The slaves' story: nterpreting nineteenth-century slave history at Shirley Plantation
Date
1995
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Publisher
University of Delaware
Abstract
This thesis seeks to examine the material lives of the slaves at Shirley Plantation, Charles City County, Virginia during the years 1815-1865, when Hill Carter owned the plantation and its slaves. The purpose of the research is to develop an interpretive plan that will incorporate information regarding slave life at Shirley into the current tour given to the plantation's visitors. ☐ In order to best complete this thesis, I am utilizing a variety of resources. Primary documents generated by Hill Carter in the running of the plantation provide the bulk of information, but are supported by Shirley's extant slave landscape and by secondary sources relating to slavery in Tidewater Virginia. The interpretive plan grows out of a study both of interpretation theory and practice, and of programs about slavery run by various museums in Virginia. ☐ The slaves themselves, rather than their owner Hill Carter, are the main focus of both the research and the interpretive plan. The main purpose of secondary sources is to gather information about aspects of slave life that are only partially revealed in Hill's documents. ☐ The current house tour at Shirley can be easily modified to integrate the black populace of the plantation, and will be the basis for the interpretive plan laid out in this thesis. While these house tour modifications will be the focus of my discussion, more ambitious programs of interpretation will be suggested as well. ☐ There is an entire population that has been neglected in both museums and in classrooms for too long, and interpretations of historic sites need to adapt in order to include that population. This thesis will explore the African-American past of Shirley Plantation and will prepare Shirley's guides to answer the questions of an increasingly curious audience.