Episode 33: Any Dandridge That Ever Wore An Head

04/19/22 • 23 min

Your Most Obedient & Humble Servant: A Women's History

The Testimony of Anne Moody Part the last of Martha Washington's In-Laws! In which Anne Moody explains how she came to own so much silver plate with engravings of parrots. Also featuring: John Custis IV, and this time, he's REAL cranky. Further Reading: "an answer (incomplete) n.d., of Mrs. Anne Moody and Matthew Moody to a bill of complaint of Daniel Parke Custis in an unidentified court in Virginia." http://librarycatalog.virginiahistory.org/final/portal.aspx?lang=en-US My book: https://www.upress.virginia.edu/title/5473 John Custis to William Byrd II, 20 July 1724, ; John Custis to [Thomas Dunbar] 15 January 1724/25, in Custis, John, and Josephine Little Zuppan. The Letterbook of John Custis IV of Williamsburg, 1717-1742. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2005, pg. 64, 68. John Custis IV Encyclopedia Virginia: https://encyclopediavirginia.org/entries/custis-john-1678-1749/ Daniel Parke Custis in Encyclopedia Virginia: https://encyclopediavirginia.org/entries/custis-daniel-parke-1711-1757/

Previous Episode

Episode 32: Think My Dear Mistress

Sarah Stewart to Dolley Madison, 5 July 1844 In which an enslaved woman who has been arrested (because Dolley Madison's son was in debt, and she and her community were held as collateral) writes to her enslaver. This week I am joined by Hilarie M. Hicks, Senior Research Historian at James Madison's Montpelier. Further Reading: Sarah Stewart to Dolley Payne Todd Madison, 5 July 1844, in The Dolley Madison Digital Edition, ed. Holly C. Shulman. Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press, Rotunda, 2004. http://rotunda.upress.virginia.edu/dmde/DPM1385 (accessed 2021-01-15). Watch this wonderful video exhibit from James Madison's Montpelier: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bsvQEdsSZ_8 Check out "A Mere Distinction of Colour": https://www.montpelier.org/resources/mere-distinction-of-colour Here's some of Hilarie's excellent work with the Naming Project: https://digitaldoorway.montpelier.org/2020/12/11/the-naming-project-catharine-caty-taylor/ This book rules: Taylor, Elizabeth Dowling. A Slave in the White House: Paul Jennings and the Madisons. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2012.

Next Episode

Episode 34: That Evil Genius

Ellen Wayles Randolph to Martha Jefferson Randolph, 29 March 1819 In which Ellen Wayles Randolph passes quite a few judgments on some ladies in Richmond, and asks an old friend for a favor. My guest this week is the incomparable Danna Kelley, tour guide and house tour supervisor extraordinaire at Thomas Jefferson's Monticello. Further Reading: The Letter: https://tjrs.monticello.org/letter/1498 Alan Taylor, Thomas Jefferson's Education, W. W. Norton & Company, 2019. Thomas Jefferson's Granddaughter in Queen Victoria's England: The Travel Diary of Ellen Wayles Coolidge, 1838–1839 Ellen Wayles Coolidge. Edited by Ann Lucas Birle and Lisa A. Francavilla. Mary Randolph Randolph: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mary_Randolph#:~:text=Mary%20Randolph%20(August%209%2C%201762,books%20of%20the%2019th%20century.