Labor, Resistance, and Celebration: Christmas Holiday Traditions among Monticello's Enslaved Community
There are no known first-hand accounts of Christmas holidays written by a member of Monticello’s enslaved community or a descendant. Yet other primary sources shed light on a season that was at once a complicated mix of labor, resistance, celebration, and family reunion. Despite the hardships of their bondage, enslaved persons at Monticello forged traditions, found opportunities—sometimes at great personal risk—and created religious observances all their own.
Heavy restrictions were placed on enslaved people, both physically and geographically. Leaving the plantation required official permission and traveling without a pass or tag risked serious punishment. The winter holidays were, however, a time when traveling passes were more commonly granted by Thomas Jefferson and other plantation masters. This afforded the rare opportunity for enslaved people to visit loved ones separated by distance and bondage.
Shortly after the death of his child—the infant died of whopping cough—David Hern petitioned a Monticello overseer for permission to visit his wife Isabel in Washington, DC. Jefferson granted this petition, and the couple were permitted to mourn together for five days over Christmas in 1808.
Sometimes holiday season reunions happened in the course of regular labor. Two days before the Christmas 1813, Bedford Davy, Bartlet, Nace, and Eve were sent to drive hogs the 93 miles between Monticello and Jefferson’s Bedford County plantation, Poplar Forest. Upon arrival, the group likely celebrated Christmas with relatives and friends; most of them had lived at Poplar Forest and labored in that plantation’s nailery as children.
For enslaved domestic servants however, the winter holidays represented a time of increased labor. Enslaved cooks, chambermaids, butlers, and launderers worked hard to meet the higher demands of travelling master families. Bringing their own traditions and skills to these Christmas celebrations, enslaved African Americans helped create a new American culture of food music, and religious traditions. Beverly, Madison, and Eston Hemings, Jefferson’s enslaved sons, all played the violin – an instrument often present during holiday celebrations. Priscilla Hemings was known for her religious piety and for hosting worship services in her home, and the Christian message of survival and escape from slavery resonated strongly with enslaved African Americans.
Accounts were settled at year’s end, meaning punishments and rewards were meted out by masters during the holiday season. For plantation owners in debt, family separation was a common reality as enslaved people were sold to reconcile the costs associated with the lavish lifestyles of the master class. Occasionally, enslaved people were manumitted. Robert Hemmings received his manumission from Jefferson on Christmas Eve, 1794. Hemmings wanted to live with his wife Dolly; to do so he convinced Jefferson to sign his manumission over to a white man in Richmond. Hemings agreed to work until his freedom was “paid off,” a freedom he eventually attained.
Longer nights and more people travelling also afforded enslaved African Americans a greater opportunity to escape their bondage. Documents from plantations all over the south demonstrate that the holidays were a time when many enslaved people made a bid for freedom.
Their struggle and the survival of their histories represents the triumph of the human spirit and the strength of family ties passed on to their descendants – and to all Americans.
