Jane Meriwether Lewis (March 31, 1770 - March 13, 1845)

The daughter of William Lewis and Lucy Meriwether Lewis, Jane was born on March 31, 1770 and died March 13, 1845. At the young age of fifteen, she married Edmund Anderson, (1763-1810) her first cousin in 1785. They had nine children.

Edmund inherited 310 acres in Hanover County and the family lived there until returning to “Locust Hill” later in their marriage. He appears to have had entrepreneurial impulses but was not a successful businessman. According to a letter written from “Clover Fields” in 1791 by Meriwether Lewis to his mother Lucy, who was living in Georgia at the time, “Mr. Anderson’s scheems [sic] are as transient as they are sudden. His whole system of afares [sic] appears to be altered monthly. He has discontinued the business at William Anderson & Co. on the account of some unhappy family differences which are two [sic] tedious to be innumerated [sic].” He may not have been the best provider for Jane and their nine children as his family lived at “Locust Hill” with Lucy after she returned to Virginia from Georgia in 1791. Jane lived with her mother until Lucy’s death in 1837.

Jane and Edmund’s third son, Meriwether Lewis Anderson (1805 - 1862) became a physician after studying at the University of Virginia and in Philadelphia. Their first child, Elizabeth (Betsy) Thornton Anderson (b. May 14, 1786), died as a young girl. A sweet letter that she wrote to her grandmother Lucy has been lent to the exhibit by a descendant.

 
Patricia Zontine, April 2009