No Southern Belles on Old N.C. Plantations
K E N A N S V I L L E, N.C., Oct. 27, 2003 -- North Carolina's plantation homes are agood illustration of what provoked an old joke that the state is avalley of humility between two mountains of conceit.
In Colonial and antebellum days, when North Carolina wassuspended between the wealth of Virginia and South Carolina, therewas plenty for the state to be humble about. To the north andsouth, good land, nimble marketing and deep-water ports helpedcreate a wealthy landed aristocracy — and showcase mansions tomatch.
North Carolina's step-behind status was reflected in itsplantations — a far cry from the stately mansions on Virginia'sJames River or the Ashley River outside Charleston, S.C.
Liberty Hall, an 1833 two-story white clapboard house a stone'sthrow from the Duplin County courthouse on Highway 24, is a typicalexample. The ancestral home of the Kenan family, who helped foundthe University of North Carolina in the 1790s, is shaded under acanopy of live oak trees and squeezed between newer homes on oneside and city tennis courts on the other.
Nice Place, For Its Day
Liberty Hall's owners were well-to-do, but far fromaristocratic.
"It was nice for its day but it was not tremendous," saidThomas S. Kenan of Chapel Hill, an eighth-generation descendant ofthe original settler.
Kenans — of Scottish and Irish ancestry — first came to thestate in 1760. A son of those first arrivals served as a general inthe American Revolution. At the family's peak, Kenans controlledalmost 7,500 acres about 12 miles south of Kenansville on thenortheast Cape Fear River.
Income came not from vast cotton fields but from sales oftimber, pitch tar and turpentine. According to Thomas Kenan, thefamily had 20 to 50 slaves, and often worked alongside them.
The family home opened as a museum in 1968, three years afterthe Kenans gave ownership to the county and set up a fund formaintenance costs.
The home gives a glimpse of the family's lifestyle in the 1850s,two decades before the timber and turpentine business would reachits peak. There are Chippendale chairs, Indian rugs and crystalchandeliers in the formal spaces. Plastic cabbages, pies and cakeswait in a period kitchen out back for someone to carry them througha covered gangway to the main house. Rows of 12 white clapboardoutbuildings topped by shake roofs include the slave overseer'soffice, furnished with a secretary desk and a bench in front of thefireplace. Raised gravel walks surround clusters of lantana shrubs.
"It would be considered a planter's home. It's not somethingthat would have staggered the large planters in the South if they'dhave come to visit," said Peter Coclanis, chairman of the historydepartment at UNC-Chapel Hill. "There were fewer of the grandplantations in North Carolina than either the Virginia or SouthCarolina lowcountry and Deep South."
Distorted View of Pre-Civil War
Coclanis said the stereotypical image of the grand antebellumplantation home distorts the realities of the pre-Civil War period.
In 1860, on the eve of the Civil War, about three-quarters ofthe South's white families held no slaves, and those who didcommonly worked next to them in the fields, Coclanis said. Threepercent of white families in 1860 had 20 or more slaves, suggestinga large operation in which the forced labor performed highlyspecialized jobs, he said.
"The large plantations were definitely a minority everywhere inthe South," he said. "This is the really, really wealthy peoplein society. Sort of like the people today who live in hugemansions."
Perhaps the state's largest plantation, Durham County'sStagville, is also one of its best preserved. Though much reducedin scale from 1860, when some 900 slaves worked almost 30,000acres, the site is now a state historic landmark.
The plantation was assembled in the late 18th century by RichardBennehan, a merchant who moved to the area from Virginia and raisedtobacco, grain and livestock on the estate. Bennehan and his wife built a Georgian house in 1787 and addedon to it in 1799.
A massive mule stable built at Stagville in 1860 providesmonumental evidence of the estate's prosperity and thecraftsmanship of its slave laborers. Carpenters assembled timbersinto an attractive barn spanning 132 feet by 33 feet that is oftenthe focal point for photographs.
By the eve of the Civil War, the plantation was controlled bythe Bennehans' grandson, Paul Cameron, who would serve as presidentof the North Carolina Railroad, a state senator, and trustee of theUniversity of North Carolina.
The post-Civil War period brought changes, both for theplantation system and North Carolina's fortunes. The huge estateswere divided and sold to tenant farmers, many of whom turned totobacco. That crop fetched a high price and for decades allowedthem to make a decent living on little land — and helped fuelincreased wealth in North Carolina.
If You Go…
STAGVILLE: 5825 Old Oxford Highway, Durham; (919) 620-0120,Open Tuesday through Saturday, 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Free admission. LIBERTY HALL: 409 South Main St., Kenansville; (910) 296-2175, Open Tuesday through Saturday, 10 a.m. to 4 p.m., Sunday, 2 p.m. to 4p.m. Admission: $5 adults, $2.50 children. GENERAL INFORMATION: Visit www.ncdcr.gov/historic-sites.htm orcall (919) 733-7862 for information on other state-run historicsites. For accommodations or other information, call 1-800-VISITNCor visit www.visitnc.com.