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McLeod Plantation: A Candid History of Slavery and Resilience on James Island

McLeod Plantation: A Candid History of Slavery and Resilience on James Island

Opened to the public in 2015, McLeod Plantation on James Island delivers a candid and profoundly moving account of the lives of enslaved and later emancipated African Americans who lived and worked here from 1851 to 1990. Remarkably, the last African American resident—a nurse who cared for the grandson of the man who enslaved her great-great-grandparents—departed the former slave quarters just decades ago.

This 37-acre historic site features a welcome center, a Georgian-style plantation house, a row of former slave cabins, a cotton gin house, a Gullah Geechee cemetery, and other structures dating back to the early 1800s. Over the centuries, it has housed three generations of the McLeod family, the Confederate Army, the Union Army, and the Bureau of Refugees, Freedmen, and Abandoned Lands.

McLeod Plantation's story encapsulates the American South's complex history, offering an unflinching look at slavery's brutality and enduring legacy. Admission includes highly informative 45-minute guided tours at 9:30 AM, 11:00 AM, 12:00 PM, 1:00 PM, and 2:30 PM.


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