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History:
Martha Jefferson’s original ring can be
found at Monticello, in the collection of the Thomas Jefferson Memorial
Foundation. French, 18th century. When Thomas Jefferson traveled to France in
1784 to serve as a trade minister to the Court of Louis XVI, he took his
twelve-year old daughter, Martha, with him and placed her in a convent school,
the Abbaye Royale de Panthemont. On her arrival, Martha could
speak very little French, but a year later she wrote, “There are fifty or
sixty pensioners in the house, so that speaking as much as I could with
them I learnt the language very soon. At
present I am charmed with my situation.” She
studied painting, harpsichord, needlework, history, geography, reading and
Latin. She generally saw her father once a week, but when Jefferson
traveled outside of Paris, Martha missed him greatly, and urged him to
write long letters, and often.
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60 Day No-Hassle