From Dolley Payne Madison to Anna Cutts, 26 April 1804.  Special Collections Department, University of Virginia Library.

Dolley Madison was close to all three of her sisters, Anna, Lucy, and Mary, but she was closest of all to Anna, who had first come to live with her and her first husband in the 1790s. She called Anna her "sister-daughter." When Anna married Richard Cutts, a congressman from Maine, and moved out of the Madison household Mrs. Madison grieved. Anna lived from 1779 to 1832; her husband from 1771 to 1845.

From Dolley Payne Madison to Anna Cutts, 25 May 1804.  Property of Mr. and Mrs. George B. Cutts, Brookline, MA, (1982).

By the end of May, 1804, Mrs. Madison was back in the thick of Washington society, full of life, with a busy social schedule, and yet always with time to concern herself with family affairs, such as the health of her niece, Dolley Washington, daughter of her sister Lucy. As wife of the secretary of state and frequent official hostess for the president in a very raw and small city, her society included the wives of foreign ministers, including the French Pichons, and the British Merrys.

From Dolley Payne Madison to Anna Cutts, 19 August 1805.  Special Collections Department, University of Virginia Library.

DPM is in Philadelphia recovering from an operation on her knee. She writes to her sister about the state of her health and her emotions at being back in Philadelphia, the city of her youth, after being away for eight years.

To Dolley Payne Madison from John G. Jackson, 23 October, 1809.  Special Collections Department, University of Virginia Library.

Mrs. Madison's sister Mary had married John G. Jackson (1777-1825), a congressman from western Virginia in 1800. Mary died in 1808. Even after Mary Payne Jackson's death, however, Mrs. Madison remained close to her former brother-in-law. In 1809 a Federalist congressman from North Carolina, Joseph Pearson, challenged Jackson to a duel. Jackson's worries creep into this letter when he asks Dolley not to "distress yourself on my account". The two men did fight that December. Jackson was wounded in the hip, but after great pain and serious infection he recovered the following spring.

From Dolley Payne Madison to Anna Cutts, 20 March 1812.  Property of Mr. and Mrs. George B. Cutts, Brookline, MA, (1982).

Lucy Payne Washington had eloped with George Steptoe Washington, nephew of George Washington, when she was only 15 years old. In 1809 Washington died, and Lucy, a widow, became a popular belle in the nation's capital while she lived with the Madisons in the White House. In 1812 she remarried, to Judge Thomas Todd of Kentucky; it was the first wedding to be held at the White House. For Mrs. Madison this meant, however, that another of her sisters would move far away. The letter mentions another family issue: the dissipated lifestyle of her surviving brother, John Payne. And Mrs. Madison tells Anna about living in the middle of intense political partisanship just months before President Madison would finally declare war against Great Britain.

To Dolley Payne Madison from Nelly C. Willis, 24 June 1812.  Special Collections Department, University of Virginia Library.

This is a letter from James Madison's favorite niece, in which the writer tells DPM about her, Nelly's, health, the weather in Orange, VA, family and local gossip, and what she needs to card and spin wool.

To Dolley Payne Madison from Clara Baldwin, 16 February 1813.  Special Collections Department, University of Virginia Library.

The writer is the sister of the wife of Joel Barlow, a famous contemporary writer and President Madison's Minister to France after 1811. In this letter Baldwin tells DPM about Joel Barlow's death and the internal conflicts within the Ministry in Barlow's absence.

From Dolley Payne Madison to Anna Cutts, 23 August 1814.  Library of Congress.

The British troops were approaching the city of Washington as Mrs. Madison remained in the White House protecting papers and valuables in this most famous of all of Mrs. Madison's letters. Written over two days, it describes the approach and arrival of the British.

To Dolley Payne Madison from Hannah Gallatin, 26 December 1814.  Special Collections Department, University of Virginia Library.

Hannah Gallatin was an old friend of DPM's and the wife of Albert Gallatin, whom JM had nominated in 1813 as a peace commissioner to negotiate a peace treaty to end the War of 1812. HG asks DPM for any information she might have on how long AG will remain in Europe.

To Dolley Payne Madison from George Boyd, 2 Spetember 1816.  Special Collections Department, University of Virginia Library.

In the wake of the burning of the White House in August, 1814, DPM concerned herself with the cost of repairs to the White House and the purchase of new furniture.