George Bradby, a free black man, worked as a general laborer at
Monticello from 1774 to 1778. Bradby came to Monticello after
Jefferson inherited his enslaved wife, Jenny, through the estate
of his father-in-law, John Wayles. Bradby’s name appears in
Jefferson’s Memorandum Books 25 times, beginning in April 1772
with payments for corn. Although Jefferson intended that “Bradby
& Jenny, & George [Granger] & his family” live in a large
Mulberry Row dwelling resembling the “Negro quarter,” it is not
known where the couple actually lived.1 Bradby grew and sold
corn to Jefferson and performed other general tasks on the
mountaintop, including running errands and “cutting wood with
[Francis] Bishop,”2 a hired white blacksmith. Jefferson had an
annual contract with Bradby; in 1776, he agreed “to give him £8.
& meat as is given to the other negroes of our family. He pays
his own levies taxes &c. & clothes himself.”3 Bradby and
Jefferson kept running accounts with each other; Jefferson
supplied Bradby with groceries, sh