The political lives of our founding fathers and mothers have been examined in great detail by many historians, but their experiences with medicine, health, and disease have generally received only cursory attention from most biographers. Yet focusing a lens on their often dramatic encounters with epidemics, disease, and medical treatments of their time lends them a corporeal presence that is absent from most historical accounts and serves to humanize them as flesh and blood individuals. James and Dolley Madison serve as prime examples of American icons who both dealt frequently with health challenges in the trajectory of their daily lives. This essay reflects the “health biographies” of James and Dolley Madison, which opens a revealing window into eighteenth century society and medicine, demonstrating graphically that even the elite, who had access to the best of contemporary medicine and physicians, were far from immune to debilitating illness.
PowellJH. Bring out your dead: the great plague of yellow fever in Philadelphia in 1793. 1949; reprint.
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Arno Press,
1970, p.
233.
2.
Dolley Madison to Anna Cutts, 26 April 1804, in David B. Mattern and Holly C. Shulman, eds., The Selected Letters of Dolley Payne Madison (Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press, 2003), 53.
3.
WillsG. James Madison.
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Henry Holt and Company,
2002, pp.
13–
15.
4.
James Madison to William Bradford, 9 November 1772, in William T. Hutchinson, ed. The Papers of James Madison, Vol. 1, (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1962-), 75.
5.
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Viking,
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33.
6.
KetchamR. James Madison. In: GraffHF (ed.) The presidents, a reference history.
New York:
Charles Scribner’s Sons/Thomas Gale,
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58.
7.
James Madison to Thomas Jefferson, 1785, The Papers of James Madison, Vol. 8, 270.
8.
See Irving Brant, The Fourth President: The Life of James Madison (New York: Bobbs-Merrill, 1970) and Ralph Ketcham, James Madison (Charlottesville, VA: University Press of Virginia, 1990), 52–53.
9.
BumgarnerJR. The health of the presidents.
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27.
10.
Lynne Cheney, James Madison, 2,4,6,51.-52.
11.
Quoted in Ralph Ketcham, James Madison (Charlottesville, VA: University Press of Virginia, 1990), 51.
12.
Ralph Ketcham, James Madison, 38–51.
13.
MadisonJamesBradfordWilliam. The Papers of James Madison1773-04-28;
1:
83–
84.
14.
See Richard Brookhiser, James Madison (New York: Basic Books, 2011).
15.
For a fine brief overview of the life of Dolley Madison see the introductions to each section of the letters in Mattern and Shulman, Selected Letters of Dolley Payne Madison.
16.
See Powell, Bring Out Your Dead, The Great Plague of Yellow Fever in Philadelphia in 1793, 231–234 for a detailed account of John Todd’s experiences and death during the epidemic.
17.
Dolley Madison to James Todd, October 1793, Mattern and Shulman, Selected Letters of Dolley Payne Madison, 24–25.
18.
James Madison to Thomas Jefferson, 10 January 1801, James Morton Smith, The Republic of Letters, 1159.
19.
Thomas Jefferson to James Madison, 12 February 1801, James Morton Smith, The Republic of Letters, 1160.
20.
Thomas Jefferson to James Monroe, 20 June 1801, quoted in Ketcham, James Madison, 407.
21.
James Madison to Levi Lincoln, 25 July 1801, cited in James Morton Smith, The Republic of Letters, 1172.
22.
Dolley Madison to Anna Cutts, 16 July 1804, Memoirs and Letters of Dolley Madison, 42.
23.
Dolley Madison to Anna Cutts, 3 June 1804, Ibid, 47.
24.
Dolley Madison to Anna Cutts, 4 June 1805, Ibid, 50.
25.
Dolley Madison to Anna Cutts, 8 July 1805, Ibid, 52.
26.
James Madison to Thomas Jefferson, 24 July 1805, James Morton Smith, The Republic of Letters, 1372–1373.
27.
Dolley Madison to Anna Cutts, 29 July 1805, Ibid, 53–54.
28.
Dolley Madison to Anna Cutts, 29 July and 31July 1805, Mattern and Shulman, Selected Letters of Dolley Payne Madison, 62–63.
29.
James Madison to Thomas Jefferson, 2 August 1805, James Morton Smith, Republic of Letters, 1374.
30.
Dolley Payne Todd Madison to Mary Smith Pemberton Morris, 20 August 1805, in The Dolley Madison Digital Edition, ed. Holly C. Shulman. Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press, Rotunda, 2004. http://rotunda.upress.virginina.edu/dmde/DPM0100 (accessed 2010-06-18).
31.
James Madison to Thomas Jefferson, 14 September 1805, James Morton Smith, Republic of Letters, 1386–1387.
32.
James Madison to Thomas Jefferson, 1 September 1805, James Morton Smith, The Republic of Letters, 1384.
33.
Dolley Madison to Eliza Collins Lee, 10 February 1808, Mattern and Shulman, Selected Letters of Dolley Madison, 85.
34.
Dolley Madison to Mr. and Mrs. Joel Barlow, 15 November 1811, Memoirs and Letters of Dolley Madison, 81.
35.
Federal Republican (13 August 1813).
36.
Dolley Payne Madison to Edward Coles, 2 July 1813, Mattern and Shulman, Selected Letters of Dolley Madison, 177.
37.
Thomas Jefferson to James Madison, 13 July 1813, James Morton Smith, The Republic of Letters, 1725.
38.
Quoted in Ethel Stephen Arnett, Mrs. James Madison, The Incomparable Dolley, 214.
39.
Twelfth Congress, Chapter XXXVII, Statute II, 27 February 1813.
40.
Dolley Madison to John G. Jackson, 27 November 1824, Selected Letters of Dolley Payne Madison, 257.
41.
Dolley Madison to Dolley Payne Madison Cutts, December [1831], Dolley Madison Digital Edition.
42.
McCoyDR. The last of the fathers: James Madison and the republican legacy.
New York:
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252.
43.
James Madison to Nicholas P. Trist, May 1832, cited in James Morton Smith, The Republic of Letters, Vol. 3, 1992–1993.
44.
Quoted in Ralph Ketchum, The Madisons at Montpelier, 140.
45.
Dolley Madison to Mary E.P. Allen, 25 February1834, Selected Letters of Dolley Madison, 304.
46.
Ethel Stephen Arnett, Mrs. James Madison, The Incomparable Dolley, 317.
47.
IngersollCJ. A visit to montpelier. In: KetchamR (ed.) The madisons of montpelier.
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168.
48.
Anna Payne to Frances D. Lear, 16 July1836, quoted in Selected Letters of Dolley Madison, 326.
49.
Edward Coles to Dolley Madision, 9 July 1836, Dolley Madison Digital Edition.
50.
Dolley Madison to the Committee of Cincinnati Citizens, 17 November 1838, Dolley Madison Digital Edition.
51.
John Coles Payne to Edward Coles, 25 September 1836, Dolley Madison Digital Edition.
52.
John Coles Payne to John Payne Todd, 12 October 1836, Dolley Madison Digital Edition.
53.
Dolley Madison to Anthony Morris, 2 September 1837, Memoirs and Letters of Dolley Madison, 203.
54.
Dolley Madison to Richard D. Cutts, 27 February 1841, Selected Letters of Dolley Madison, 358.
55.
Memoirs and Letters of Dolley Madison, 209.
56.
Elizabeth Collins Lee to Zaccheus Collins Lee, 1849, Selected Letters of Dolley Madison, 390.
