Interpreting Historic Stagville

Stagville Plantation is a North Carolina historical site that was once the home to the Bennehan-Cameron family. Before even beginning to purchase slaves, the Bennehan’s first came to the area to invest in general stores. What started off as a small plantation surrounding their home grew to become about fifty square miles in size and was the home of thousands of slaves. The hilltop that their home sat on became a center of a bustling plantation complex separated into many separate quarters. The house was central and prominent on the landscape because it served as a surveillance area, and reminded the enslaved that every move they made would be seen and monitored. Surrounding the Bennehan home was small one-room log cabins which were home to multiple families of enslaved people at a time. When the Bennehan and Cameron families married together, they began a business deal regarding the plantation, which grew so large it was split into many quarters, with Stagville Quarter being the main location where the family home sits. 

On our visit to Stagville Plantation, the weather was cool and comfortable, though the rainy weather did mean the ground was a bit wet. Immediately when we arrived and were greeted by Vera. I was impressed by her extensive knowledge of every aspect of the property. While I was unsure if she would put up a facade of the truth, on the contrary, she was very honest about the history of the Bennehan-Cameron family. She informed us of the thousands of enslaved people that lived on the property and of some of the actions they took to resist against their enslavement. Rather than just telling general information about the slaves on the plantation as a whole, she told personal, first-hand stories about real people and their lives. In some aspects, the property is still very reminiscent of the people who lived and worked there. For example, some of the homes that enslaved families lived in are still present at Horton Grove, though they are much larger than the average homes of slaves during the time.

I feel that Clint Smith and Dorothy Redford would be appreciative of the work that Vera and her colleagues are doing at Stagville, where they strive to tell the truth of the enslaved people who lived on the plantation. Despite these successes, the plantation no longer really evokes the feeling that it would have during the time when people were enslaved there. While the houses still stand, and the inside is set up to replicate the past, the environment and landscape outside the door is very much changed. The ground is covered in regular grass instead of crops and fields, and tall trees line the property, which is not indicative of how the property woud have looked at the time. While the plantation and the historians work to accurately portray the history of the plantation and the stories of the enslaved who lived there, on a physical level, the landscape does not accurately represent what it was like. The atmosphere did not feel like a plantation; it felt almost like a park or any other outdoor space. I believe a change that could be made to the plantation to improve the message they send to visitors would be to modify the landscape in a way that better parallels the past. They could do this by adding crops that would have been growing on the plantation and getting rid of the trees that surround the plantation currently. During the times the enslaved people lived and worked on the plantation, tall trees were not growing there as the slave owners wanted to have clear lines of sight to all places in order to keep an eye on the workers. I also think that while there are some large slave homes still on the property, this could skew visitors' perceptions on the lifestyle of slaves on the property as these houses are much larger than average. A way to resolve this misconception could be possibly building imitation homes to more accurately represent what the plantation was like during the time period. While I do believe that Redford and Smith would appreciate the efforts that Stagville is making to paint an accurate picture of how slaves were treated during this time, there are ways Stagville could be modified to stay more true to history. It is important to accurately portray history because, despite the fact that slavery is a difficult subject to confront, it is necessary to keep society informed to prevent history from repeating itself. 

While I do believe that Dorothy Redford and Clint Smith would appreciate the efforts that Stagville is making to paint an accurate picture of how slaves were treated during this time, there are ways Stagville could be modified to stay more true to history. It is important to accurately portray history because, despite the fact that slavery is a difficult subject to confront, it is necessary to keep society informed to prevent history from repeating itself, as well as make people aware so they can be educated and make amends for the future.