The baby was barely five months old when the family moved to New York City, and there the child grew up. Soon after, another daughter was born to the Burrs, but she died in a few years and little is known about her. Early in little Theo’s life she exhibited a marked devotion to her father. At the age of four years Mrs. Burr was reporting, “Our sweet prattler exclaims at every noise, ‘There’s dear papa’ and runs to meet him.” It was said that her attachment for her father was not of a common nature and that when he was away she could not hear him spoken of without an apparent melancholy.
Such accounts sound suspiciously like an effort on Mrs. Burr’s part to flatter the Colonel into forgiving her for having presented him with two daughters and no sons. They might be dismissed as such had not their truth been clearly demonstrated by later events. By this time the once delicate baby had grown into a plump, gay little girl with rosy cheeks and a winning smile.
Little Theo’s upbringing became almost immediately the special care of the Colonel. The way he went about it suggests that subconsciously at least he was trying to make amends for her not being a boy. Wherever business might take him and however occupied he might be with his law practice and politics and other personal matters, his thoughts were never far away from his daughter and her training.
Burr was years ahead of his time in his acceptance of revolutionary theories on the education of women. Someone had put in his hands a book by the pioneer feminist Mary Woolstonecraft entitled Vindication of the Rights of Women. He had been greatly impressed by it. Writing to his wife he said: “I had heard it spoken of with a coldness little calculated to excite attention; but as I read with avidity and prepossession everything written by a lady, I made haste to procure it, and spent last night, almost the whole of it, in reading it. Be assured that your sex has in her an able advocate. It is, in my opinion, a work of genius.”
The burden of Miss Woolstonecraft’s argument was that women are as capable of receiving an education as are men, if not more so. Burr embraced the theory; or else he was determined to test it. Forthwith he proceeded to put it into practice in the education of his own daughter. To his wife he remarked: “But I yet hope, by her, to convince the world what neither sex appears to believe, that women have souls.” So obsessed was he with this idea that he later confided to his wife: “If I could foresee that Theo would become a mere fashionable woman with all the attendant frivolity and vacuity of mind, adorned with whatever grace or allurement, I would earnestly pray God to take her forthwith hence.” Strange sentiments coming from a man who in his usual contacts with women was reputed to be attracted chiefly by their physical attributes.
In his determination to give his daughter the same education he would have given a son the Colonel spared no expense in employing tutors. At this period, with a flourishing law practice, he was probably better off financially than at any time in his life. Two or more hours both in the afternoon and evening were reserved for the child’s instruction. And Theo proved an excellent student, thriving under what surely would have broken down the health of an ordinary child. By the age of ten years she was reading Horace, Terence, and Lucian and preparing to begin Homer and Vergil. Exercises in Greek grammar shared a place with the study of Gibbon. Her curriculum included as well philosophy and political economy, French and German.
The Colonel’s solicitude did not confine itself to Theo’s mind. It extended to her deportment, speech, expression, and dress as well. Nor was her musical education neglected. Under competent instruction she mastered the two popular instruments of the day—the pianoforte and the harp. Besides all this, in the hours set aside for recreation she was taught to ride, skate, and dance. Not even a princess being prepared to sit some day on a throne could have been subjected to a more well-rounded program of education than that which Colonel Burr bestowed on Theodosia.
Colonel Burr’s prosperity was more apparent than real. Possessed of extravagant tastes and a flair for lavish entertainment, he was condemned forever to live beyond his means. In addition to his house in the city he purchased an estate outside which he named Richmond Hill. It comprised a commodious dwelling house, a stable, a dairy, numerous other appurtenances, and abundant ground.
Theodosia was barely ten years old when her mother, after an illness of several months, died of cancer. Since there was no one else for the Colonel to call on, at that tender age Theodosia assumed the exacting duties of acting as hostess for her father. This was no insignificant task as the Colonel delighted in extending the hospitality of his house to distinguished visitors who were constantly arriving in New York. Theodosia presided at table with dignity and poise and without self-consciousness in the presence of such notables as Talleyrand, Louis Philippe, and Jerome Bonaparte.
It is not surprising that her fame spread throughout the city and beyond it. An English traveler who had the privilege of being received at Richmond Hill noted in his diary that this precocious young lady was “elegant without ostentation, learned without pedantry” and “educated with uncommon care.” He found her speaking French and Italian with facility and “perfectly conversant with the writers of the Augustan Age.”