Randolph, Martha Jefferson, 1927, Biographical Sketch

THE DAUGHTER of Thomas Jefferson acted as the First Lady of the Land during his administration. She later married Thomas M. Randolph. Her mother Martha (Wayles) Skelton Jefferson was a widow when she married the country's future third President, but died nineteen years before he achieved that honor. Her loss was the great and lasting sorrow of the famous patriot's life. For four months he was not out of the sound of her voice as she lay dying in their unique suite at Monticello where their bed stood in an alcove between two rooms, so that on rising he could step into his room and she into hers. They were all the more a devoted couple for having been so often called to mourn together the loss of their children, four out of six having died in infancy or childhood. The mother's last wish was that the little girl she was leaving should never have a stepmother, and she died content with the pledge which her husband kept through the remaining forty-four years of a life tenderly faithful to the bride of his youth.1. Brief Biographies of our Presidents and the First Ladies of the Land, 1927, American Weekly, Inc., page 4.