Thomas Jefferson to Charles Massie, 24 [October] 1815
To Charles Massie
Monticello Aug. [Oct.] 24. 15.
Sir
I formerly had some good cyder of you, & I understand you generally make it. if you can furnish me 100. galls of what you can recommend I shall be glad to take it, and will send the money and a cart for it any day you will name in December, because I shall be from home all the month of November. Accept my best wishes and respects
Th: Jefferson
PoC (MHi); misdated; on verso of reused address cover to TJ; at foot of text: “Mr Massie”; endorsed by TJ: “Massie Charles.” Recorded in SJL as a letter of 24 Oct. 1815 and presumably written then, as TJ was not at Monticello on 24 Aug.
Charles Massie (1765–1830), farmer, worked with his father, Charles Massie (1727–1817), on the family’s extensive apple orchard at Spring Valley in southwestern Albemarle County, which he later inherited. The Massie family first supplied cider to TJ in the spring of 1812 and continued to do so until the spring of 1826 (, 266; DNA: RG 29, CS, Albemarle Co., 1810, 1820; , esp. 2:1275, 1417; Albemarle Co. Will Book, 6:288–9, 10:141–3; Richmond Enquirer, 4 May 1830; gravestone inscriptions in Spring Valley Cemetery).