Nation's largest remaining antebellum plantation burns to the ground
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Nottoway Plantation was built in the 1850s for sugar plantation owner John Hampden Randolph. Photo: Courtesy of Pierre Part Volunteer Fire Department
Nottoway Plantation burned to the ground this week after a fire broke out Thursday, authorities say.
Why it matters: The plantation was the largest antebellum mansion remaining in the South, making it an important but complicated connection to the nation's history of enslavement.
The latest: The fire's cause is still under investigation, Fox 8 reports, but the building is "a total loss," says Iberville Parish President Chris Daigle.
Zoom in: The 64-room mansion was built by John Hampden Randolph in the 1850s.
- The home was located on the edge of the Mississippi River in Iberville Parish, south of Baton Rouge. In recent years, it had rebranded as Nottoway Resort and served as an event space, offering tours and dining.
Between the lines: Randolph was already successful in the cotton business when he decided to expand into sugar production with the development of the plantation at Nottoway, according to 64 Parishes.
- His success came on the backs of the enslaved people he owned — 155 of them in 1860, records show.
Public reaction to Nottoway's destruction has been mixed.
- Its "early history is undeniably tied to a time of great injustice, over the last several decades it evolved into a place of reflection, education, and dialogue," Daigle wrote. "The loss of Nottoway is not just a loss for Iberville Parish, but for the entire state of Louisiana. It was a cornerstone of our tourism economy and a site of national significance."
- Lauren Marque Sanders, who said on Facebook that she'd worked at the property for 23 years, called it "beyond sad."
- "I knew this house like the back of my hand. I'm at loss for words," she wrote.
Sharing a video of the building while still aflame, Brad Gordon wrote: "If you don't understand why Black Americans are celebrating the symbolic dismantling of this monument to bondage and generational oppression — well, today, we simply don't care."
