George Washington's Dentures: Teeth from Enslaved People?

“George Washington's Dentures: Teeth From Enslaved People?” is an 8x.11 photo on fine art paper. The background is taken from a 1784 Mount Vernon ledger noting payments of cash for 9 teeth of unidentified "Negroes." The teeth are a photo of one of the surviving sets of our first President’s dentures. 

The Mount Vernon transaction is unclear whether the teeth from the enslaved people were for Washington himself, or whether his dentist wanted the teeth for other patients What is certain is that George Washington’s dentures were not wooden, as is the common belief.  “They were made from a variety of materials, including human teeth,” according to Kathryn Gehred, a research specialist with “The Washington Papers” at the University of Virginia. 

It was not uncommon in the 18th century for rich people to pay for teeth to be pulled from poor men, women and children. Enslaved people, needless to say, had little control over how their bodies were treated. 

Gehred’s argues that without further documentation, it is impossible to state with certainty that Washington’s dentures include teeth from enslaved people. But, she continues, as a slaveholder, Washington followed “the standards of his time. He condoned and even encouraged violence as a way to keep enslaved people subservient.” And, as the Mount Vernon ledger notes, he did sell teeth from 9 unidentified enslaved people to his dentist.

 

Other historians are less unequivocable in their interpretations. Henry Wiencek, in his 2003 book “An Imperfect God: George Washington,” writes: “It has long been known to specialists that some of Washington’s false teeth came from the mouths of his slaves, but this inherently invidious tidbit of fact has not been widely circulated…because it is impossible to rationalize it completely. Better not to know.”