Biddy Boyle
Cite this Page
"Biddy Boyle," White House Workers History Project, White House Historical Association, 2026, https://whha.whirlihost.com/Detail/workers/137.
- Position
- Laundress
- Years in President's House
- circa 1804 – 1805
- Legal Status
- Free Person
- Gender
- Female
- Race/Ethnicity
- Unclear from Context
- Presidency
- Thomas Jefferson
- Biography
- Biddy Boyle was a washerwoman in Thomas Jefferson’s White House, but details about her life outside this employment remain unknown. She was paid $7.00 per month, according to Jefferson’s 1804 memorandum book and $7.00 plus a $1.00 gratuity in 1805.1 She disappears from Jefferson’s books after 1805. Jefferson may have hired other women on a short term basis to assist Biddy.2
- “Memorandum Books, 1804,” Founders Online, National Archives, https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Jefferson/02-02-02-0014. [Original source: The Papers of Thomas Jefferson, Second Series, Jefferson’s Memorandum Books, vol. 2, ed. James A Bear, Jr. and Lucia C. Stanton. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1997, pp. 1117–1143.]; “Memorandum Books, 1805,” Founders Online, National Archives, https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Jefferson/02-02-02-0015. [Original source: The Papers of Thomas Jefferson, Second Series, Jefferson’s Memorandum Books, vol. 2, ed. James A Bear, Jr. and Lucia C. Stanton. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1997, pp. 1143–1171.]
- Lucia Stanton, “‘Those Who Labor for My Happiness:’ Slavery at Thomas Jefferson’s Monticello,” (Charlottesville, Virginia: University of Virginia Press, 2012), 45.
- Birthplace
- Unclear from Context
- Unclear from Context
- Related Association Content
- https://www.whitehousehistory.org/a-well-ordered-household