New DNA analysis of hair strands linked to Thomas Jefferson has provided fresh genetic evidence confirming a centuries-old question: that he fathered children with Sally Hemings, an enslaved woman at his estate Monticello. The findings, detailed in anthropologist Richard Kurin's forthcoming book "History by a Hair," reinforce conclusions that historians had reached decades ago, though the new evidence decisively rules out alternative theories that Jefferson's brother Randolph could have been the father.

The genetic analysis found odds less than one in 1,000 that Jefferson did not father Hemings' sons Madison and Eston. Whilst a 1998 DNA study had already largely settled the question for most historians, the new evidence addresses lingering scepticism and alternative explanations. Historian Leigh Fought emphasised that this should definitively close the historical case, noting that no other historical event has required such extensive evidence to confirm its occurrence. The findings also redirect focus towards Hemings herself—a figure with few surviving records—and her efforts to secure a better future for her children despite her powerlessness as an enslaved person.