Ann Cary Randolph Morris facts for kids

Ann Cary Randolph Morris (1774–1837) (nicknamed Nancy) was the daughter of Thomas Mann Randolph Sr. and the wife of Gouverneur Morris. Books have been written about the scandal in which she was embroiled in central Virginia as a young woman after the death of her fiance. After she married Gouverneur Morris in New York, she regained much of her favorable social prominence until he died in 1816. She was devoted to their son, Gouverneur Morris Jr. (1813–1888), whom she called her "richest treasure.” They lived at Morrisania (in what is now the Bronx). He had the St. Ann's Episcopal Church in Bronx built in her memory.

Morrisania mansion of Ann and Gouverneur Morris and their son. St. Ann's Episcopal Church was built on the grounds of the former mansion.

Early life

Tuckahoe Plantation, the birthplace and childhood home of Ann Cary Randolph Morris.

Ann Cary Randolph was born near Richmond, Virginia on the Tuckahoe Plantation. Her parents were Thomas Mann Randolph Sr. and Ann Cary Randolph, and she had 12 siblings. The aristocratic, plantation-owning Randolph family of Virginia, descended from William Randolph of Turkey Island, Virginia, and often intermarried among the First Families of Virginia.

[Tuckahoe plantation was] the scene of boisterous barbecues, fish fries, and fancy dress balls. The clapboard mansion was known throughout the colonies for its fine walnut paneling and fragrant boxwood gardens. Done up in velvet and gold, the colonel’s bedroom was the stuff of legend; the stables housed some of the fastest horses in the South.

—Alan Pell Crawford

During her childhood, she and her cousin Martha Jefferson Randolph were close friends. Her mother died in March 1789. In September of the following year, her father married a woman about Ann's age named Gabriela.

By the age of 16, Ann had a number of suitors. She was described as "by every indication a fetching girl with a 'little upturned nose,' a gift for self-dramatization, remarkably little in the way of discretion, and oodles of appeal." Ann and her stepmother fought and Ann was asked to leave the house.

Marriage

Pierre Henri, Gouverneur Morris, 1798, watercolor on ivory, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York

Ann was living in a boarding house in New York in October 1808 when she received a visit from Gouverneur Morris, whom she had first met when he visited Tuckahoe Plantation around 1788. After corresponding for awhile, she accepted a position as his housekeeper. Morris was a senator for New York, a delegate to both the Continental Congress and the Constitutional Convention, and an ambassador to France under President Washington. In April 1809, she went to work and live in New York at his residence, Morrisania. As a surprise to Morrisania guests, they were married on Christmas Day in 1809, with Ann’s plain, worn housekeeping dress serving as her wedding gown. Kirschke states, "Her wedding dress was a statement that they both very much enjoyed, Nancy [Ann] because it showed her gratitude for his past kindness and Morris likely because of the element of surprise for the guests."

Ann’s marriage to a prestigious figure allowed her to move on from her dismal years and regain social prominence. From June to September in 1810, the newlywed couple traveled to inspect the land for the Erie Canal. In December 1811, they were guests at the White House, where they met with President James Madison and First Lady Dolley Madison and socialized with political and diplomatic figures. In 1815, Ann recommended Samuel Larned as consul at Gibraltar in a letter to President Madison. Larned went on to have a 23-year career in diplomatic service.

Thomas Seir Cummings, Gouverneur Morris Jr. (1813-1888), 1840, Walters Art Museum.

The couple had one child, Gouverneur Morris Jr., in 1813. In October 1813, Gouverneur was away from his wife and baby and wrote a poem for her in a letter. After he returned home, the couple spent only one other night apart. Ann had the poem published posthumously in the alumni magazine The Columbian.

Ann maintained relationships with family members and friends in Virginia, which included her sister Judith and Judith’s sons, who had become the wards of the childless, unmarried John Randolph of Roanoke. Tudor Randolph, her younger son, attended Harvard University in 1814 and became seriously ill with tuberculosis. Ann took him in at the Morrisania mansion and cared for him for three months. Judith and John visited Morrisania during Tudor's convalescence. In the hope that a change in climate would help him improve his health, Tudor traveled to England, but he died there in August 1815. Judith died in 1816.

Previously, on his way home to Virginia from his visit to Morrisania, John Randolph wrote a "vitriolic" letter to Ann, who then wrote a long response to twenty of John's political opponents. Throughout the years, John Randolph attempted to keep the Bizarre Plantation scandal alive, and Ann heard unflattering rumors about herself throughout New York. The animus toward her extended to relatives of Gouverneur Morris, who were no longer heirs to Morris’s estate because of his marriage to Ann and the birth of their son.

Gouverneur Morris died on November 6, 1816 at Morrisania. Ann and her son continued to live at Morrisania until her death in 1837. Ann considered her son her "richest treasure" and focused much of her attention on ensuring that he received a good education. Her son became a railroad executive and was one of the founders of the Republican Party. He married his cousin, Martha "Patsey" Jefferson Cary, the daughter of Ann's younger sister Virginia Randolph Cary.

St. Ann's Episcopal Church, 1934. It was made a New York City landmark in 1967

She fought rumors of her in-laws that her son was not a son of Gouverneur Morris. She used the press, friend's advice, and attorneys to address claims against her and her husband's character. Her efforts, and those of her husband's before he died, did much to restore her reputation. She also managed her husband's estate, which was diminished due to mismanagement by one of his nephews, so that her son would inherit an "unencumbered estate".

Ann died in 1837. In her memory, her son built the St. Ann's Episcopal Church along the Harlem River on the grounds of Morrisania.

Gouverneur Morris born Feb. 9, 1813; died Aug. 20, 1888. Founder of this Parish, to which he gave church and lands for the glory of God and in memory of his mother.

—Inscription on a plaque to the right of the chancel at St Ann's Episcopal Church.

Ann and Gouverneur Morris are buried in a family crypt at St. Ann's.