Members of the Hubbard family are among some of the earliest documented enslaved individuals at Monticello.
Born in 1747, Cate grew up at Shadwell when it was Peter Jefferson’s Albemarle County “seat,” and, with her mother, Sall, she likely served within the Jefferson household. Sall would eventually see Cate, as well as her other children—Nan, Jupiter, Caesar, “Little” Sall, Lucinda, and Simon—dispersed, some living and working at Monticello while others were sent to Poplar Forest in what is now Lynchburg, VA.
In 1774, Cate was at Monticello with her two small daughters, Hanah and Rachel, when Thomas Jefferson was granted a vast inheritance upon the death of his father-in-law. Among the 135 enslaved men, women, and children involved in this bequest were James Hubbard and his three young children—Joan, Armistead, and Nace. By 1783, Cate and James had combined their families, and together they would have six more children—Maria, Eve, James, Philip, Sally, and Nancy. In 1795 the family was moved to Poplar Forest.
While Cate’s daughter Hanah was housekeeper and nurse at Poplar Forest, most of the family were employed largely within the spheres of agriculture and trade, working at such positions as overseers (or “headmen”), cultivation, river transport (“watermen”), spinning, weaving, carpentry, and blacksmithing.
Sons James and Philip would come to challenge the strictures of enslavement, each in their own ways. James made two bold but unsuccessful attempts to escape bondage. The first took place in 1805, when he traveled north to Washington, D.C., and was captured in Fairfax County. Six years later, he chose a westerly direction where he managed to remain free in the Lexington, VA, area for more than a year before being captured and jailed. During that time Jefferson had sold him in absentia to carpenter Reuben Perry, and, presently, James’s fate remains unknown.
In 1814, refusing to submit to Poplar Forest’s overseer Jeremiah Goodman, Philip embarked on a similar course of action, taking it upon himself to travel to Monticello, seeking Jefferson’s help. Goodman opposed Philip’s match with his wife, Hanah, the daughter of Dick and Dinah, and was bent on punishing the couple. Philip’s endeavor yielded success as Jefferson interceded with a warning to Goodman against mistreatment or interference, allowing the couple to live together at the Bear Creek quarter farm. Goodman was dismissed the following year.
Although James and Cate, their children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren are documented into the early 1820s, little is known of later generations following the death of Jefferson and the sale of Poplar Forest in 1828.