Day 41. Oak Alley

 The day started beautifully.  I had been encouraged by several friends to make a stop at Cafe du Monde for coffee and beignets, and we did as advised.  All I can say is that powder-sugar dusted beignets are the bomb!  To me, beignets are the perfect French version of Spanish sopaipillas and country fair funnel cake.




After that delightful breakfast, we went to tour Oak Alley Plantation in Vacherie, Louisiana, on the banks of the Mississippi River.  Originally built by a French Creole family, the Romans, the plantation became a sugar cane plantation.  Josephine Stewart, whose husband bought the property in 1925 and brought it back from decay, in the early 1970's left 25 acres, including the big house and the location of the slave houses, to the Oak Alley Foundation with the stipulation that the doors be open to the public.  With this background, I was so impressed by the walking tour and grounds.  The walking tour starts at the slave quarters.  The foundation has rebuilt the slave quarters and developed a powerful, unfiltered depiction of the lives of slaves at the plantation.  The placards described the injuries and disease and long, arduous work hours and insufficient shoes and hard life of the slaves.  The final building moved me to tears with the names of the former slaves written on its wall.  The accompanying plaque read as follows:

Between 1836 and the Civil War, 198 men,

women and children were enslaved at Oak Alley.

Dehumanized and quantified like any other

commodity, they appear in sale records and

inventories, yet as people they have been all but

forgotten to history.

This is a respectful recognition of the people on whose

backs this plantation was built.  For most of them, a

name is all that remains of their story.

From there we entered the plantation owner's home.  It is a 12 room home with large wrap-around porches on the first and second floors, both of which have very high ceilings to accommodate the hot Louisiana weather.  Since there are no basements in this high-water-level area, the home has a third floor attic for storage.  Of course, the house has been modified from the time it was the home of plantation owners, but you still can imagine the life of the owners.  The juxtaposition with the lives of the slaves who toiled on the plantation is stark.