Oak Alley Plantation, Louisiana

The Oak Alley Plantation

I’m showing the outside pictures only since we couldn’t take pictures inside. It was somewhat Grander than the Poche House. What struck me with both was that they had many rooms with different functions. Music, reading, parlor, children’s playroom, cigar room, sitting room, etc. The  bedrooms weren’t as large as I expected, but the furniture was beautiful. 

The original owners entertained often, the dining room was large and equipped with a large wooden fan that was secured above the table and had a rope that was attached, that a slave; generally a child, would pull to move it back and forth while the family and their guests were eating. I have never seen something like this, it was large and shaped like a shutter. It would have been covered with decorative material back then as to not distract from the elegant nature of the dining table, and apparently it worked quite well. Since Louisiana is hot and humid, they would generally try to position the houses next to rivers to get the cool breeze. 

Many Slaves worked in the house which was thought to be a better position. The head maid wore a nicer dress than any other slaves on the plantation, and was expected to have it clean, at all times. Mainly because she was the one most seen by guests, mostly at dinner where the owners wanted to make a good impression. They had dresses on display for both the head maid and the lady of the house. I found everything about the dining area interesting. The china, silverware, table, fan and the dresses, all in an enormous space.The table was large but definitely didn’t overtake the space of the room.

 The history of the home and the owners was interesting but owning people and the treatment of the slaves is just unconscionable to me. Furthermore, they could treat slaves anyway they chose to, and sell them off with or without their families. Oddly enough (or maybe not), most of the building and woodworking detail on the plantation homes was usually done by the slaves. They built beautiful, grand homes and then got to build shacks for themselves with the minimal material given to them. Seeing a plantation up close was different than reading about it —being here was surreal.

                          Slave Quarters 

We viewed two rows of shacks that slaves had lived in. Usually, multiple families shared the homes. I noticed all the doors could be locked from the outside and the windows had wooden covers that were set up with latches that could be locked from the outside too. The slaves worked up to 18 hours a day, every day. They also had to take care of all the animals on the plantation before and after working in the sugar cane fields. Working in the fields must have been grueling work, the tools used to cut the sugar cane looked very dangerous, and the humid conditions must have been miserable to work in. 

 

The Slaves were considered part of the estate, thus they had to have a value attached to them. I was shocked when I read this, I definitely never saw this in any history books. Sad and really disturbing. 

                  Enlarge the picture to view better. 

The cooking pots were outside hung over firewood. The washing bin below was close by the cooking pots and huge. They used it to wash the clothes for the entire plantation. They would use lye to clean the clothes which would burn their skin. They also had one shack dedicated as a medical facility ran by one slave. 

If a slave was seriously injured, they were at the mercy of a doctor that was called, only if the slave running the facility couldn’t repair the injured person. Sometimes a broken arm would be amputated rather than set to heal. They had opium for pain which was also addictive. It was used for most everything. I can’t imagine the pain suffered in this facility. Enlarge to see better. 

 

            

                  Enlarge to read, very interesting. 

 
This is only a portion of the wall that we viewed. The name of every slave that ever worked on this Plantation has been added to the wall. Since there was a glare, I could show only a portion. There were over three hundred names. Since detailed records were kept since slaved were part of the value of their estate, they had all of the names of every slave that was ever on this plantation.