Madison Hemings

Madison Hemings, born James Madison Hemings (18 January 1805 – 28 November 1877), was the son of the mixed-race slave Sally Hemings; he was the third of four children to survive to adulthood. Born into slavery by his mother's status, he was freed by the will of his master Thomas Jefferson in 1826. Based on historical and DNA evidence, historians widely agree that Jefferson was likely the father of all Hemings' children. At the age of 68, Madison Hemings claimed the connection in his memoir published in 1873, which attracted national and international attention. 1998 DNA tests demonstrate a match between the Y-chromosome of his brother Eston Hemings and that of the male Jefferson line. Madison's sons did not have male-line descendants, so his line was not tested. Historians continue to debate the issue.

Madison and his younger brother Eston Hemings were freed in Jefferson's will of 1826; they each married in Virginia and lived with their families and mother Sally in Charlottesville until her death in 1835. Both brothers moved with their young families to Chillicothe, Ohio to live in a free state. Madison and his wife lived there the remainder of their lives; he worked as a farmer and highly skilled carpenter. Among their ten children were two sons who served the Union in the Civil War: one in the United States Colored Troops and one who enlisted as a white man in the regular army.

Among Madison and Mary Hemings' grandchildren was Frederick Madison Roberts, the first African American elected to office on the West Coast, who served in the California legislature for nearly two decades. In 2010 their descendant Shay Banks-Young, who identifies as African American, together with two Wayles' and Hemings' descendants who identify as European American, received the international "Search for Common Ground" award for work among the Jefferson descendants to bridge gaps and heal "the legacy of slavery." They have founded "The Monticello Community" for descendants of all the people who lived and worked there in Jefferson's lifetime.