The guide for our tour through the Randolph House in Williamsburg
is sturdy and middle-aged. Delia is
African-American, her skin a pale cocoa.
Her close-cropped hair is graying and wrapped in a striped kerchief. She wears a loose white muslin dress, tied at
the waist with an apron. She is
good-natured and funny, and cracks up when I say Dave is my first husband. Awkward.
Don’t even know why it came out that way, but she thinks it’s
hysterical, and she smiles and shakes her head every time she glances my
way.
It is sweltering hot and those of us gathered beneath a shade
tree in the yard of this stately eighteenth century house are grateful for the
chance to rest and fan ourselves while sitting on rough wooden benches awaiting
the start of our tour. “Finish up your
snacks and drinks now,” says Delia.
“Don’t want any spills inside.”
A young woman in red sneakers sips from a plastic cup. “Can I bring it in if I’m really
careful? I just bought it.”
Delia shakes her head.
“Finish it up. I don’t think any
of these folks will mind if we sit a bit longer.” She’s right: a visit to Williamsburg involves
much weary walking and standing. Once
the woman chugs down her beverage, we rise regretfully from our perches and
follow Delia through the entrance.
She is intelligent and knowledgeable, and I wonder if she is
a history teacher when not impersonating a slave. For that is her role. Like every African-American interpreter in
this colonial town, she represents one of the enslaved persons that made up 52%
of the town’s population in the 1780’s.
“Enslaved persons” is Delia’s preferred term as it emphasizes the state
of enslavement and the fact that this individual is not just property, but a person.
A person who has been wronged.
Our guide wants to be sure her charges understand this: “There was no ‘good’ slavery.”
As we wind past the fine furniture, porcelain ornaments, and
china that belonged to the privileged Randolph family, Delia tells us about
those who performed the polishing, cleaning, cooking, and laundry. Johnny and Eve were Mr. and Mrs. Randolph’s
personal servants, so trusted they carried the house keys and supervised other
workers. Yet, when the Randolphs died
and their wills were read, Johnny and Eve were items to be disbursed along with
the bureaus and beds. “Life was hard work,” says Delia, “and it was also uncertain. An enslaved person could be given as a
birthday present or to settle a debt.”
Later in the afternoon, Dave and I trudge down the hot brick
sidewalk to the Charlton Stage, plotting our route from the shade of one tree
to that of the next. While tourists
strive to stay cool in skimpy sundresses, shorts, and sandals, the interpreters
we encounter are dressed in multiple layers. I pity the men especially, in their
long–sleeved shirts, waistcoats, overcoats, breeches, and woolen stockings. Woolen stockings! I shudder.
We had arrived in Williamsburg the night before our tour and
ate dinner at the Dog Street Pub. Dave
loved the beer and the heavy earthenware mug in which it was served. I loved the creamy Welsh rarebit: a rich
cheese sauce with a trace of stone ground mustard poured over a thick slice of
toast. I had eyed a gentleman sitting
with his lady two tables over. Although
dressed in a shirt and slacks much like Dave’s, the man was regal. Something about the angles of his face, the proud
nose, and gray hair. I whispered to
Dave,” Bet you anything he’s Thomas Jefferson.”
Dave checked him out.
“Could be…”
Dave and I had prepared for this trip. He finished Nathaniel Philbrick’s Bunker Hill a few weeks ago, and at
Mercy Learning Center, I’ve been studying the Revolutionary War, Declaration of
Independence, and Constitution with my students, Taiwo and Nicole. In our discussions of the founding fathers’
efforts to plan for posterity, to plan for us,
I have at times become teary at their foresight, even as Taiwo and Nicole
have been wide-eyed with admiration. So,
Mr. Jefferson has been on my mind.
Upon reaching Charlton Stage, Dave and I inch down the rows
of low wooden benches to take our seats in the shade. Soon Thomas Jefferson – indeed, it is my Mr. Jefferson from the pub –
strides down a narrow walkway to the stage.
Seemingly impervious to the heat, he wears a tri-corn hat, white ruffled
shirt, blue coat, brown breeches, and riding boots.
The stately Virginian slave-owner opens with references to
the Declaration, and the self-evident truths of equality and the unalienable
right to Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness. He asks us, “Consider, if you will, how do
you feel when you do good?”
“Happy,” we, the multitude, dutifully respond.
“And how do you feel if you do something deceitful,
something you know not to be right?”
Most mumble the obvious, “bad,” but one thoughtful soul,
breaking boldly from group-speak, suggests, “uncomfortable?”
“Indeed,” says Mr. Jefferson. “Uncomfortable. Such acts might keep us awake at night.” And then he makes clear his case that in
doing good lies the happiness of which he wrote.
Our speaker asks for questions and parries concerns about a
populace that does not bother to vote despite the right to do so, and a
government seemingly in the power of a wealthy few. In answering, he swivels on one booted heel and
sweeps his arm, hand out, palm raised, in a gesture to encompass us all. “Is
this not a government of the people? It
is to the people to hold that right and that responsibility firmly.
Speak out! Just as you are doing
here today.”
I imagine the collective flurry of thoughts as each of
us mentally composes letters to our congressmen demanding change as directed by
Thomas Jefferson. For to those of us sitting on these wooden benches in this town of centuries old
clapboard and brick homes - having visited coopers and brickmakers, weavers and
gunsmiths, having witnessed soldiers recruited for the upcoming battle of
Yorktown, and having questioned the quandary of a fight for liberty by those
served by slaves - the statesman before us is
the Declaration’s author.
Jefferson invites Robert, a young boy of ten or so, to join
him on the stage. Robert has embraced
the spirit of this visit to 1781 and wears breeches, stockings, and a tri-corn
hat. His mouth slightly open, his eyes
wide, it is hard to say if he is star-struck or nervous as he stands before us,
face-to-face with Mr. Jefferson. But there is no mistaking his look of lust
when Jefferson draws a sword from its scabbard and hands it to him.
“While not known as a soldier, I have had some success with
the pen,” Jefferson says with a self-deprecating grace that draws a chuckle
from the crowd. He then places a quill
in the boy’s other hand. Predictably, he
asks, “Master Robert. Which do you
suppose to be mightier? Pen or sword?”
The boy pauses and I wonder, would a child this age know the
expected response? And much as we Americans
have been drilled in that concept and long for its truth, does it still hold in this world rent by war and driven by money?
As one, the audience holds its breath, leans forward, and
wills young Robert to respond.
“The pen?” His
response is hesitant, a question really, but we burst into relieved
applause. Huzzah!
Jefferson smiles and nods, then reaches to retrieve the
sword – gleaming, impressive, and undeniably mighty. Robert’s expression is wistful as it
disappears into its scabbard, and he is left with the pen. Jefferson pats the child’s shoulder and the
rest of us clap as the boy returns to his seat, proud owner of a new feather
quill.
Will Robert remember this moment, the regal man and his powerful
words peppered with “lest we forget” and “forthwith”? Later, as Dave and I muse at the extremes of
inspiration and polarization represented in Williamsburg’s history, I wish I’d
asked Mr. Jefferson where his plantation worked by slaves, no, enslaved persons, fits into his concept
of liberty.
