Long before Jefferson built his retreat house here, he had enslaved men, women and older children working the tobacco and wheat fields—going "into the ground," as he called it. They planted up to 300,000 hillocks of tobacco each year. It took 18 . . . — — Map (db m198081) HM
The Wing of Offices was constructed on the east side of Jefferson's retreat home in 1814, “110 feet long, in the manner of those at Monticello, with a flat roof in the level of the floor of the house." Hannah, the enslaved cook, spent many of her . . . — — Map (db m198085) HM
Bedford County was probably named for the English statesman John Russell, fourth duke of Bedford. Russell, as secretary of state for the Southern Department from 1748 to 1751, had general supervision of colonial affairs. Bedford was formed from . . . — — Map (db m234611) HM
(lower)
Commemorating Lewis and Clark
In 2003, surveyors placed a monument on the lawn northwest of the house to commemorate the bicentennial of the Lewis and Clark expedition. The brass survey disk bears the design of Jefferson's Indian Peace . . . — — Map (db m99783) HM
Except for Jefferson himself, no one deserves more credit for the ornate character of the retreat house than his enslaved craftsman John Hemings. He apprenticed as a joiner under James Dinsmore, an Irish immigrant. "There is nothing superior in the . . . — — Map (db m198084) HM
About 200 feet north of this location, a fence marked the edge of the "curtilage." This sixty-one acre area separated the house and designed landscape from the larger plantation. In 1813, Jefferson noted that he had "inclosed and divided it into . . . — — Map (db m99785) HM
"If you would engage the negroes to dig and remove the earth South of the house, 90 feet wide, down to a foot below the lower floor, & descending from thence due South 1 inch in every 10 ft. ...l would gladly pay them for it, but it is only with . . . — — Map (db m198083) HM
(preface)
On May 26, 1864, Union Gen. David Hunter marched south from Cedar Creek near Winchester to drive out Confederate forces, lay waste to the Shenandoah Valley, and destroy transportation facilities at Lynchburg. His raid was part of . . . — — Map (db m55782) HM
Chartered by the state in 1795, this is the oldest secondary school in Virginia in continuous operation under its own charter. Conducted for many years as a private school for boys, it began to receive public funds in 1884. It now operates as a . . . — — Map (db m55789) HM
Half a mile north is St. Stephen's Church, built about 1825 under Rev. Nicholas Cobb, later Bishop of Alabama. In the old cemetery here many members of early families of the community are buried. — — Map (db m42894) HM
When Jefferson became president in 1801, Poplar Forest was a 4,500-acre plantation with at least 60 enslaved men, women and children living and working on the property. In August 1806, President Jefferson visited Poplar Forest to help his . . . — — Map (db m198082) HM
Francis Eppes inherited the house and 1,074 acres following his grandfather's death. His cousin Thomas Jefferson Randolph sold the remainder of the estate to cover debts. The Eppes, Cobbs, Hutter and Watts families who lived at Poplar Forest in the . . . — — Map (db m99781) HM
Thomas Jefferson's landscape design of house and mounds may have been influenced by Renaissance architect Andrea Palladio's five-part plan for a villa (left) — pavilion, hyphen, main block, hyphen, pavilion.
In his innovative design, Jefferson . . . — — Map (db m99779) HM
Thomas Jefferson designed the sunken lawn to accommodate the lower level of the house and form an area similar to a plain parterre or bowling green. Enslaved laborers led by Phil Hubbard, working on their own time for pay, excavated the lawn and . . . — — Map (db m99784) HM
