Nicholas Philip Trist (1800–74), public official and diplomat, was born in Charlottesville and educated at the College of Orleans in New Orleans. He fell in love with TJ’s granddaughter Virginia J. Randolph during a visit to Monticello in 1817. Dissuaded by her family from seeking an early marriage, Trist attended the United States Military Academy at West Point, 1818–21. The couple finally wed at TJ’s mountaintop home in September 1824. Trist subsequently assisted TJ in various ways and helped administer his estate after his death. He studied law under Edward Livingston, was admitted to the bar, and spent time as secretary to the University of Virginia Board of Visitors. During service as a State Department clerk that began in 1828, he sometimes acted as President Andrew Jackson’s private secretary. Trist was the United States consul at Havana, 1833–41. Returning to the State Department as chief clerk in 1845, two years later he was dispatched as a special agent to negotiate an end to the Mexican-American War. Although clashes with General Winfield Scott and members of James K. Polk’s administration led to his recall, Trist stayed on in Mexico in defiance of orders and signed the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo in February 1848. This act of insubordination, the treaty’s subsequent ratification notwithstanding, led Polk to withhold Trist’s salary and effectively ended his diplomatic career. He then worked as a lawyer in New York City and, for twenty years, as a railroad clerk and paymaster in Pennsylvania. In 1870 the federal government appointed Trist deputy postmaster of Alexandria, and the following year it paid him over $14,000 in back wages and expenses from his time in Mexico. He died in Alexandria (ANB description begins John A. Garraty and Mark C. Carnes, eds., American National Biography, 1999, 24 vols. description ends ; DAB description begins Allen Johnson and Dumas Malone, eds., Dictionary of American Biography, 1928–36, 20 vols. description ends ; Shackelford, Descendants description begins George Green Shackelford, ed., Collected Papers … of the Monticello Association of the Descendants of Thomas Jefferson, 1965–84, 2 vols. description ends , 1:100–13; DLC: NPT; NcU: NPT; Richmond Enquirer, 21 Sept. 1824; Jackson, Papers description begins Sam B. Smith, Harold D. Moser, Daniel Feller, and others, eds., The Papers of Andrew Jackson, 1980– , 10 vols. description ends ; JEP description begins Journal of the Executive Proceedings of the Senate of the United States description ends , 4:344, 348, 5:407, 17:520 [21 Jan., 10 Feb. 1834, 16 July 1841, 9 July 1870]; Herbert Weaver and others, eds., Correspondence of James K. Polk [1969– ]; Alexandria Gazette, 11 Feb. 1874; gravestone inscription in Ivy Hill Cemetery, Alexandria).

the mountain was that on which Monticello stands.

Hetty Carr, the widow of TJ’s nephew Peter Carr, provided another account of the Randolph-Bankhead fight in a 5 Feb. 1819 letter to her son Dabney S. Carr, stating that Bankhead “has been threatening Jefferson Randolph a long time & at Court he approached him with such an expression of countinance, as convinced J. that he ment to stab him. as he knew he carried a long knife as long as a dirk, he has bought several of them for the express purpose of killing Jefferson. but his wife has always contrived to get them from him. the morning of the Court he got a new one. as soon as he got within arms length of J. Jefferson raised his whip to keep him off & struck him with the small end of it. he approach on so fast that J. was obliged to turn the large end of the whip in retreating to keek [i.e., keep] out of the reach of the knife after receiving several stabs he fell on his back but was up in a moment but wilst he was down B. stabed him in the back. his arm is dreadfully cut. but hi is thaught not to be in any danger now. at first it was thaught he could not live. B. was tried & bailed to appear next monday.
Jefferson is staying at Mr Garrets, who has behaved very kindly to him. as soon as Jeffersons wounds were dressed he went to see Jane to let her know how Jefferson was. altho it was 11 oclock at Night, & asked Jane to come & stay at his house. she is now there with Jefferson. he was carried day before yesterday in a litter from Mr Leitch’s store where he was first carried. you will easily suppose what an agitation I have been in & what an agitation I now am in for fear they wont send B. to the Penitentiary. …
Jefferson is in fine sperits and dont mind it altho he perhaps will loose the use of some of his fingers, as two of the arteries were cut. he is not able to turn himself in the bed. the young men in town set up with him every Night. poor Mr Jefferson was dreadfully agitated, when he saw him first. he got there in less than half an hour after it happened. Frank dyer went for him. Jane heard it as soon & no-one with her but her little Children” (ViU: CC; with one repeated word editorially omitted). See also Joseph C. Vance, “Knives, Whips and Randolphs on the Court House Lawn,” MACH description begins Magazine of Albemarle County History, 1940–  (title varies; issued until 1951 as Papers of the Albemarle County Historical Society) description ends 15 (1955/56): 28–35.