Jane Randolph Jefferson

John Adams describing the reaction to the Declaration of Independence in Philadelphia, 1776.

At about 7 o'clock in the morning on Sunday, March 31, 1776, Jefferson's mother, Jane, 55 years old, was stricken with a stroke and succumbed within an hour.

Jefferson asked the Reverend Charles Clay to preside over the funeral.

Jane Randolph Jefferson was buried at Monticello.

In seeing his mother was put in the ground he held sacred near others he loved, Jefferson made certain that she would always be a part of his home and a part of him.

Jane's death disoriented her son.

Already immersed in the most difficult and fearful of political enterprises, revolution, and the creation of a new form of government, Jefferson was brought face to face with one of the deepest personal crises of mankind.

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