His daughter gave Hemings "her time", so she was able to live freely in Charlottesville with her two youngest sons, Madison and Eston Hemings, for the rest of her life.
The historians Philip D. Morgan and Joshua D. Rothman have written about the numerous interracial relationships in the Wayles-Hemings-Jefferson families and the region, often with multiple generations repeating the pattern.
Jefferson's sons by Sally Hemings: Beverly, Madison and Eston, were each apprenticed to John Hemmings at the age of 14 for training as fine carpenters.
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In 1826, he was given his tools from the joinery, as well as the work of his two apprentice assistants, his nephews Madison and Eston Hemings, until they came of age and were freed.
He was among the scholars who was commissioned by the newly formed Thomas Jefferson Heritage Society in 1999 to review materials about Thomas Jefferson and Sally Hemings, after the 1998 DNA study was published indicating a match between the Jefferson male line and a descendant of Eston Hemings, the youngest son.
Sally Hemings | Eston Hemings | Madison Hemings | Betty Hemings | Eston von Sohr |
In 1998, a DNA study helped to confirm his account, as it showed a match between the Jefferson male line and a descendant of Eston Hemings, the youngest son.
1998 DNA tests demonstrate a match between the Y-chromosome of a descendant of his brother, Eston Hemings Jefferson, and that of the male Jefferson line.
Following additional late 20th-century historical analysis by Annette Gordon-Reed, among others, and a DNA study in 1998 that disproved the Carr claim and showed a match between the Jefferson male line and an Eston Hemings' descendant, the scholarship has changed dramatically.
In his memoir, Hemings said their son Thomas Eston Hemings died in Andersonville prison during the American Civil War, after having fought on the Union side with the United States Colored Troops.