Peter Fossett
Peter Farley Fossett was an enslaved person in Monticello. After gaining independence at the age of 35 with the help of his family, he went on to become a successful caterer in Ohio, an Underground Railroad conductor, and the pastor of First Baptist Church, Cumminsville, where he served for 32 years. In his reminiscences, published in 1898, Peter Fossett remembered the comparison between Monticello and his new owner’s plantation, Colonel John Jones, where he was threatened with a whipping if ever caught with a book in his hand.
Peter Fossett
Isaac Granger Jefferson
Isaac Granger Jefferson worked as an enslaved tinsmith and blacksmith at Monticello. Granger’s short memoir, written by an interviewer and published in the 1840s, contains significant and interesting details about Monticello and the people who lived there, as well as major historical events he witnessed. Granger was the third son of two powerful members of the enslaved labor force at Monticello. In 1797, his father, George Granger, rose from foreman of labor to overseer of Monticello, the first enslaved person to do so, and was paid £20 a year.
Isaac Granger Jefferson