White House Historical Association

Sally Houseman

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"Sally Houseman," White House Workers History Project, White House Historical Association, 2026, https://whitehouseworkers.org/Detail/workers/134.
Position
Laundress
Years in President's House
circa 1803
Legal Status
Free Person
Gender
Female
Race/Ethnicity
White
Presidency
Thomas Jefferson
Biography
Sally Houseman was a washerwoman in Thomas Jefferson's White House, but details about her life outside this employment remain unknown. In a letter from May 18, 1803, Sally’s brother, John Houseman, wrote to Thomas Jefferson: “I have a Sister by name Sally Houseman living in your House. She has been ill used by one of your Domesticks (Abraham Golden) and knocked prostrate on the floor; and that without any assault from her side.”1 She was paid $7 per month, according to Jefferson’s 1803 memorandum book.2 She disappears from Jefferson’s books after 1803. Jefferson may have hired other women on a short term basis to assist Sally.3
  1. “To Thomas Jefferson from John A. Houseman, 18 May 1803,” Founders Online, National Archives, https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Jefferson/01-40-02-0299. [Original source: The Papers of Thomas Jefferson, vol. 40, 4 March–10 July 1803, ed. Barbara B. Oberg. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2013, p. 391.]
  2. “Memorandum Books, 1803,” Founders Online, National Archives, https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Jefferson/02-02-02-0013. [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. 1089–1117.]
  3. Lucia Stanton, “Those Who Labor for My Happiness:" Slavery at Thomas Jefferson’s Monticello,” (Charlottesville, Virginia: University of Virginia Press, 2012), 4.
Birthplace
Unclear from Context
Burial Place
Unclear from Context
Related Worker
Abraham Golden
Footman, Valet, 1801 – 1804
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