Highland Guest Room

This room is displayed as a Monroe guest room, with historic and reproduction furnishings. The four poster bed was donated by Elizabeth Valentine Meade Howard, descendent of the bed’s original Albemarle County/Charlottesville owners. It dates to 1800, and is said to have been used by Lafayette when he visited Charlottesville in 1824.

A letter from Monroe to his son-in- law George Hay in 1818 indicated that this structure was initially used as a slave quarter and later converted into a living space for Monroe’s guests. Monroe wrote, “The three rooms, in which the servants lodged, below, the well, have been finished inside, painted, & made habitable for friends.” This statement has fueled continuing research, as it is surprising that Monroe would house visiting friends and guests in a structure that once lodged enslaved workers.