Thomas Jefferson (April 13, 1743 (April 2, 1743 O.S.) – July 4, 1826) was an American Founding Father, the principal author of the Declaration of Independence (1776) and the third President of the United States (1801–1809). At the beginning of the American Revolution, he served in the Continental Congress, representing Virginia and then served as wartime Governor of Virginia (1779–1781). Just after the war ended, from mid-1784 Jefferson served as a diplomat, stationed in Paris, to help negotiate commercial treaties. In May 1785, he became the United States Minister to France. Jefferson was the first United States Secretary of State (1790–1793) serving under President George Washington. Upon resigning his office, with his close friend James Madison he organized the Democratic-Republican Party. Elected Vice-President in 1796, when he came in second to John Adams of the Federalists, Jefferson with Madison secretly wrote the Kentucky and Virginia Resolutions, which attempted to nullify the Alien and Sedition Acts.

Elected president in what Jefferson called the Revolution of 1800, he oversaw a peaceful transition in power, purchased the vast Louisiana Territory from France (1803), and sent the Lewis and Clark Expedition (1804–1806) to explore the new west. His second term was beset with troubles at home, such as the failed treason trial of his former Vice President Aaron Burr, and escalating trouble with Britain. With Britain at war with Napoleon, he tried aggressive economic warfare against them; however, his embargo laws did more damage to American trade and the economy. In 1807, President Jefferson signed into law a bill that banned the importation of slaves into the United States. Jefferson has often been rated in scholarly surveys as one of the greatest U.S. presidents.

A leader in the Enlightenment, Jefferson spoke five languages and was deeply interested in science, invention, architecture, religion and philosophy, interests that led him to the founding of the University of Virginia after his presidency. He designed his own large mansion on a 5,000 acre plantation near Charlottesville, Virginia, which he named Monticello. While not a notable orator, Jefferson was an indefatigable letter writer and corresponded with many influential people in America and Europe.

Jefferson was a tobacco planter and enslaved hundreds of people during his lifetime, yet he professed opposition to slavery throughout his life and privately struggled with the dilemma of slavery and freedom and its compatibility with the ideals of the American Revolution. Through 1785 Jefferson introduced legislation to end slavery by gradual emancipation and eventual deportation of freed slaves. All the bills were defeated.  Under the 1782 Virginia manumission law, Jefferson freed two enslaved men in 1794 and 1796 respectively. In his will of 1826-27, Jefferson freed five additional enslaved men, including his sons Madison and Eston Hemings.

After Martha Jefferson, his wife of eleven years, died in 1782, Jefferson remained a widower for the rest of his life; his marriage produced six children, with only two surviving to adulthood. In 1802, allegations surfaced that Jefferson also fathered children with Sally Hemings, Martha's half-sister who was enslaved at Monticello. In 1998, DNA tests revealed a match between her last child and the Jefferson male family line. Although some historians have noted that the evidence can also support other possible fathers, most have concluded that Jefferson had a long relationship with Hemings and fathered her six children (four of whom survived to adulthood).

Hercules (November 20, 1794-1823) was born to enslaved parents Hercules and Betty at the Poplar Forest plantation. He apparently spent his life as an enslaved farm laborer, occasionally hired out to work for others. Six years after his 1813 escape attempt, Hercules was accused, along with a Black doctor, of poisoning a number of other enslaved people at Poplar Forest, possibly with an improperly administered herbal remedy. In 1822, Hercules appeared before a local court, accused with two others of stabbing an overseer (not Goodman), thereby "rebelling and making insurrection" against the government of Virginia. Hercules was found not guilty, but Jefferson, wanting to make an example of him, sold him south, to New Orleans, where Hercules died a year afterward.

Jeremiah Augustus Goodman (1780-February 1857) was appointed overseer at Jefferson's Poplar Forest plantation on August 11, 1811. Jefferson dismissed him from the job in May 1815.