WHEN THE BODY of Rep. John Randolph of Virginia was exhumed, they discovered that the roots of a nearby pine tree had pierced his coffin, threaded themselves through his long flowing hair, penetrated his eye sockets and, feeding off his brain, had filled his skull with their white, spidery tendrils. It was a macabre but appropriately sensational discovery for a body that had been the topic of so much gossip and speculation while the man was alive. Known as John Randolph of Roanoke (appending the name of one of his estates in order to distinguish himself from other relatives of the same name), Randolph was a member of Congress and a fixture in the nation’s capital during the Jefferson and Madison administrations. Randolph was born in 1773 on a plantation named Matoax and later inherited Roanoke, but he spent most of his youth and a good part of his manhood on a third family plantation, aptly named Bizarre, in a family that can best be described as Southern Gothic. Young Jack was a sensitive and high-strung child. When thwarted, he would work himself into tantrums so violent they caused him to pass out. His father died when he was only two, but he enjoyed an idyllic childhood of comfort and privilege under the care of a doting mother—until she remarried and his stepfather felt compelled to beat the sissy out of the effeminate boy. The first corporal punishment Randolph ever received was inflicted “as soon as the festivities of the wedding had ceased,” he later wrote, and ushered in a regime of “most intolerable tyranny.” Harsh discipline left Randolph with a burning resentment against tyranny of all kinds, but also with a craving for strong masculine authority figures he could emulate, a complex desire that later erupted ESSAY Genderfluid Master of the Bizarre WILLIAMBENEMANN William Benemann is the author of Unruly Desires: American Sailors and Homosexualities in the Age of Sail and Men in Eden: William Drummond Stewart and Same-Sex Desire in the Rocky Mountain Fur Trade. in unexpected ways. When in Congress arguing against the establishment of a national bank, Randolph rejected the imposition of “a master with a quill behind his ear”—a mere bookkeeper or accountant who might direct the nation’s fate. “If I must have a master,” he proclaimed, “let him be one with epaulettes, something that I could fear and respect, something I could look up to.” Later in life, when Andrew Jackson had replaced Thomas Jefferson as his great idol, in an uncharacteristically fawning letter Randolph cast Jackson as Alexander the Great and himself as his lover Hephaestion, though he added: “I trust that I am something better than his minion (the nature of their connection, if I forget it not, was Greek love).” Randolph was first elected to the House in 1798, and because of his sharp intellect and unsurpassed oratorical skills he was immediately assigned the powerful position of chairman of the Ways and Means Committee, serving also as majority whip, and eventually as majority leader. Still, his androgynous appearance bewildered his contemporaries. “His whole organization was delicate as a woman’s; nay more delicate,” one observed. “His long straight hair,” another wrote, “is parted on the top and a portion hangs down on each side, while the rest is carelessly tied up behind and flows down his back. His voice is shrill and effeminate and occasionally broken by low tones which you hear from dwarfs or deformed people.” Another was pointedly dismissive: “As to Mr. John Randolph you can scarcely form an idea of a human figure whose appearance is more contemptible... one would suppose him to be either by nature, or manual operation fixed for an Italian singer, indeed there are strong suspicions of a physical disability.” At times Randolph was described almost as one of the walking dead. His lips were “the color of indigo” and his complexion was frequently compared to parchment, “destitute of any beard, and as smooth as a woman’s.” One observer described his skin as “precisely that of a mummy; withered, saffron, dry, and bloodless.” Contemporaries were also unsettled by Randolph’s mesmerizing eyes. His pupils were usually dilated into huge black 10 The G&LR John Randolph of Roanoke on his embarkation for Russia onboard ship Concord.
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