Plantation Life in South Carolina

Boone Hall - Live Oaks

As part of the research for my latest novel, "Karma Nation," my son Rishi and I traveled across the American South. My previous blogs recorded our explorations of Houston, New Orleans, Atlanta and Charleston. In this blog, I share my impressions of some of the plantations I visited in South Carolina.

We were actually quite surprised at the number of plantations that dotted South Carolina, especially around Charleston. What could be their economic base?

Our visit to a few of them answered our questions. Several plantations have become quite well-known tourist attractions, some remain working plantations, while a few are preserved by non-profit societies, wealthy individuals or as state parks.

Boone Hall was on our list as a must-visit site. USA Today’s #1 plantation, it is dominated by a magnificent colonnaded home form the Antebellum period, situated at the end of a stunning allee of two-hundred-year-old live oaks. The interiors reveal the luxury that country gentlemen of the era lived in. Portraits of the erstwhile inhabitants hung on the walls, expensive furniture filled the rooms and curtains imported from Europe lined the windows. Nine original slave cabins, replete with mementos and displays of the lives of its tenants sit on one side of the mansion. A live theatre show of Gullah culture, a mixture of Creole English and Geechee, practiced by the slaves, is presented during the busy season. It is also a working plantation, well-known for its strawberries and vegetables.

Slave Cabins, Boone Hall

Next, we visited McLeod plantation. The main home, designed in the English Georgian style, it too paid attention to the Lowland slave culture that became prominent in South Carolina. A part of the Charleston County Parks system, it was crowded with school children when we were there. Full of detailed historical notes, along with interpretive tours, it satisfied our curiosity.

Plantations were large communities, villages really, with populations that sometimes reached thousands. Many functions were centralized, such as cooking and clothes-cleaning. The cook-house, attended to by slaves, usually sat behind the main house. So did the wash-house.

Inside the master’s house, a series of rules—a system of apartheid really—allowed white slave-owners and their families to live deeply separated lives, despite being surrounded by a very large number of black slaves. Certain areas of the house, such as the sleeping quarters of the white women, were off-limits to male slaves. Only a select number of slaves were allowed into the main house on a regular basis; most of the field slaves didn’t enter. Slaves had their speech and actions constantly surveilled; only at Church on Sundays were music and speech by slaves allowed. This practice had the effect of eventually pushing Black Churches to the forefront of civil rights movements.

While the plantations today seem idyllic with their flower gardens and sunny weather, it was obviously not pleasant for its inhabitants. While the slaves lived a life of hard work and deprivation, the plantation owners had their issues as well. With constant rumors of slave rebellions and attacks against them, they lived in anxiety. When Spain controlled Florida, escaping American slaves were offered freedom and some joined the Spanish Army to fight against them. In America, the Abolitionist movement became active almost since the birth of the country. Following the Revolutionary War, Northern states abolished slavery, beginning with the 1777 constitution of Vermont, followed by Pennsylvania's gradual emancipation act in 1780. In many ways, it had to be clear to plantation owners that their way of life was not long to last.

Behind the manicured lawns, extensive gardens and brightly painted houses, lay the narratives of a difficult and divisive period in American history. That to me, was the story of our visit to the plantations.

Mohan Ashtakala is the author of "Karma Nation"

Published by Books We Love