Contrary to popular belief, President Thomas Jefferson did not father the children of his slave, Sally Hemings, according to William G. Hyland Jr., author of ‘In Defense of Thomas Jefferson: The Sally Hemings Sex Scandal.’ It was his brother Randolph, “a ne’er-do-well,” who had a history of consorting with his brother’s slaves.
Hyland,a lawyer and member of the board of directors of the Thomas JeffersonSociety, says the DNA results that established a link between Hemingsand Thomas Jefferson implicated the wrong man. Randolph, 13 yearsyounger, would have the identical Jefferson Y chromosome as his olderbrother and would have been a match for the DNA, he says.
Further, Randolph was at Monticello around the time of conception ofeach of Hemings’s children, including Eston, the youngest. Hylandspends a great deal of time trying to link Hemings and Randolph andexculpating Thomas Jefferson from the relationship, arguing, in part,that a ruffian, not a refined man would mingle with slaves.
“From all accounts he was just a ne’er-do-well farmer,” Hyland says ofRandolph in a telephone interview. “He certainly didn’t have theintellect or the training or education that Thomas Jefferson had. Butvery little is known about him. We do know he was married a couple oftimes. Sally Hemings didn’t have any other children after he gotmarried. He was at Monticello nine months before she got pregnant withEston and he was known to kind of socialize with the servants and theslaves.”