Lansdowne Plantation |
| The Great Great Granddaughter descendants of the original occupant greet visitors to the house still in the family and shows hospitality and a peek into the past in each room and some of the stories from within. |
All told, there must me at least a score of fabulously furnished antebellum mansions scattered around Natchez, Mississippi. In fact their antebellum mansions are a big industry in town. For Natchez, March through April is "Spring Pilgrimage" - when the home are open to the touring public on rotating days and weekends. Tickets (at $15-$20 a head) can be purchased inside the well done Natchez Visitor's Center for home tours, 3 for the price of 2 even. We all quickly reached a consensus that if you've seen one (maybe two) set(s) of four-posted beds, imported Persian carpets, French draperies via steam boat from New Orleans and sideboards of silver cutlery ad nauseum, and the 'dependencies' (less euphemistically called 'slaves quarters') - you've seen them all. But what the hey, looking over our options while in Natchez, we sprung for tickets to tour 'Lansdowne'; one of its great appeals was that it was still in the family of the original builders. Like so many of these mansion and plantation homes, when rich-planter Daddy married off one of his daughters at 17 or 18, she was given a newly build house and 800 or so acres so that she and her new husband could properly entertain in the planter society - until the damn Yankees came and put an end to all of the great formal fun and soirees.
At Lansdowne we were met by several sisters, descendants of Great Great Grandmother who guided us through the rooms and times of the mid-1860's. Portraits of the modern family dressed in Confederate uniforms (dashing cavalry officers) and hoop-skirted ladies. The table was set with so much silver and flatware that when I asked about the utility of one peculiar serving piece, I was told that no one really knew what that piece might have been used for in its day. No wonder the planter class did not want to give up the institution of slavery - who was going to wash all of those dishes and polish all of that silver?
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| The family silver now on display. Hidden before the arrival of the Yankees and saved from looting in all certainty, |
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| A splendid table |
Dunleith Mansion
With our particular B&B comes a free tour of the Dunleigh Estate, so after breakfast in the carriage house converted into a fine dining hall, we grabbed a morning tour. The estate was build by a Philadelphia banker who came to Natchez to court the business of wealthy cotton growers, but he ended up courting a widow with six children. The banker and his planter-class wife had 9 more children to add to the 3-story Dunleith Mansion. |
| Dunleith Mansion Mic Jagger has rented and hosted a party here. |
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| Imported French wallpaper in the dining room |
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| We set a spell on the lawn beside the greenhouse |
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| Late march - In time to catch the tail end of the azalea blooms |
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