Martinsburg gazette. [volume] (Martinsburg, Va. [W. Va.]) 1833-1855, 1847-10-28
JETFERsoN'S HOUSE, DEATH,
GRAVE AND MONUMENT.

On the summit that commands this en-
chanting view, the mansion was built by JET
ferson when he had wealth TO lavish on his
cultivated tastes. The houseis bundled feet
long, and OF peculiar form and proportions
you enter a wide, lofty hall, that was once
adorned with the works of art which he had
selected with o masters skill in the high pla
ces OF earth: then you pass on 10 the spacious
dinlng-room with polished inlad ioor---lhen
10 his library and study, and parors--ascend
this flight oil stairs, not wide enough for more
than one TO walk up al time, and you find
the chamber where he died on the 4ih of July,
1923. The bed was IN a recess, the ends OF
which sustained two cross pieces, and on
these was thrown the inatirass on which he
laid himself TO die! II was the gloomest
place, that dead room---ihat was ever in;
/ there was The suangest gathering Of thoughts,
icrowding on each other; and each claiming 10
/ be the true emotion for the hour and spot.
| thought of liberty and revolutions: OF human
greatness and glory of philosophy, and re-
| ligion and infdelity. and death, and hereafter:
of the soul Of mighty man struggling with
the letters Of flesh and rushing away from
them into the darkness of an untred future,
! into the presence of the Infinite, in whom the
wisdom of men and Of angels is lost as drop
! that falls on the ocean: before whom the soul
of THE unholy shrnks away and finds the rags
of human glory and the fig leaves of pbiloso
ply to be no covering when The eye Of the
/ Holy One searches the spirit; such thoughts
as these pressed on me as stood in the cham
Der whence the soul Of jefferson He'd, 10 Judge
ment-The mansion, now owned by Cap
tain Levy, is falling into decay was sold
aud ak the furniture, for his creditors, Jefier
son having died nsoiyent, and almost the only
relic left of The man whose name is identified
with his country's history, as devoted pa
triot, and distinguished President, is a bust
of Voltaire, which stands here as sort Of III
telar divinity of this deserted and dilapidsted
house.
AS you descend the mountain, you pass an
enclosure without a gate. that contains the
grave Of Jefferson and more neglected,
wretched buriaLplace you will seek in vain.
| If Campbell's "last man. had been buried
here, he could not have been less cared for.
The wife of Jefferson, "torn from him by
DEATH ten years after their early marriage, lies
here.
A granite obelisk, battered much by demo
cratic pilgrims, but without name or epitaph,
is doubtless the monument of Jefferson. IL
was here placed by his executor, and the pan.
ell on which was 10 be inscribed the epiiaph
which he wrote for himself, has never been
inserted in the stone. ! was told that il is IL
ing with iron gates designed cor the enclosure,
on the banks of the river where they were
landed, and that no man has troubled himself
TO see that they ever reached their destination.
mention these facts that those who would
honor the memory Of the Apostle of Democ
racy may stir themselves to pay respect TO his
ashes, aud those who do not respect his name
and his principles, may see how both are es
teemed in the region Of his home and his tomb.
sBy late Virginia paper il appears that the
epitaph was inscribed on marble tablet which is
preserved in the solitary Mansion
EPITAPH.
Here lies buried tNf
THOMAS JEFFERSON,
Author of the Declaration Of indie
pendence, Of The State Of Virginia, for
Religious Freedom, And Father
OF the University of Virginia. i