Extract from Virginia J. Randolph (Trist) to Nicholas Philip Trist
| Monticello May 13th 1823 |
We have all had a dreadful shock at an accident which was near proving fatal to my dear Grand-Father the other day in the river, and are more miserable than ever at his persisting [. . .] in the practice of riding without a servant to attend him, while his arm is still in a sling and quite helpless. his horse mired in the river, & fell, confining [. . .] Grand-Papa’s legs under him, and although not hurt by that, he would inevitably have been drowned had not the rapidity of the current carried him down to a much shallower place, where by reaching the bottom of the river with his hand he was enabled to rise on his feet & get out. he says it would have been thought by every one that visited the spot, if he had been drowned, that he had committed suicide. as yet he has experienced no ill effect from the thorough wetting that he got.