Papers of Dolley Madison 1794-1849, n.d.

Access and use

Location of collection:
University of Virginia, Special Collections Dept.
Albert and Shirley Small Special Collections Library
University of Virginia
P.O. Box 400110
160 McCormick Rd
Charlottesville, Virginia 22904-4110
Contact for questions and access:
POC: Brenda Gunn
Phone: (434) 924-1037
Phone: (434) 243-1776
Fax: (434) 924-4968

Summary

Language:
English

Background

Scope and content:

This collection consists of ca. 182 items, chiefly correspondence to and from Dolley Payne Todd Madison.

Biographical / historical:

Dolley Payne Todd Madison (May 20, 1768 - July 12, 1849), wife of President James Madison, who served from 1809 until 1817. She also occasionally acted as First Lady during the administration of Thomas Jefferson, fulfilling the ceremonial functions more usually associated with the President's wife, since Jefferson was a widower.

She was born in New Garden, a Quaker community in what is today Guilford County, North Carolina, on May 20, 1768, a daughter of John Payne, a not-too-successful farmer and erstwhile starch manufacturer, and his wife, Mary Coles. She spent her teenage years in Philadelphia, where she married John Todd, Jr. (January 7, 1790), a lawyer who was instrumental in keeping her father out of bankruptcy and who found Mary Payne a position as the manager of a boarding house. The couple had two sons, John Payne Todd (1792-1852) and William Temple Todd (b./d. 1793). Her husband and their younger child died in 1793 in a yellow fever epidemic.

Dolley Todd married James Madison on September 14, 1794. The couple were introduced by Aaron Burr, a mutual friend, who was a frequent guest at the boarding house managed by Mary Payne. The location of the wedding was a Virginia plantation owned by the bride's brother-in-law George Steptoe Washington, a nephew of the first president of the United States. The Madisons had no children but raised Dolley's son from her first marriage, John Payne Todd, whom they called Payne. Unfortunately, the child grew into a profligate young man addicted to gambling, a habit that resulted in his mother's eventual impoverishment.

During her husband's political life, Dolley Madison was noted as a gracious hostess, whose ebullient personality, love of feathered turbans, and passion for snuff seemed at odds with her Quaker upbringing. However, probably her most lasting achievements were her letters to James Madison during the period of the framing of the United States Constitution, and her rescue of state papers and a Gilbert Stuart painting of George Washington from the White House before it was burned by the British army in 1814.

When James Madison's second term as president ended in 1817 the couple retired to Montpelier. Dolley loved to entertain at Montpelier and often had the house full of guests. James Madison suffered from arthritis in his later years and was unable to write so Dolley spent much of her time letting him dictate his correspondence. Not long after James died in June of 1836 Dolley left Montpelier and moved back to Washington, D.C. At her funeral in 1849, Zachary Taylor used the phrase "First Lady" to describe Dolley Madison, a term now used to describe the president's wife.

Physical description:
ca. 182 items