United Daughters of the Confederacy

Hello everyone,
Sorry for the vacation but I am back. Been busy with Bivens Photography. This time with a personal story that really touched me in a crazy way.

Jenny-Sue and I want to the Gamble Plantation (the last plantation standing in Florida) The thoughts that race in your mind when you know the place you are at was a sugar cane plantation with 200 slaves to maintain it. In the first photo you see the iron they used to keep their masters looking good in the hot heat of Florida, they put hot embers into the hole and that was how they did it, also they made the soap, candles, and everything else to maintain and run the house

The second photo is of the water storage unit they collected the rain water in. They placed a huge piece of limestone in the center, when the water passed through the lime stone it was good to drink (a filter system). I looked in the system and the water was still very dirty (on the clean side).

The third photo is a list of slaves for their records. The slave quarters are gone and I can only think the daughters did not see a need to save that house. The walls in this place were 2 feet thick and we were so hot it was crazy. At that time there was no ice this far south and the bugs were out of this world. The slaves use to take the beds out everyday to beat the hay/feathers/or Spanish moss so that the bed bugs wouldn't be harsh on their masters. This was a 2-3 hour process everyday.

The last photo is of the house. There were no outside stairs so that the Indians could not sneak up on them and there were rope ladders to the bed rooms so that if they were invaded they can run upstairs and pull the rope so that the Indians could not get them. All the beds had bug nets because the bugs at the time can kill you (malaria). Three man lived in the house, a father and two sons. The slave house was a big open room with a door and a window (no nets, no privacy). I can only guess how that must have been. I was about to die in the big house because of the heat--so the slave quarters must have been crazy.

The part that gets to me is that I went to a place where my people must have been in hell on earth with 3 men. I know the ladies had kids by these guys and their own stories to tell but there is no record of that here.

The United Daughters of the Confederacy pereserved and currently maintain the house (built in 1895).