Historians Uncover Slave Quarters of Sally Hemings at Thomas Jefferson’s Monticello
July 3, 2017, NBC News — Reporter Michael Cottman announces: “Archaeologists have excavated an area of Thomas Jefferson’s Monticello mansion that has astounded even the most experienced social scientists: The living quarters of Sally Hemings, the enslaved woman who, historians believe, gave birth to six of Jefferson’s children.”
From inside the red-dirt floored, dusty, rubble-stone room built in 1809, Gardiner Hallock, director of restoration for Jefferson’s mountaintop plantation, says: “This discovery gives us a sense of how enslaved people were living. Some of Sally’s children may have been born in this room. It’s important because it shows Sally as a human being — a mother, daughter, and sister — and brings out the relationships in her life.”
