Belmont Mansion: A 19th Century Country Estate

Life here depended upon the forced labor of enslaved Black men, women and children, plus paid European immigrants. Where known, the people who labored in various roles are listed by name; where their names are unknown descriptions of their roles are included. As you tour the grounds, try to visualize the many people who built and maintained this site. 

The Rose Garden

The original rose garden, roughly four times the size of the one you see today, was located just north of the greenhouse. William Acklen, second son of the family, recalled "a mass of roses of all colors and varieties in an intricacy of walks." The gardens at Belmont produced a wide array of show-worthy plants, particularly when Adelicia was married to Dr. Cheatham.

The Enslaved People's Quarters

In 1850, as construction of Belmont began there were homes for 13 men, women and children enslaved by the Acklens at this location. These enslaved people moved onto the land to clear it for building the mansion and constructing a carriage drive, delivery drive and gardens. Between 1850 and 1860 those initial 13 were joined by 19 others. Together they were instrumental in landscaping this 177-acre property and maintaining its many structures. 

None of these houses survived into the 20th century. It is believed they were modeled after the houses pictured here which served as homes for the enslaved people of Fairview – the Gallatin, Tennessee, home Adelicia Acklen shared with her first husband Isaac Franklin. Prior to Adelicia’s marriage to Isaac he was the nation’s largest domestic slave trader from 1828 to 1830. The wealth she inherited upon his death helped build Belmont. 

Freedom Fountain

Belmont University’s Freedom Fountain stands today where the homes of the enslaved people of Belmont once were. The buildings were home to Brutus Jackson, Frances Jackson, Aggie, Fred, Ben Gant, George, Rena Gibbs, Julia Ann, Mortimer, Randolph, Rose, Salley, Manuela and her two children, Betsy and her children: Alexander, Amanda, Harriet, Ivey, James, and Joseph; and Maria and her children: Ezekiel or Zeke, Mary Ann, and William.

These inscriptions stand as a testament to the work and humanity of those named. Also included here are: John Baker, Betsy or Bettie Baker, Ruffin, Georgina, Eva Snowden Baker, and London who were not enslaved at Belmont but are documented as being enslaved to the Acklen family on other properties. This memorial exists to commemorate and honor all their lives. 

Here those men and women, whose forced labor brought the larger estate to life, created homes for themselves. Here they formed relationships, birthed and raised children, and cared for their loved ones. At least two, George and Randolph, later sought freedom during the Civil War by leaving the estate to serve as contraband laborers for the Union Army. 

The Carriage House and Stables

The driver, carriage and horses sketched in this Belmont estate painting were commonly seen on these grounds. Enslaved drivers (called coachmen) like William maintained the carriages and trained the enslaved stable hands. The Acklens had at least two carriages – one for Joseph’s business travels and one for Adelicia’s social calls. All of this activity was managed by a paid, white overseer who supervised nearly every aspect of the site including the laborers, both enslaved and free immigrants.

Enslaved coachmen were typically accompanied by teenage footmen who rode on the back end of the carriage. Their job was to assist people entering and exiting the carriage and loading and unloading the luggage. After the Civil War, Emancipation and the dissolution of slavery, Adelicia Acklen brought a hired French footman with her when she returned from a Grand Tour of Europe. Charles Luizard served as her footman and later her driver.

The Service Entrance

On the east side of the estate ran a service drive for deliveries which arrived on heavy wagons pulled by mules or draft horses. A separate service drive was necessary as the heavy wagons would rut the oyster shell lined carriage drive. Delivery wagons followed this drive to the east side of the house where the kitchens and other service areas were located. After the estate was sold and became a female college (1890), this became the east campus entrance.

The Marble Fountain

The white Italian marble fountain in front of the mansion dates to 1857. It is thought to be the oldest operational fountain in its original location in the American South. Gravity fed water from the water tower (stop 17) which stands at the opposite end of this path supplied this and two other fountains with water.

Ensuring the fountain had flowing water was just one of the responsibilities of the gardeners, like Scotsman Owen Sharkey. Sharkey had been a gardener at the Tennessee Hospital for the Insane, where Dr. Cheatham (Adelcia Acklen’s third husband) was Superintendent. His first position at Belmont was as an assistant gardener before becoming head gardener. Sharkey would have had a labor force to assist him. Prior to the Civil War, those assistants were primarily enslaved men (and boys). After the Civil War and Emancipation, the gardener’s assistants were hired laborers like Swiss-born Elias Winker. 

Central Gazebo

Cast iron ornaments and structures were frequently used to decorate 19th century gardens. This 1853 gazebo made of both cast and wrought iron was advertised in widely distributed catalogs by the Janes, Beebe & Company of New York (which later became the Janes, Kirtland & Co). As seen in this image, flowers grew up through the cast iron frame of the gazebo, covering the structure. In the middle of the gazebo stood a large cast-iron outdoor aquarium filled with gold and silver fish. Four other smaller gazebos also stood on the property; the pair in front of the house remain in their original location. 

Original Rose Garden

This is the location of the original rose garden. Such a large collection of roses required much time and attention of the gardeners, like French immigrant Leon Geny. After Geny left the Belmont Estate, he and his brother John established floral and greenhouse businesses in Nashville. Over 150 years later, Geny’s Flowers is still a thriving Nashville floral business. Today the campus rose garden is a quarter the size of the historic rose garden and stands just to the east of the mansion.

The Grounds

Maintaining the garden’s neat appearance was a labor-intensive job. To prevent the lawn surrounding the garden beds from becoming overgrown, sheep were used to graze the grass. An older enslaved male child would be responsible for herding and managing the sheep with the aid of a sheepdog. Raking was another frequent job as the walkways between the lawn and garden beds were made from crushed oyster shells which required clearing and leveling. 

The Greenhouse

The May 1868 publication of The Gardener’s Monthly, a national publication, included an article on the Belmont gardens and described the ca. 1853-57 greenhouse as “built of iron, [was] truly a Crystal Palace, with its high dome and spacious wings.” The greenhouse had three different sections, with the center section being a two-story conservatory. Each section of the greenhouse contained flowers of different climates, with one serving as a grapery. The greenhouse sheltered rare plants like banana trees and the night-blooming cereus which were novelties the family shared with friends. Other documented plants include, “One Norfolk Island Pine, standing over thirty feet high and a collection of Camellias.”

Such a variety of exotic plants required particular attention from skilled gardeners. Henry Gray served in this capacity and was a member of the Tennessee Horticultural Society (as was Dr. Cheatham, Adelcia’s third husband). Gray had to possess a vast knowledge of the proper care of a variety of plants. He would have known the correct temperature and climate for each section of life in the greenhouse. A furnace under the greenhouse regulated interior temperatures. The heat from the furnace would rise through the vents in the floor providing climate control. 

The Water Tower

A 105-foot water tower, completed in 1857 and now utilized as the campus bell tower, provided water to irrigate the gardens and supply the fountain. This unusual engineering feature utilized coal to power the steam engine which pumped water to the top of the tower. Gravity then pulled the water into the gardens and supplied the pressure needed for the fountains.

As with other structures on the estate, enslaved manpower was required to keep it functioning. The steam pump was replaced by a windmill after the Civil War when the enslaved black men, who had once hauled the coal to the steam engine room, were emancipated. This change was one of many made when the estate transitioned from enslaved to paid workers.

The Gardener's Cottage

Head gardeners, under contract to the Acklen family, were white immigrants from England, France, Germany, Ireland, Scotland, and Switzerland. The gardener’s cottage was a four-room brick building for the gardener and his family and stood just southeast of the greenhouse and water tower. 

In 1860, Leon Geny served as gardener of the Belmont Estate. Born in France, he did not speak English and was assisted by a man named Robert Kunz, from Germany. When the Union soldiers occupied the estate in 1864 William C. Rock (believed to have been English) occupied the head gardener position. In 1867, Englishman Henry Gray served in that capacity. When Henry left, Scotsman Owen Sharkey assumed the role, followed by Swiss-born Elias Winker in 1870, then Michael Mullins from Ireland and Valentine Fisher from Germany in 1880.

The Menagerie

Prior to the Civil War, the Acklen family kept a collection of exotic animals from around the world. Set amongst park-like gardens, this menagerie effectively served as Nashville's first zoo. The collection included a monkey, alligators from Louisiana, a bear, and an aviary of birds. The grounds and menagerie were open to the public six days a week but closed on Sundays. Thus, they effectively catered to the upper class since most members of the working class labored every day but Sunday. The care of farm livestock and menagerie animals fell to enslaved men and older children.

There are no surviving pictures of the menagerie today. The above drawing is a sketch of Belmont drawn by Elijah Edwards, a Union chaplain. During the Civil War, soldiers who encountered Belmont wrote in journals and letters. Those documents, along with newspaper articles, described both the house and the grounds.

The Springhouse/Dairy House

A ca. 1853 dairy house at this location stored milk, butter and buttermilk. The building would have looked much like the spring house at Andrew Jackson’s Hermitage in Nashville, Tennessee, which is pictured here. Spring houses and dairy houses were very similarly constructed. The difference was that spring houses were built over the spring whereas dairy houses were built downstream. In a dairy house the water from the spring flowed through stone troughs placed in the dairy.

To stock the dairy enslaved farmhands milked cows at Montvale, a farm adjacent to Belmont which provided food for the estate. Fresh milk was either stored in the dairy house or churned into butter and buttermilk in the kitchen. All dairy goods were kept in the dairy house in large pottery crocks which sat in the stone troughs. The cold spring water cooled those crocks. As a result, kitchen hands made multiple trips to the dairy house each daily.

The Spring

A spring on this site supplied the water tower. However, the Acklens were not the first to utilize this spring as water source. Before the land belonged to the family it was home to an indigenous population. From roughly 900-1600 AD, the people known as Mississippians built towns and villages throughout Tennessee. They established communities close to sources of water for drinking and irrigating crops like the “three sisters”, squash, beans, and corn. By the 1600s, Tennessee was claimed by other indigenous nations such as the Cherokee, Chickasaw, and Choctaw. The Mississippians who survived are believed to have merged with these newer arriving nations.

The Aviary

Originally located just west of the gardener’s cottage, the aviary is the only surviving structure from the menagerie. It was filled with exotic birds, including a white owl sent to Adelicia from Arkansas. Currently the aviary is located on the opposite end of the lawn which sits behind Freedom Fountain.

The Bath House

Nineteenth century bathhouses enclosed plunge pools, narrow and deep pools built for the purpose of lounging, wading, and cooling off. In addition, the plunge pool served medicinal purposes. Joseph Acklen used a pool to alleviate his arthritis symptoms. As a center for relaxation and medicinal treatment, the bathhouse required regular cleaning by either enslaved maids or paid immigrants. The bathhouse no longer stands today; in 2009 an archaeological team surveyed the area and found the pool partially intact.

The Bowling Alley and Billiards Room

The 1867 Bowling Alley (also known as the Ten-Pin Alley) and attached octagonal Billiards Room provided a source of entertainment for family and guests. Around this time, indoor bowling became a more socially acceptable activity for women, though women were still expected to dress formally. Often young Black children (like John Young who lived here with his mother after the Civil War) were paid to retrieve the balls and set up the pins. During the female college era, the school continued to use the bowling alley and turned the Billiards Room into a gymnasium.

The Icehouse

The next three buildings – the ice house, art gallery and gas plant – were located west of the mansion where the Morningside Retirement Community is today. The ice house stored ice during warm months. During the winter, ice was harvested from retaining ponds on the property built for this purpose. The ice was then insulated with sawdust to keep it from melting. Having their own supply of ice on the property meant the Acklens need not purchase it in the city. Small ice boxes were placed inside the house near the kitchen and dining room for the enslaved cook Mortimer to use for meal preparation. 

The Art Gallery

Construction of this building, which housed an art gallery, bowling alley and guest rooms, began in 1857. There were six guest bedrooms on the main floor with rooms for the enslaved people who traveled with those guests on the walk-out basement level below. The art gallery allowed the Acklens to showcase their art collection. Art collecting, particularly of Renaissance art, was a popular 19th century pursuit among the wealthy. Though construction of the building began in 1857, when soldiers passed through the estate during the Civil War they wrote that it remained unfinished. The building was torn down shortly after the war.

The Gas Plant

The Nashville Gas Company was chartered in 1850 as the first gas company in Tennessee and fifth in the South. These large plants provided gas for street lighting and piped gas into homes and businesses to power interior lights. Belmont, as a country estate two miles from the city, was too far from supply lines to receive gas from the company. So, the Acklens installed their own plant in 1857. Since gas plants had a tendency to explode, it was located away from the house. Coal was burned to produce gas which was converted into combustible gases and captured in a cast iron tank. From the tank, the gas ran through an underground pipe system and into the house. Enslaved men brought in coal daily and hauled the cinders away for disposal

After the Civil War

The creation and maintenance of the Belmont Mansion Gardens and Grounds was made possible because of the forced labor of enslaved Black people and the work of paid immigrants. Every job and role was vital. After the Civil War a few of the formerly enslaved people remained as paid staff while most left for opportunities in Nashville and elsewhere. Eventually, Adelicia Acklen sold Belmont to a developer and moved to Washington, D.C. The developer later sold the house and 15 acres to two women who began a college which has evolved into Belmont University.