John Wayles
• Martha (Wayles) Jefferson) and Thomas Jefferson, Monticello Plantation, Albemarle, Virginia (See Families of Betty Hemings.)

Research Notes

"Mary Hemings and her children lived in Bell's house on Main Street until 1792, when she took a significant step. She asked to be sold to Bell, who was now her common-law husband and the father of her two youngest children, Sarah and Robert. Jefferson, unwilling to part with all her children, gave his superintendent "power to dispose of Mary according to her desire, with such of her younger children as she chose." We know nothing of the circumstances of Mary Hemings Bell's painful decision. We only know that Thomas Bell paid Jefferson £115 for Mary, Sarah, and Robert and soon freed them all."^[3]

Sources

1. ↑ "Thomas Jefferson Encyclopedia" (https://www.monticello.org/site/research-and-collections/mary-hemings-bell)
2. ↑ American Spirit Magazine, Daughters of the American Revolution, January–February 2009, p. 4 cited at (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mary_Hemings)
3. ↑ monticello.org

• Jefferson, Thomas. Farm Book, 1774-1824. 174 pages. Original manuscript from the Coolidge Collection of Thomas Jefferson Manuscripts, Massachusetts Historical Society.(https://www.masshist.org/thomasjeffersonpapers/farm/)

See also:

• Museum at Monticello, Albemarle Co., VA
• Daughters of the American Revolution, DAR Genealogical Research Databases, database online, (http://www.dar.org/ : accessed August 13, 2019), "Record of Mary Hemings", Ancestor # A204694.